Table 4 - Old coots with loot

The Gramercy Park


The press was having a blast. It was the type of story they liked best: exposing the rich and powerful at their pettiest and most peevish. Abbotsford’s story ran the gamut from front page headlines in the Post and a blow-up photo of the ‘Dead-door fish’ to a page nine blurb in the city section of the Times used to wrap dead fish. The New Yorker ignored it with it’s haughty air of propriety and New York magazine ate it up and regurgitated like a doting mommy penguin. It was a sexy story – surprising really because sexy is not a word usually associated with Gramercy Park. Other than the odd Julia Roberts sighting, Gramercy tends to be a haven for cotton-haired octogenarians and their silly, bitty pooches. Even the park tends to be more staid than glam because it’s gates remain, after a century of growth and change, locked except to a precious few.
In 1831 when real estate developer Samuel Ruggles purchased part of Peter Stuyvesant’s bowery - swampland really - he spun straw into gold, creating the model for future Manhattan moguls. He turned it into one of Manhattan’s most exclusive addresses (aren’t they all). When Ruggles sold the sixty-six building lots around Gramercy Park to the cash heavy, the deeds stipulated that only the lot owners could have access to the park. To ensure that, a fence and gate were erected and sixty-six skeleton keys were awarded to each of the lucky lot owners. Now one hundred and seventy-four years later the rule still applies. The sixty-six lots which lie beneath elegant row housing, the National Arts Club, The Players Club, a Synagogue and a gorgeous Queen Anne style coop apartment building each hold a key to unlock the cast iron gates of the private leafy oasis known as Gramercy Park. Today there are more than sixty-six keys, each co op owner in the lovely apartment building has one, the artists-in-resident at the National Arts Club each possess one, and several members of the Synagogue are key holders too. But in a city teeming with 10 million inhabitants even a few hundred keys is still extremely exclusive. Of course the original keys browned with age and crooked as an arthritic joint no longer work in the lock, but they are still held onto as dearly without their former use, a tangible memory of a history of privilege.
The park itself has hardly changed till this recent scuffle. It is reminiscent of a Parisian park. A smaller, bushier version of Parc Monceau, a shady variety of trees: Buckeyes, folksy Horse Chestnuts, cosmopolitan Norway maples, and stoic London plane trees line the wide, inviting gravel-filled walkways. The slatted benches that line the paths are painted a complimentary forest green so as not to jar the eye from the peaceful flora. Yet all one has to do is look up at the skyscrapers crowding the airspace beyond the gating to realize the greenery is an anomaly. But they suit each other well, the park and the skyscrapers, both feats of extraordinary effort and determined vision.
But there has never been a determined visionary that did not confront conflict. Some conflicts surprise like a mugging, little warning, lots of adrenaline and an added plank in your conversation platform. Others you recognize their potential at their inception, see the two participants incompatibility long before they do, and just wait to witness the developments. So it was with Gramercy Park. Abigail, from the perch of her lovely brown brick twelve-story on west 59th, when she thought of the park at all, thought about it in reference to her uncle, a holder of one of the elusive keys. Her uncle Abbotsford had lived in the picturesque Queen Anne-style coop on the park for forty years and held the honorary position of keeper of the gate. He was a trustee and longtime chairman of the Gramercy Park Trustees. Abigail suggested just before the tree debacle that her seventy-two year-old uncle designate a new lifetime gatekeeper from the neighborhood. She thought he didn’t need to mediate the constant bickering that was occurring between keyholders over things like pet pickup and what type of new-fangled lock to install. She worried, unnecessarily apparently, that a conflict would arise to which he would not be equal. True to the curmudgeonly manner earned by a New Yorker of his years, he told her to mind her own ‘God-damned business’ or he’d leave his ‘God- damned co op interest’ to a ‘God damned stray cat.’ She, in keeping with a successful 37-year old lifelong New Yorker, replied that she’d have the will invalidated but not before using it as proof of his insanity, have him committed, seize his apartment anyway and sell it to some nouveau riche, white-trash underwear model.
