First Warm Night

For many years, my summer time in New York meant strange happenings in the street. As the first warm evenings approached, there was something in the air besides a little more humidity. You would get an email or a phone message telling you that something was up and if you got there in time you would be part of an experience.

A Broadway style performance by non-broadway style performers on the steps of the New York Public Library. A party in a subway with a DJ and green gels taped over the lights. A feast march for a psuedo-saint through the lower east side ending in a shower of fireworks. Marching bands on cobbled streets beneath bridges at midnight. Running of bull-like people and things over tha gowanus canal. Condiment wars. Santacon. Chengwin.

No permits. No anger. No point, but to have fun in a creative and a slightly subversive fashion. Absurd...inclusive...fun.

There was no cover charge. But there usually was music where one could dance to wild abandon. Or an environment where one could wear wings. Or just stare. Or skip down the streets. Or laugh.

Corie and I had an opportunity to experience together the First Warm Night this past Saturday. I was so pleased to still be in town to share a moment with her that is just so New York to me. It was also a moment that represented an aspect of my past that I couldn't share with her, since we had not yet found each other.

While I may be a bit more tame than my earlier years, these nights still bring a wide grin to my face. My grin was wider yet to see Corie thrill to the joyful street of our first warm night.

Read Corie's account of the evening.

first warm night