Night City

A few years ago I blogged about my love for the romantic world of late night NYC. Since this is the one of the most exciting and romantic of cities, the allure of nighttime NYC takes on an especially sexy sheen. Nighttime NYC is a place of bright lights and dark streets, of people working to keep the city going while others are out there partying, of friends and lovers coming together, of crime, of craziness, of ... endless possibilities. All of us who were young (or old) in NYC have our special memories of this city at night.

That's why New York magazine now has a whole special section called After Midnight where various notable New Yorkers write about their memories and impressions of New York at night. This electronic "scrapbook" is interspersed with stories about NYC at night back in the 19th and early 20th centuries, when things just as shocking (if not more so) when down in the nighttime environs of NYC.

I had many late nights in NYC back in my pre-child years. This included outings with various friends and significant others, most recently my wife. Back in 1994, I remember leaving a party at 4 AM in the Village and we walked up towards midtown, watching the city wake up (this was the same day, as it turned out, that OJ Simpson would go for "the ride of his life" out in LA). I remember all those nights in the early 2000s when, hopelessly single, my friends and I would go out to bars and, eventually, to places like Veselka and Caffe Dante for dessert. And, naturally, the many late nights with the special lady who would become my wife.

One night, back in 2008 (after this blog was created!) stands out. My wife/then girlfriend and I had gone to the They Might Be Giants concert at the Beacon Theater on the Upper West Side. I had mentioned this in passing to my brother who indicated that he and his girlfriend were also planning to go to the same concert. Afterwards, the four of us repaired to Big Nicks Pizza Joint for late night snack and there, for the first time, the now-wife and I got to the know the person who would become my sister-in-law (and mother to my niece and nephew). It was a lovely night and, in retrospect, a transitional moment in all of our lives.