Return to the essay table of contents
34. ALSO BETRAYED BY A DRY CLEANER (Dec. 2003)
This here is a story of friendship and betrayal in New York City, and it's a
shallow story.
For years I'd gone to
this Asian dry cleaning shop. I and the owner-- and of course, being a true New
Yorker, I never learned her name-- did our friendly chitchat, and we developed a
store friendship.
So one day I brought her
a zippered sweater for cleaning. A few days later I picked it up and brought it
home. I looked at it there-- the zipper was totally busted! Instead of telling
me she'd broken it she'd closed the sweater with a safety pin and handed it to
me as if everything was okay!
I returned immediately.
I asked her why she
hadn't told me what she did.
For the first time in all
our years-- her smile of friendship faded.
She refused to fix it. No
way. And she refused to reimburse me.
This was the first time
in all our years together that I'd asked for anything beyond the routine. I
started to get angry-- then turned on my heels and walked out. I have never been
back. I do not even look into the window of her store when I pass.
You see, New York City is
this humanity-filled but lonely place where millions of people
form..."relationships" with their storekeepers. We hesitate to admit, to
ourselves or others, how important these relationships are, even though we may
never learn names or ask one personal question or share one personal secret. The
extent to which these store relationships substitute for real friendship, love
and family-- to answer that is pathetic.
How...deeply...our
storekeepers can hurt us.
Return to the essay table of contents