No More Banks!

There are many things to be excited about when returning to the greatest city on earth. The suburbanization of the Upper West Side is not one of them.

When I was growing up, the neighborhood had a real character. Dangerous, yes, with drug dealers at every corner, and junkies stumbling back to the abandoned building on 88th and Amsterdam while my father and I waited for the morning carpool. But it, like so many other areas of the city, was defined by a long cultural history. Saying that you were from the Upper West Side meant something - it meant you were an intellectual, an artist (or at the very least, a person who deeply appreciated the arts). It meant you were not from the Upper East Side (a distinction which is becoming less and less defined). It meant you probably wore long skirts and schmatas and shopped at Liberty House. It meant you were part of a neighborhood, that you knew everyone on your hall, you chatted in elevators, you didn't go on Amsterdam Avenue at night, you went to Zabars before it was really cool to go to Zabars. It probably meant you were Jewish - my mother told me that she was talking to a Jewish friend of hers and without even thinking she said "Well, the Upper West Side Jews like us" which her friend found highly amusing (we are not, in fact, Jewish, and really no one but my mother actually feels like we are - but her point is that when you live on the UWS for 30 years as my family has, the culture is so powerful, and the association with the neighborhood so important, that in many ways you come to see yourself and the world from the standpoint of your friends and neighbors). It meant something.

I could tell you all about the evolution of my area. The Red Apple, a really kind of dirty super market, was replaced with Sloan's, another dirty supermarket, was replaced with Boston Market during Giuliani, was replaced with an awful toy store, was replaced with Duane Reed. Actually, Duane Reed replaced the toy store and the little bank on the corner, which became the huge bank on another corner, while the wonderful movie rental place with the great oldies section became a TMobile (there's another one three blocks away, and another one five blocks from that). The Gap and Banana Republic have been there for at least ten years, as has the Club Monaco, but the Deli on 86th turned into an Aldo in the last few years. The most upsetting was the really cool clothing store on my walk home which is now a Starbucks. Boulevard, the great restaurant/bar of my youth (best french fries, and crayons on the table) became a swanky place called Aix which is now empty. Murder Ink, the bookstore that my father loved, is closed. Now there is only Barnes and Noble.

But the main problem is the banks. The fucking banks. There is a Bank of America five blocks from... another Bank of America. There is an HSBC bank which takes up half the block. The size of these places is totally absurd. And it's not like they've added more ATMs, they're just taking up more space. It's disgusting, really, all the energy wasted in those places, the poor economization of space, the completely anonymous feeling of walking into these huge and empty areas. I walked in once, and there was air conditioning coming from a vent above me, and heat pumped in through a vent beneath my feet. Really. When we asked about it, they said they couldn't do anything about it because it was being regulated by some control center in some other part of the country. Ultimately, I just find it so disheartening and bizarre. I mean, you can get money out, but there's nothing to buy because there are no stores left. There's no small business.

And with the small business goes the neighborhood. The yuppies have moved in. The buildings (like mine) are going condo. The last place that sold flowing hippie skirts just closed. Hot and Crusty has gone from dark and shabby to sleek and shiny, and now the pizza sucks. A lot.

Worst of all, my deli is gone. My deli is gone. If all you want is milk and a chocolate bar, you have to go to Food Emporium. I stood on the corner and almost cried the day I saw that it was empty. It breaks my heart.

If it becomes a bank, don't be surprised if one night I happen to accidentally hurl a brick through its shiny neutral exterior.