I found a room in the village to rent, it was the back part of a women's brownstone. I got the room and there was a flat roof outside the window that would act as a balcony, if I climbed out and I did. I used her bathroom and she gave me kitchen privileges. The woman who rented me a room in her flat would not allow me to have much contact with her. I really probably talked to her only a few times when I stayed there. I do remember her part of the flat was in the front of the Brownstone facing East 11th Street. I used her kitchen for small food storage and very little cooking. Everyone mostly ate out in New York. I wasn’t a big eater. Mrs. Brand and I sat in her living room once and she talked about her husband's published book. I saw it on the coffee table. She was always business-like with me. I occasionally found her walking out my room with a clever reason for why she was there.
After work the shops on University Place welcomed me. The “Odes and Ends'' shop found itself as a regular stop. Each day as I came home I would stop to continue my chats with Michelle. I found a positivity I never had experienced. My mother in her fears was not really wanting to be the breadwinner, she never allowed herself whimsical smiles and fun, like Michelle did. I recognized women could have positive natures. Still when I was a child I had my Pollyanna living attitude. They called it the “Glad game,” in the book. My life was a life without a father, I became the little girl looking for compensative stories.
Pollyanna received a crutch one year for Christmas by mistake instead of a doll and her response was; “ Well at least I don’t need it.” I would run from house to house talking to the neighbors. Seeing what traditional families were about. I continually played my positive games. I wanted University Place in the City to be the same as my home in my neighborhood in Rochester's neighborhood. The Village gave me a home and a woman with care and fun.
I learned it was alright to talk to everyone from Michelle, it depended on a person's loving motives. This neighborhood is more exciting than I had known. Still I had a desire to be rich and famous. I told Michelle once this is what I wanted, to be rich. She looked at me and said, “Oh, you would be far too dangerous if you were rich.
The time I spent talking with her expanded into longer visits. I became the daughter she never had. She took me out to dinner and on long bus rides uptown. We would talk to everyone. I had so much fun seeing the City on those bus rides. I’m laughing at myself now because I knew I could get a Rock to talk, it seemed. I learned this from Michelle. Women could have fun and be fun. My job promoted warm greetings to the clients as they came to the Salon. I sold them make up and I was dube a person who could sell the Brooklyn Bridge.
This time together expanded. I was alone except at work and our relationship was so comforting. I found that I loved having as much time as possible with Michelle. One of my favorite spots was Max’s Kansas City Restaurant. It was where artists, musicians, poets and I would go. My favorite new place to frequent became this hot spot. Max’s Kansas. A bar and Restaurant. Soon I went there by myself after work. I heard Andy Warhol used to hang out and had his studio upstairs as I remember. It did become his favorite place to hang out. I must have seen him. The designs and fashions of these people were fabulous. I had to be fabulous too. Every kind of style I had only experienced before in magazines.
None of this had conscious planning; it just evolved in my City life. Life unfolded there. What held my life there was going with Michelle.
