From “My Dealing, Stealing, Squealing Neighbors,” a recent New York magazine piece by the excellent Luc Sante about his years living in Manhattan tenements:
“The task of holding the house together fell on the super, a man named Zygmunt, whom everyone called George. He lived in the first apartment on the right as you came in, was usually available—except on Sunday mornings, when his hangover took precedence—and was a dab hand with a pipe wrench. He did commendable work under the circumstances, although he never was able to fix the bathtub of Rose and Simon, my neighbors across the hall, with the result that they came over to use mine a few times a week for the entire term of my residence.
By and large, I loved my neighbors, although I worried constantly, owing to the presence of so many loose cannons in a single fragile container. One afternoon I took myself out to the movies. Film Forum was showing the last picture directed by Erich von Stroheim, which he called Walking Down Broadway although it ended up as Hello, Sister! It contained a subplot about a construction worker who, after getting plowed at the saloon across the street from his work site every night, would sneak back in and steal a few sticks of dynamite, which he’d throw under his bed when he got home. In the third act, naturally, nature took its course. I walked home thinking about how such a character would not be out of place in my building. Then when I opened the door I beheld my neighbors, all of them, out in the halls, rushing around with buckets of water. We had very narrowly escaped a conflagration.
It seemed that the art critic on the fourth floor had become immersed in crack to the extent that he had neglected to pay his Con Ed bill. His service cut off, he had been lighting his way with candles, although he was perhaps not as attentive as the situation might warrant. Furthermore, his apartment contained several years’ worth of newspapers, as well as a small fortune in contemporary oil paintings. Nature had taken its course.”
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Luc Sante collects postcards:
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