The discussion shut down after that. The type of conflict Abigail foresaw was the exacerbation of the classic tension between the haves and the have-nots – those in possession of a key and those who long to be, those who play inside the gilded cage, and those who watch – their faces pushed tightly against the bars, able to breath the same air, but not straddle the same ground. But she’d obviously romaticized the residents of her beloved city. In Manhattan those conflicts are strictly for the bridge and tunnel types. Manhattan 2005 has no have-nots. There are only haves. The have-nots were given the bum rush long ago, when Guiliani brought New York back from the brink and Times Square became home to Geoffrey the Toy’s R Us Giraffe.
The only conflict that could occur was the haves against the haves – Way more press worthy than the other kind anyway. By the time the full difficulty was exposed, rotten fish were smelling up fashionable stoops, lawyers (those enablers of the haves) were mass mailing letter-headed missives on creamy card stock and the op-ed pages of the New York Dailies were smudged with indignation.
It all started so simply, quietly, as befitted the Grecian Formula dawdlers of the park. A letter received by Mr. Abbotsford Gelding from an old lover of his who also lived in the coop at 34 Gramercy Park East.
Darlin’ Abby,
The English Elm that reaches outside my window has grown far too large. Thanks to its boughs my entire apartment is shrouded in darkness. Some mornings when I wake up I’m afraid for a moment I’ve been stuck in the family mausoleum before my time. Would you be a dear and bring this matter up at the key holder’s meeting. I shall be in Italy for the summer, and would love to see either the tree removed or the boughs trimmed. I’m quite sure it would affect the value of my apartment, not to mention the damage it does to my health. What is that depression caused by no light in the winter? Wel,l whatever the term, I am suffering from it all year long!! Thanks very much for your help; I promise to bring back something divine from Roma for you.
All my love and kisses, xoxoxoxoxox Bryan
Why were southern faggots more faggotty than northern fags, Abbotsford wondered, probably exposure to all that damn seersucker. Abbotsford knew, however, exactly what the old queen was complaining about. He too looked out onto the same tree, and it had grown into an unchecked behemoth these last two decades. He doubted the association would approve removing it entirely, nothing like that had ever really been done before, but the removal of a few offending boughs should not be an issue. The next meeting was scheduled for July 8 in the National Arts Council building, hosted by that flaky hippy Claire Chapin. He often missed the meetings where Ms. Chapin hosted, he did not know her well at all, but her appearance irritated him. She wore her long graying, auburn hair in a fortune- tellers bun and favored flowing, batik’d caftans - perfectly ridiculous, not to mention trite on a woman her age. To Abbotsford’s way of thinking a woman should age like a man, with dignity, in khakis, white turtlenecks, navy cardigans and deck shoes – just like Katharine Hepburn. Now there was a lady who knew what she was about. Abbotsford had seen her on several occasions when she came into the park with a member of the arts club, but had only met her once. That silly Claire had introduced them with an elaborate politesse that Abbotsford felt in retrospect may have been mocking. Still this was one meeting he would not miss, who knows he may be able to cut down the damn tree after all. Most of the keyholders should be away in the Hamptons or Vineyard, if he could convince the few who attended, he might have the tree cut down before many were the wiser, then he’d have a damn view too.
Dressed nattily in his khakis and topsiders and armed with photos of the sweeping limbs, he headed over to the arts building in the early evening. He left the letter at home, Bryan couldn’t write a business letter to save his life, he had to litter ‘loves’ and ‘darlins’ through it, as if he delighted in exposing his personal life to the busybodies in the association. He felt the crisp bite of the night air. It felt good and best of all it smelled good, or at least better than usual. New York never smelled good anymore, hadn’t really since the sixties, but some days the air seemed heavier with waste and decay. Most things in New York were better in the sixties, parking for example. One could still use one’s car instead of just renting it space and dusting it monthly. When he lived at 57th just off of Park he could park right in front of his building. Abbotsford shook his head, bringing present day back to his thoughts. He opened the cast iron gate of the park and moved slowly inside, his knee was bothering him again. He stretched it slowly then cut through the park. The trees cast soft grey shadows on the gravel and seemed to shake the weariness of the day from their limbs. He opened the gate not far from the front of the National Arts Club. Crossing the street he stepped down under the awning of 15 Gramercy Park South and pulled the heavy black and glass door of the Club. One of the bohemians-in-residence was in the foyer,
“Hullo?” The resident was scruffy-haired, but mercifully didn’t smell.
