Repotted I: The Prequel

My last post, issued almost a month ago, was about the first stages of a “U-turn” move from Chapel Hill back to Raleigh. This move involves downsizing and a second at-bat in defining our next stage of life. The prospect was daunting, so we (for which read Liz) decided that an appropriate first step was to get out of Dodge while the processes of buying and selling ground forward. Leaving our cares behind, we jetted back to the place where our life together began: New York City (for which read: Manhattan).

Elizabeth Marion, a recent college graduate, and Joseph A Smith, Jr, a fledgling lawyer, met in Manhattan in 1978 as coworkers at a downtown law firm. A lunch in the bowels of the World Trade Center was our first date. One thing led to another, and we were married in 1979. While it doesn’t seem like only yesterday, the memory stays fresh for me. The trip this year was a celebration of our 47th anniversary. While special, any trip to the Big Apple is for us a return home.

The City today is, of course, vastly different from what it was in 1978. We lived there briefly at the end of a near-bankruptcy when pessimism about its future was common currency. The good news about this precarious situation was that Manhattan was relatively affordable for us working folks. The other news was that it was expensive enough to discourage family formation. So, off to the suburbs for us (another story for another time).

Today, by contrast, New York is a rich and bustling city. While there is renewed “decline” talk, based on the election of a democratic socialist mayor and associated trash talk by billionaires miffed at the prospect of having their mansions and penthouses surtaxed, a walk around town suggests that someone didn’t hit the send button on the decline email. Like all great cities, New York is in constant renewal. The song of the jackhammer greets you everywhere you go as infrastructure and building upgrades proceed apace. The “ICE memo” hasn’t reached Manhattan either; the language spoken by virtually all of the construction workers there is — wait for it — Spanish. Add to this cacophony the number of languages heard on strolls up Fifth Avenue or through Central Park and you know that New York is one of a handful of world cities that leave the others behind.1

The City is a cultural treasure trove. Our recent trip included visits to or attendance at:

• The Raphael exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum, extraordinary not only for the monumental works themselves, but for a library of beautifully presented preparatory sketches that were, themselves, great art. As if that weren’t enough, in the next gallery over was an exhibit of cathedral architectural drawings that was mind blowing. And that’s only a portion of one floor. The Met is, in a word, overwhelming.

• The Gainsborough show at the Frick. Worth seeing, but only as an appetizer to the Frick permanent collection, which is sublime. Where else can you see an El Greco hanging over the fireplace of a massive living room?

• A performance of the Handel and Haydn Society, a wonderful chamber orchestra, at Carnegie Hall. The concert was in Zankel Hall, one of the smaller recital halls of the main facility. Absolutely perfect acoustics and a full and enthusiastic house for Bach and Teleman.

Our culture feast has left me with fond memories and a couple of more general thoughts. The first is that no part of it would have been possible without the massive accumulation of wealth by a few people who then used it to create cultural institutions (often with their names attached) that enrich all of us. One cheer for capitalism?

The second is that it is now clear to me what seniors, in the final phase of their lives, are good for: support of the arts. In each of the cultural venues mentioned above, the majority of the fee-paying audience was over sixty. Because of our interest — and our money — arts institutions and deserving artists can support themselves. So, Boomers, let’s get out there and support the arts!

As for the out-of-sorts billionaires, I have a feeling that the trash talk will subside and they will remain. With all due respect to Miami, Dallas or Austen, nothing compares to New York. And, while I’m not an expert on construction, I think mansions and penthouses are kind of hard to move. New York landmarks and a New York state of mind are, yes, only in New York.