Mist Walker

As always, I'm early.

I'm early for everything. I show up to work early. I show up to all my appointments early. I show up to movies early. I wore G-Stars in 2006. I first heard Wale in 2005(Paint A Picture was the tape, it was mid. He didn't become interesting until 100 Miles and Running during his run with Nick Catchdubs and Mark Ronson). So for this, I was characteristically early.

Too early, in fact. Maybe by an hour and a half. I was a block south of Canal Street, in the borderlands of Tribeca. Oddly calm for a Saturday. The Senegalese street vendors hawking fake Louie were standing around bored. Not much traffic, probably due to the inclement weather. The sky was matte grey, a warm toned grey. It clashed with the cool, slate-like shades of the former factories that lined Lispenard Street. One has to question the notion of intelligent design because no competent graphic designer would ever have their greys clash in such a manner.

I pass by what used to be Pearl Paint. Past the layers of spray paint I catch a brief glimpse of my reflection in the window. A marble Supreme hat, a Levi's trucker jacket and a checked dress shirt and too slim for the zeitgeist pair of chinos, both from Uniqlo. I notice one or two more greys in my beard and wonder if they make me look distinguished or just old. I still haven't decided yet.

To calm my nerves, I reach into the trucker jacket I've had since before I heard that Wale tape and I take a quick hit of a rosin pen I got a month or so ago. The strain is called Dark Rainbow x Light something or other. Light Yagame weed. If you get put in a pack after ending up on a Death Note it'll be some sort of nebulous indica hybrid, I suppose. I reach the end of the block and turn the corner to pop into Church Street Surplus.

I still haven't bought anything from them but I always marvel at what they have available. I set down the iced coffee I was nursing on the counter and head towards the men's jackets. As always my eyes go towards the Alpenflage camo. Unfortunately the jackets they have in that pattern are either "combat shirts", which only have chest pockets, or they have some sort of weird backpack thing attached to them. Or they're some kind of parka which I'm not really interested in.

I look to my left and see some M65 pants in the same pattern. I'll pull the trigger on those one day. There's a model of Martine Rose cargos that have showed up at Century 21 that kind of reminds me of them. The leg opening on the M65s is much wider but I'm sure you can futz around with them to make them work. They're proper military cargos, after all.

I look back to my right to paw through the jeans. I go through the 33s and 34s. A lot of flare jeans, a lot of jeans from random department stores that haven't existed since Joe Biden had his original hairline. The only pockets I recognize are Lee and Levi's. Maybe an occasional Wrangler. All of the Levi's are Orange Tab. They're still going for at least 150 a pop. Funny how that works out isn't it? Orange Tab was their less expensive and more experimental line and now it's highly sought after. Either people don't know better or we've sunken that far. Probably a bit of both.

I grab my iced coffee and make my goodbyes. As I turn right onto Canal I think back to a year ago when I was idly checking their eBay page and saw a jacket from WW2. A German jacket. Weren't they Jewish?

You need to be careful with camo. There's a pattern called brushstroke camo that is incredibly striking. Probably the coolest pattern I've ever seen. The reason you need to be careful and check which country it originally came from is because it's primarily associated with the former Rhodesia. I'll be damned if I wear anything from those racist losers. Better make sure it's from Pakistan or something.

I'm on White Street now. About half an hour beforehand. I pass by one of the many vacant storefronts down here and notice the white paneling in the window is really glossy and has some great reflections. I take some pretty cool pictures of the condo across the street. It's almost as if the entire street is covered in dirty snow, even though it's the end of April. I know that that one photographer from the Bronx I know will like these. Gabe will probably like these.

I turn onto Lafayette and I pass by what used to be Santos. Andrew WK owned it. Then some skinhead rock fest played there and it closed the next day. What's Andrew WK's deal? Is he a Nazi? Is he even real? Is Katt Dennings in on it? I know he did stuff with Current 93 which is a degree of separation from Boyd Rice who's definitely a Nazi. Same with Death in June.

