STARLINGS

photo by paulhobson.co.uk
Today is day three. The apartment went on the market on Sunday. There were, apparently, 19 groups of people traipsing through, which we were happy about, not so much because we think one of them will buy, or even because we want one of them to buy, but because after all that cleaning, sorting, discarding and arranging, we wanted to amortize the sparkling pristine order. The more people who saw how neatly the books were shelved, the less labor was expended per person viewing the apartment, and so the more value we got out of the effort. Very satisfying.
But then more people came yesterday, more today, and more will be coming tomorrow. How much longer can we keep the sink free of coffee cups, the bedside tables free of pills and pencils? And there is the ambivalence, the terrible wrenching confusion of Potential Seller’s Remorse. How can we leave New York when the sky is so blue? When the starlings are whistling from the crab apple trees? Do they even have starlings in Los Angeles? Who is the mayor of Los Angeles? Villegarosa, maybe? What can that possibly mean to someone weaned on the whining of Ed Koch, the ranting of Rudy Giuliani and quiet conversation of Mayor Bloomberg?
It is true that everyone in LA is from New York, or very nearly true, and it is also true that starlings are an English bird introduced to the U.S. by someone who wanted all the birds of Shakespeare to reside here. And finally it is true that Jet Blue has a special fare for Oct 31. This is all reassuring. If I were in Los Angeles now, I could fly back to New York on October 31 for 31 dollars! With all the other New Yorkers. To see the starlings. Thank you, Shakespeare.