I wish you could have felt it

There’s a scene in Spike Lee’s 1994 Crooklyn where Clinton, the oldest among four siblings in Lee’s semi-autobiographical film set in 1970s Brooklyn, chooses to attend the Knicks game in the NBA finals over his struggling musician father’s jazz recital. During the concert, the camera pulls back to reveal a mostly empty auditorium. As family and friends celebrate post-concert around the dining room table, Clinton walks in through the front door, racked with guilt over missing his father’s big night. He somberly announces in a near whisper that the Knicks are champions before heading upstairs to his room.

“The Knicks won. How ‘bout that,” his father says softly after a pause.

I’ve been thinking about that poignant scene this week. About Carlton Williams, the young actor who played Clinton, who passed away in 2003 from sickle cell anemia at the age of 24. About Spike Lee, the unfailingly devoted Knicks fan who wove that storyline pulled from his own experience into the screenplay. It stayed with me back when I saw it in theaters in ‘94 and popped into my head again when the city celebrated the Knicks championship win, ending 53 years of heartbreak and disappointment. As a life-long fan, I’ve waited my entire life for this.

I wish you could have felt it.

The rapturous joy and thunderous cheers across all five boroughs that simultaneously erupted from every fan who held their breath until the clock ran down to zero. Drivers in cars slowing down to a crawl so they can fist bump strangers. City buses stopping in the middle of the street so that MTA drivers can belt along to every NYC anthem that was ever written with their fellow New Yorkers. I wish you could have seen the crowds of smiling people burst into spontaneous dance and felt the explosive cheers on every street corner vibrate into your soul.

I don’t even like crowds, but found myself aching to go outside during game nights, just so I could high five strangers and walk around Brooklyn like an idiot with a smile plastered on my face. Sometimes we just want to belong and be a part of something big.

We walked for miles on Saturday evening, stopping at every impromptu watch party, catching whiffs of the heady scent of Linden trees mingled with the smell of greasy pizza and occasional weed. It smelled like summer in the city. l didn’t even mind being packed in, pressed shoulder to shoulder with a crowd of hundreds, eyes glued to a big screen TV erected in downtown Brooklyn, reacting to every free-throw, turnover, and basket in guttural groans and exuberant cheers.

I wish you could have felt it because I’ve never experienced anything like it. Not even when the city celebrated in the streets after Obama won in 2006 or when Biden beat Trump in 2020. I have never seen the city more united in my entire life as a New Yorker. And unlike our response to unspeakable tragedies watching towers fall and waters rise or the 7 PM banging of pots out our windows to thank our healthcare heroes amid constant sirens and Covid death, it was from pure infectious joy.

Even if you don’t care about The Knicks, basketball, or sports, you can love the collective happiness that brought together an entire city regardless of age, race, politics, religion, or money. A city that can feel rigged to only serve the wealthy, that can beat you down with record-breaking rents, crowded public transit lines, and day-to-day friction. Where dreams get crushed and resurrected. For nearly two months with each consecutive play-off win, we believed. And for a night, we forgot all about our worries, uncertain futures, unemployment, rising cost of living, and whatever monstrosity of a cage fight was being built on the south lawn of the White House.

Because it was never just about basketball.

“Calm down, it’s just a game!” my family would say as my nerves flared at every missed basket and questionable foul.

No, it was never just about basketball.

We are all starved for hope. We are starved for real human connection. We desperately need something to be happy about. NYC showed the entire country how a city of immigrants, a city that gets slandered by right-wing media for our diversity of cultures and ethnicities, can come together and celebrate. Along with a socialist mayor who can’t stop smiling and is seemingly everywhere because of his genuine love for the city, we showed that we could vibe shift this darkness into healing.

Cosmically, it feels like we flipped a switch to times before Covid, to times before we were tethered to our phones as our constant companions. Do you remember? When all we ever did was spend our summers outside with friends and neighbors?

Maybe it was right here all along, and we just had to shake ourselves out of the trappings of modern life and remember what life was like. It was a night to show younger generations what life could be.

Will this feeling last? Does anything last forever? No, but I’m hoping that this infectious good energy will spread to the rest of the country through Pride, neighborhood block parties, the cultural exchanges and celebrations of the World Cup, and living more of our lives outside with our communities. Because collective joy is the most incredible thing to witness and experience.

For Carlton, Spike, my dad, my brother, Patrick, Starks and the entire 90s Knicks team: yeah, they did it. This one’s for all of us.

Thank you for reading.
Everything is Liminal is reader-supported publication. Posts are free, but some are paywalled at a later date. If you enjoy this newsletter, I’d be grateful for your support with a paid subscription. It keeps me writing and helps to support my family.

To read:

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• Are Americans Too Old? (The New Yorker)
  "All of this has made younger voters more cynical and disengaged. And with good reason: there is ample evidence that older people favor policies that emphasize security for themselves over investment in the young."
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• ‘This will be timeless’: what art can we expect from Chicago’s $850m Obama Presidential Center? (The Guardian)
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• Lose Yourself in Some of David Hockney’s Most Memorable Works (Another)
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• Mamdani’s NYC World Cup campaign is inspired by sports memorabilia, city signage, the subway and the five boroughs (It’s Nice That)
  It’s indeed nice to see how design has returned to City Hall. Raised by a filmmaker and married to an artist, I feel like Mamdani really understands the power of good design to build community and activate civic engagement.

• Why Hope Is Inseparable From Living (Atmos)
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• These visitors’ viral World Cup videos are showing what really makes America great (LA Times)
  I have to admit, I am loving these clips on social of international World Cup visitors losing their minds over American food and things like air conditioning everywhere and ice in drinks. Throw in the Mexico/South Korea love fest and the Norwegian Viking row in Boston and I might get over this basketball/post-NBA finals let down.

  
  Till next week – JP
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