Theresa: Home Page

From The Peopling of New York City

Contents 1 EXPLANATION OF MY WIKI 2 LINKS 3 ME : ] 4 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY

EXPLANATION OF MY WIKI

I've created this page to provide some background information on me and my research project. Below are links to my complete journal entries on the class readings, and more importantly, my research project on Little West 12th Street.

Why Little West 12th Street?
I chose this street because I felt that it emoted a certain irony and would have an interesting history that would translate well into a compelling research project. My initial interest was in the obvious paradox created by bold remnants of history, such as slaughterhouses and abandoned warehouses, which survive alongside the contemporary elements of the revitalized Meat Packing District, such as upscale bars, restaurants, and boutiques. (see street proposal)

LINKS

User: Theresa Dietrich [STREET RESEARCH]
Theresa's Journal Entries

ME : ]

Some Unnecessary Information

INTRODUCTORY ESSAY

I feel my face grow pink in the cold as I move, strides large and deliberate, towards the orange neon of the “24/7” Dunkin Doughnuts sign. It’s two-thirty Wednesday night and I’m in need of pick me up in the form of deep fried dough. Three fourths of the way through my philosophy assignment, I decide I deserve a small reward, walking briskly from my apartment. I arrive, embracing the warmth and the aroma of nutty coffee laced with sugary carbohydrates. I deliberate momentarily, bombarded by the endless combinations of sprinkles and fillings. I’m interrupted by an intentionally audible conversation, taking place behind my back. “Where she from? Ask her where she from,” I hear close behind my back “Nah, you ask.” “I think she’s polish. She look kind of German or something.” “I’ll have a glazed doughnut and a non-fat latte,” I say to the bespectacled woman behind the counter. “Shoot,” the first voice says, now apparently addressing me directly, “you don’t need non-fat nothing ma.” “Where you from girl,” the other voice enters. Exhausted and still contemplating the implications of Edwardian determinism, I remain unresponsive, then grab my treats and head for the door.” “Get yo skinny ass back here white girl, we’re talking to you,” the voice calls, now loud and abrasive. I slow; unsure of weather a polite acknowledgment will satiate my hecklers. “Good night,” I say naively amiable, aiming to be respectful. “What, you can’t have a conversation with us cause we’re black,” the first man offers accusatorily. “Shit, you ain’t even that cute,” the other chimes in, “Go back to SoHo.” I continue my original trajectory towards the exit, pushing to the door open just in time to see a jelly donut splatter on the glass next to my shoulder. “Go back to SoHo bitch,” they jeer. I’ve lived in Brooklyn for about five months now, but I still constantly feel like a traveler, a tourist. For the first time in my life I find myself often in the minority, the obvious outsider. At the grocery store I mistake plantains for bananas and marvel at the presence of yucca and other oddities foreign to me. I feel unwelcome riding the two train to the last stop. I regularly convince myself, not unreasonably, that everyone’s wondering why I didn’t get off nine stops ago on the lower east side, or if I’m lost. I’ve come to love my modest locale in Midwood, embracing it in all of it’s humble splendor: kosher delis and Golden Krust Bakeries; but I still have the sinking feeling that it doesn’t yet love me back. I arrive at King’s pharmacy one morning an hour before it opens, hoping to get my prescriptions before class. I’m the first person there, alone outside the door, bagel in hand. An hour passes and other eager customers join me. 8:00, the doors are opened and I walk to the window, readying my prescriptions and money. Looking around I come to the sudden realization that I’m the only person there under forty, and the only person that is white. Some women whisper all too loudly about the “uppity little white girl” at the front of the line. A man behind me says he needs his prescription, he’s very sick, its urgent, he’s here every Wednesday but he’s never seen me before. I offer him my position in line, triggering a kind of chain reaction. I end up at the back of the line feeling more out of place than ever. Though this is my current home, my present city of residence, I mostly feel like a college student renting a room. Everything in Brooklyn suggests certain temporality to an outsider, to a traveler. Connections are fleeting; relationships feel transitory, living arrangements unnervingly momentary. I think quite possibly the only way to survive, as a traveler, is to rely on established connections; or to create new ones, thus, shedding one’s status as an “outsider.” As a native of rural Pennsylvania, I’m not yet sure how to shed my traveler’s status in Brooklyn. I don’t know how to stand confidently at the front of the pharmacy line or appear inconspicuous at Dunkin Doughnuts. I still fumble to find my metro card before virtually every subway ride and become helplessly confused when Bedford Avenue follows Twenty-fourth Street. I often find myself, stumbling through streets filled with unfamiliar music and culinary aromas that turn my unaccustomed stomach, longing for some connection to bind me back to earth, anything to keep me from floating away unidentified and without any apparent associations. I’ve tried, I think, to sprout roots through the cracks in the concrete sidewalk, but its as if my blonde hair or college ID reveal my presence as obligatory, eliminating any chance for me to feel the welcome sense of permanency so foreign to a traveler. My all-around failure to institute new associations has prompted me to rely heavily on the former, established connections. Some nights, I call my best friend Elyse in Pennsylvania. We talk of classes and professors, failed first dates and exciting new friendships. I ask if she can hear the crickets and see the stars. I tell her I can hear a couple yelling in Hebrew and can see nothing but a black sky. We talk for hours, my eyelids become heavy and my comments more infrequent. “I’m going to let you get to bed,” she says gently, “but I will talk to you soon. I miss you.” And there, curled on the black futon in my apartment, I am home.