Dear Diary:
Sara Felsenstein It rained as I left work and moved mindlessly through Times Square. The city smelled of damp concrete and food-truck smoke. Colors, caught on raindrops, launched from billboards and splattered messily on the ground.
Rain is a commuter’s nightmare. Umbrellas can’t shield you from puddles of trash or the angry masses en route to Port Authority. They can’t really even shield you from rain.
I turned down 47th Street, a street I’ve passed hundreds of times going to and from the bus terminal. Tonight, though, I was meeting my family for dinner and a Broadway show.
The city must have known I would stay, because somewhere on 47th Street, it changed. I looked up to see a silhouetted manwalking briskly into the night like a character right out of an old film noir. All around him: glossy, reflected light.
The Barrymore Theater awning framed the whole intriguing scene.
My phone lit up with a message: Where are you
I should have walked faster but instead stopped and captured three images on my camera. In New York, moments that jolt you from the present are rare and tend to happen only when you’re alone.
I walked a few yards and opened the door to Trattoria Trecolori, where the maître d’ knew at once who I was, smiled almost surreally and then led me upstairs to my family’s table. Here, it was warm and dry and smelled of fresh garlic. I peered at the menu but my mind was still on that spot outside, on that shadowy, ageless man walking past the theater.
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