Autumn in New York

It's still pretty warm at night. The other day at 4am there was still no need for even a long-sleeve shirt, and last night I slept with the covers off--when I finally slept. But Fall is in the air, nevertheless. I can feel it, like the atmosphere at Christmastime. I think I fell in love with Autumn in New Jersey. I was a nanny to a five-year-old boy back in 1986 on Long Island, New York and then West Orange, New Jersey. The most beautiful parts of Jersey are an ocean of deciduous trees. Just beyond the back yard was a forest of green, which, in September, became a pallette of rusty reds and browns. Those months were hard. I was an immature country boy, lost in the big city of New York with people I didn't know. There was the age difference and the geographical difference between us and then there was the cultural difference. The Family I lived with were Orthodox Jews. In some aspects it was a wonderful learning experience. The grandfather of the little boy became a great friend. We painted two apartments they owned in Queens, just above Flushing Meadows Tennis Courts. We'd take breaks and look over the Manhattan skyline and talk about a lot of things. He struck me as a wise man. I was at the same time awestruck by the city and dismayed by it. It seemed to contain at once inexpressible beauty and unfathomable horrors to me. I expressed this to him and we talked about human nature and their penchant for short-term happiness that often led to crime and pain. He was the only one in that family who seemed to understand me. I clashed with the others and eventually was kicked out. They hadn't paid me very much so I didn't have enough to fly back to Idaho. I got a job as a checker at a supermarket in Morristown.

Luckily I had made friends among the other nannies who attended church with me. It was with these people that I really enjoyed myself. We'd play football in the park or go to the diner and talk until late at night. We went to a couple of clubs in New York, and watched the skyline from across the bay at Liberty Park, the elegant Statue of Liberty lighting the view.

I'm glad I lived there in Autumn. Nature added a beauty that really livened my experience. I went back a few years later in the dog days of Summer and wondered why I had ever found it beautiful. But it is. I remember the whole experience with a lot of joy. The darker times like almost being robbed by a con man, or the smelly back alley behind the apartments, or the beautiful but despondant hooker I saw scrambling for a john, or feeling so alone and lost that I'd sit in the park and sob are all part of it. They act as a kind of balance that enhances the beauty. My fondness for that time and the great experiences--screaming for joy when the Mets won the series, attending the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade and shouting to my friend who was in it, eating lunch at the top of the World Trade Center--would not be as great without them.

For the last couple of months I wanted to get in touch with the family I worked for. It's been 17 years and I just want to let them know there are no hard feelings. I'm not sure how they'd take it, though.