Living Two Lives

Times Square / 1976 / Photo by RS

Living Two Lives

Once upon a time, as in the week before last, every cat and kitty longed to come to Raintown to make the scene and see how it all went down. Jazz saxophones playing cool sounds out the backs of bars – taking you places you wanted to go. Most of the new ones fresh off the train, came out of hell holes located smack dab in the middle of Nowheresville. After a few months in town, they either knew what was what and how it all goes down, or they got on the same train back to Nowhere. Later, when they were situated in the city and could freely stroll down brick alleyways, digging themselves, hanging out in underground cellars, rooftop getaways, and secret hideaways, holed-up where they could finally breathe, feel new feelings, think new and expansive thoughts, their eyes opened even wider. One evening, she of the shapely Cleopatra nose, recently clipped black bangs, and double-black lashes, sat next to him in the nude modeling drawing workshop and said sideways, while keeping her peepers on the naked model she was drawing, “You can procure lots of things in Raintown, but eventually it starts taking things back. You dig?” He nodded to her, and drew a swooping line connecting sideways breast to curve of back. One night, her words flashed in his mind, and it seemed as though they’d been written in the darkening clouds. As he glanced up at the drizzle falling on the fire escapes, he wondered if he could still find some of what had gone missing. Keeping his wits intact, he turned left into the downtown alley with a familiar doorway, feeling for the golden ticket in his coat pocket. He wondered why it seemed everybody seemed to be living two, or even three lives, instead of just one. On the other hand, some nights there was so much happening at once, that was a good thing. Two lives in one, he mused, while sensing his mind open and illuminated as he walked up to the bar in the crowded underground speakeasy.