Demographics Part III

By early 2007, the gentrification of 1990 Lexington Ave was in full-swing. Every week I would see a new group of white, recent college grads unloading their belongings into the lobby. To my delight, most were female. It's a unique experience--I'm a white male, I had lived there for almost half a year and was becoming well acquainted with the neighborhood, so I welcomed the chance to share my recent discoveries with a girl whom I had known for all of ten seconds. I'm sure they were merely happy to realize they were not the only newcomers to 1990 and gladly foregave my ulterior motives.

June of 2007 saw a stark uptick in new, white residents. College was out, it was time for the future corporate lackeys of America to move to New York City and chase their dream. Tensions were at an ebb and flow rate. By this time, most of the community residents of 1990 accepted that they were going to be living amongst newcomers. I was operating on some new found street instinct, booze and corporate Kool Aid adrenaline--Harlem's wannabe Gordon Gekko.

During the weekends, I would turn my 2 bedroom into a pseudo-meatpacking district lounge. The house music was flowing, the purple lighting was resonating from wall-to-wall and my terrace was the smoking section. Despite the fact that most of my friends were too afraid of making the trek to 121st street, I threw one hell of a party. The ambiance was entirely out of place for East Harlem and also a bit over-the-top for my poor roommate who just wanted to teach kids in his classes well enough so they could graduate from high school.

When my empty nightclub living room wasn't enough, I would hop on the express train to bars in the east village and alphabet city. Imbibing just enough to not black out for the return trip uptown. Many of the new white kids took taxis back from the clubs downtown, but I had something to prove. I would always get an adrenaline rush from hopping the 6-train uptown from Union Square, blasting house music on my iPod and remaining in the train car after the 96th street stop. The border between the posh and proper Upper East Side and the darkness and difference of those streets that throbbed above this de facto racist boundary--an American Iron Curtain.

* * *

The drunk walk at 4am on a hot summer night was when adrenaline overtook intoxication. Three and one-half blocks from the mayhem of 125th street, past the phone booths where the dealers hungout, to my home of 1990 Lexington Avenue. By the time I would reach the front of the building, I would be met with looks and utterances from the dozen or so youths and 20somethings on the sidewalk. Often smoking weed, drinking Henessey or 40s, they nearly always left me alone. By that time of night, the dice game down the alley leading to the fire exit had already been broken up. A street fight may or may not have taken place, without any police involvement; entirely resolved as quickly as it had been conceived. The block between 121st and 122nd on Lexington had an organic street vibe to it. One group hung out on the downtown side of the entryway, one on the uptown and another across the street. At night, the block lived, breathed and died on its own accord. Law enforcement had little or no interest in containing and probably too little muscle to confine the street culture. Furthermore, the bloods had such a strong presence in the area, no rival gangs dared venture into the territory.

In the brightness of the Manhattan night, swimming in liquor and dreams of luxury, I would often hear gunshots in the distance. Helicopters would swarm, sirens would blare, my police scanner chirped incessantly. But I was alone, protected and insulated. Perched atop my crow's nest of isolation, aloft from that deck of hard Harlem life.