{"id":96418,"date":"2016-04-01T16:44:24","date_gmt":"2016-04-01T20:44:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=96418"},"modified":"2016-04-01T17:42:00","modified_gmt":"2016-04-01T21:42:00","slug":"brief-encounter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2016\/04\/01\/brief-encounter\/","title":{"rendered":"Brief Encounter"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

\u201cPolite New Yorker\u201d<\/p><\/div>\n

Guess who I ran into this morning? Three guesses. And if you guessed Jacob, my neighborhood friend, you\u2019re right!\u00a0<\/p>\n

I was enjoying a toasted, buttered bialy, a coffee-cart small, and a newspaper on a traffic island, when who should sit down on the bench opposite but my old comrade-in-arms! He was looking very natty in a bright green fedora and tweed jacket. On his lapel was a button that read POLITE NEW YORKER<\/small>.<\/p>\n

I recognized the pin at once, of course. It\u2019s sported by all the counter people at Gray\u2019s Papaya, the venerable, twenty-four-hour hot-dog-and-tropical-juice institution. I am a great Gray\u2019s Papaya devotee; my descriptor on all social media\u2014\u201cAristocratic Melon of the Tropics\u201d\u2014is an homage to their brash signage. (It seemed as good as any.)\u00a0<\/p>\n

In delight, I wrapped the foil around my bialy, firmly lidded my \u201cWe Are Happy to Serve You!\u201d cup, and crossed the few feet to my friend\u2019s side of the island. He eyed me warily.<\/p>\n

\u201cHello!\u201d I said. \u201cJacob! It\u2019s me! Sadie! We met on the traffic island at Seventy-Ninth Street!\u201d (I didn\u2019t mention our other run-ins, at, respectively, Gristede\u2019s, Columbus Avenue, Zabar\u2019s, Eighty-Third Street, and the stoop of my childhood building\u2014many of which I\u2019ve chronicled in this space.) I also didn\u2019t mention that at our last meeting (at the deli) he\u2019d asked me to be a special guest on his podcast; I didn\u2019t want to push my luck.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat do you want?\u201d he demanded.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust to say hi,\u201d I said cautiously. \u201cAnd maybe compliment your hat, which looks like spring,\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cLeave me the hell alone and give me your paper,\u201d he snarled.<\/p>\n

\u201cFine,\u201d I muttered. \u201cI\u2019m done with it anyway.\u201d I left him the paper and the rest of the bialy. \u201cThat pin used to mean something, you know,\u201d I added as a parting shot, even though it\u2019s true that everyone at Gray\u2019s Papaya is really grim and surly, too, and they always have been. Why wouldn\u2019t they be?\u00a0<\/p>\n

As I stalked away, I reflected that if this was one long, Truman Capote\u2013style hallucination, I could see why people always seemed irritated with the voices in their heads, and sullenly fingered the POLITE\u00a0NEW YORKER<\/small> button pinned to my Westsider Books tote bag.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Sadie Stein is contributing editor of <\/em>The Paris Review, and the <\/em>Daily\u2019s correspondent.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Guess who I ran into this morning? Three guesses. And if you guessed Jacob, my neighborhood friend, you\u2019re right!\u00a0 I was enjoying a toasted, buttered bialy, a coffee-cart small, and a newspaper on a traffic island, when who should sit down on the bench opposite but my old comrade-in-arms! He was looking very natty in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":178,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13115],"tags":[11479,12511,12838,158,21778,347],"class_list":["post-96418","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-our-daily-correspondent","tag-characters","tag-city-life","tag-conversations","tag-encounters","tag-grays-papaya","tag-upper-west-side"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n\u201cPolite New Yorker\u201d: The Gray\u2019s Papaya Button<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"April 1, 2016 \u2013 Guess who I ran into this morning? Three guesses. 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