“I’m here to see Ms. Chapin please, I am Abbotsford Gelding.”
The hippy nodded, “She’s in the back parlor.” He thumbed vaguely to an area behind him.
Abbotsford twisted his lips, “Thank you that was helpful,” he grumbled, and made for the back of the building, assuming he’d either run into the ‘back parlor’ or another ruffian who could be more articulate. Paintings and photographs hung side by side on the flocked paper. The outlines of former pieces remained visible on the wallpaper around the art. Abbotsford stopped to inspect a photograph of his park, the green benches lit by twilight in the fall. He could almost feel the coolness of winter in the air.
“Mr. Gelding,” Claire Chapin called grandly from a faded velvet settee.
Abbotsford looked up to see her motioning him join her. She sat in a dark paneled room her caftan and bangles looking incongruous in the stifling Victorian setting. Why on earth, he wondered, wouldn’t the damn hippies have painted the hideous paneling and banished some of the gilt-frames? Maybe they thought it was kitschy, or worse ironic. Lord, how this generation stuck smugly to it’s irony. He looked at Claire, she was patting the space on the settee beside her. He sat down in an empty beige armchair instead, squinting.
“So glad you could be here, it seems there will be just a few of us this evening. Those without friends in the Hamptons I suppose,” she laughed ruefully.
Abbotsford didn’t find that at all amusing, he had many friends in the Hamptons, not that it was any of this lady’s business. His knee was aching keenly now, he’d better go back to the damn, useless doctor again. Why the quack couldn’t just give him a decent pain killer was beyond him. He smiled thinly at the six occupants of the back parlor. Beside hippy Claire on the settee sat Margaret Biggens, owner of 3 Gramercy Park West, one of the twin houses attributed to Alexander Jackson Davis, a big-deal architect from the early nineteenth century. Number 3 and 4 Gramercy Park West, with their intricate cast iron verandas generally represents Gramercy Park to most New Yorkers. In the uncomfortably short-looking armchair sat Fremont Scalia, a once-productive Broadway producer, who owned number 4, though if the scuttlebutt was true, not for long. Two very Versace’d ladies in their 50’s sat on the Louis XV reproduction, resting tea saucers on their laps, their important, hardware intensive handbags displayed casually at their feet. Abbotsford recognized them as representatives of the Brotherhood Synagogue at 28 Gramercy Park south. They returned his polite nod.
The meeting meandered along without point for about 30 minutes while the group gossiped about those absent and discussed the celebrity tabloids. After Abbotsford snuffled down his third stale sugar cookie he made his move.
He began, “If we could get down to business now, I’ve got some…”
“Yes, quite right,” Cecily cut him off loudly, “Let’s call this meeting to order.” Rather formal he thought, for a damned hippy. He began again.
“I’ve got a letter.” He reached down and shuffled with the file by his legs.
“Good, Mr Gelding. We will look at that shortly, but first I have something of dire importance to discuss.”
Abbotsford bristled, “Well, it couldn’t have been more important than Brad Pitt’s sex life, because I noticed that discussion was tabled first.”
Cecily looked at him sharply, then remembered to smile. “Well yes, Mr. Gelding, a little light conversation does make everyone feel comfortable, before attending to the bigger issues at hand.”
Pompous bitch. Well he wasn’t about to be railroaded. He had a keyholder’s concern in his hand and he was going to address it. Hell maybe he’d cut the damn limbs himself – what would her patchouli-touting highness have to say to that?