vicious circle

i have never been much of a tourist. i don't care all that much about popular places to go and i have no desire to climb to the top of the statue of liberty. she looks the same from battery park as she does on tv. i don't care much about the empire state building except that to stand on the top of it provides a rooftop view of economic injustice that can only be seen, not described. i never did go into the world trade center, because despite its tragic and horrifying demise, its purpose irritated me and its tourist magnetism was sad to me. but today, as i surfed around the net reading more about my own personal hero, i find myself in deep regret over never having participated in the "dorothy parker's new york" tour. i spent countless hours on most of the streets that are covered in the tour, but i never knew where i was while i was there. i knew that my favorite place to drink and play pool was an original beat hangout, but it never really went further than that. why? i have always felt so strangely connected to places and things through their known history and i have always been so intrigued my the early beat generation and particularly by some of new york's most spectacular women...dorothy parker, zora neale hurston... why didn't i bother to find those places and learn about them and feel the intensity of the historic spaces where so much of what i have some to love and cherish was created and shared. i did go to stonewall like the good little queer that i am and i went to the the tenement museum on orchard street (which when i visited, was under threat of destruction by a greedy landlord who wanted to make more money off of the property by renovating and leasing). so i did a few of the second or third rate tourist attractions. the ones that are more depressing and/or educational than suits your average traveler. the ones that offer a window into new york that has fewer bright lights and a lot less flash. but i forgot to seek out the next tier. the layer of history that includes the people who valued the importance of those stinging elements of reality while they were happening. i should have sat at the algonquin and imagined myself as a 1920's intellectual with short hair and long pants and a smelly cigarette blathering on about whatever is was that pissed me off that day. (that part of me wouldn't have been different no matter my generation). maybe i would even be making eyes at the older woman across the room from me whose hair is even shorter and voice a little deeper. i do love to blog, but honestly, i would take a moleskin journal, a telescopic cigarette holder and a circle of angry friends over almost anything.