an old neighbor was kind enough to write a very detailed account of something that happened in my old apartment building in new york city. I lived in that building for almost 10 yrs and moved away from it just recently. It was where I came home to, invited friends over to and generally spent whatever time I could in. It was home. And one always has a grand/romantic view of the place that they call home. At least this is how I always viewed my building.....
The something that happened a few weeks ago was a drug bust....not a little one but a pretty decent sized one that involved 40 police men, 9 police cars, 2 paddy wagons and forced entry at 1am!!!! This was a serious raid in a very decent, family oriented/professional building with a doorman!!!! Not the kind of building where you would expect this sort of thing to happen.....maybe if it was way up town in the Bronx, or downtown near the projects but definately not in Greenwish Village....
Anyway, I cannot figure out what the "drug ring" was actually selling....it was either Charlie or Harry, not certain but either way, the police had been planning this raid for a while. And it turns out one of the tenants was also operating as a male prostitute! Sheesh, who knew.
It still blows me away to think that for years....I had always seen these individuals and thought that they were up to no good....but never in my wildest dreams imagined that they were running something so big! I always thought that it was strange that these guys were around during the day and could afford to live in our building....I guess that I thought that they had some sort of government scam going or that they were living off inheritance.....and one time I even thought that they worked as carers....or maybe that one of them was a famous writer....they were always a little edgy or out of it....I'd see them keeping odd hours and they always smelled funny....
how naive we can be.....how naive I was!
kinda good to think that even after all the years in nyc I was still mildly innocent....
more ny reflection soon....