At Walker and Lafayette my mind goes back to 2019, New Years Eve. For whatever reason I decided to walk through the Lower East Side and Chinatown. I had just smoked some bullshit CBD preroll I had gotten on St Marks. I walked down Essex, underneath the Manhattan Bridge then I doubled back down Canal. As I turned down the west side of Lafayette I pass under a scaffold where I pass a group of homeless men. One of them yells a homophobic slur at me(do I come off gay?) and says "STOP LOOKIN AT MY DICK!!!!!!! I HAVE BOY PARTS!!!!!!!"

I don't know what that was about.

I'm on Walker and it has started drizzling. I take my Airpods out. I'm outside of what looks to be some kind of upscale cocktail lounge. I check my email to make sure I have the right address. I do. As far as I know, this interview was supposed to be for a Japanese denim store. The Japanese denim store in fact.

At this point in time I had already started a job. Rather I left a company, got a new job, they let most of the people they hired go(including the guy that hired me) and got a different job in that company. There was something else I was holding out for, especially after four rounds of interviews but I guess it wasn't meant to be. Kinda sucks because they had an espresso machine and snacks and the office had great views. Less annoying too even though it's four blocks away from where I am now.

I was at this new job since the end of March. Two days in, I get sick. It wasn't COVID. I convalesce and finally get around to watching the entirety of Neon Genesis Evangelion. Up until that point I had only seen the first six or seven episodes and that was after watching the first two rebuild movies a few years prior to the show appearing on Netflix. I was planning to see End of Evangelion in theatres but I got sick with whatever the fuck non-COVID bug I had. There was a lot of "Wow!" and "Oh fuck!" being said those few days and it set me down a path of Anno completionism that has definitely altered my brain in some way. Shiki Jitsu sure as hell affected me that's for sure.

So I started this job at the end of March. By the end of April I'm on a drizzly street in Tribeca outside of a random bar waiting for a Japanese man whom I wouldn't recognize to answer an ad I saw on Instagram. Like I said, I try to be early.

At 5, a car pulls up and an older Japanese man exits. He asks for my name. I give it to him. He silently lets me into the bar, which I learn is his.

We head towards the basement, which is full of stereo equipment and pristine mid-century furniture. He offers me a seat on any chair in the room. I choose the Eames couch. He explains that he wasn't sure how to post the ad and that one of his younger employers suggested putting it on Instagram. He asks me about my previous experience and I go over my history working in e-commerce and shipping, as well as my knowledge of Japanese denim and heritage clothing in general, which is actually quite a bit. I asked him a few questions about the day to day of the business. You know, would I be working on the import side or the retail side, how has the yen's inflation affected the ability to bring in new product, you know nuts and bolts shit. He shrugs me off.

He then explains that finding good help has been difficult and that those younger employees at his main store have lacking work ethics, not like people from our generations(this gave me at least one answer concerning the new greys I found). The job itself, which was advertised as a shopping and e-commerce job, wouldn't require me to be in the store that often. He moreso needed someone who can handle business at the store, at the bar above and a few other businesses of his. I could probably do a lot of it from home if I chose or if it was necessary.

As I sunk into this original Eames couch and stared at a poster of the cover for Kind of Blue as he laid all this out, the words "20 an hour, maybe" were uttered. For a job where I was going to float between at least two or three businesses. Maybe. I don't know. Man, just thinking about that has me kind of blue!

After all this, perhaps sensing my apprehension towards having a job that mercurial, he says that he will let me know. He lets me out into the mists that have covered Walker Street and you know what? Despite all the bullshit I must say he had a strong handshake.

As I walk up Lafayette, I check my phone. The lockscreen says 5:27. I open Instagram and check my stories, partly to see what's going on with people, partly to see who saw whatever nonsense I posted today. Mostly I check to see one avatar. I then check to see what's at a wine tasting a couple stops up on the 6. Looks like Georgian wine. I could use a drink, maybe a whole bottle. After this bullshit.

I just hope I'm not too late.