Vintage VII

The Final Vintage Entry
Originally written on April 7, 2005


A few weeks ago I took the subway to a part of town just minutes away from Madison Square Garden and only half a block from an ex-boyfriend's old place. It was an area of New York City that I generally avoided yet knew rather well. And still I managed to find myself on an avenue and a street that I'd never crossed before.

I turned the corner on a cool if not miserable late winter afternoon and came upon a truly original setting, something only possible in Manhattan. A piece of magic.

I came upon B&H Photo Video and Pro Audio.

Upon entering this absolute Mecca, I found that the allure lay in the combination of state-of-the-art camera equipment mixed with an environment staffed by seemingly thousands of Hasidic Jewish male employees. And no sooner had I crossed the threshold did I feel more perky than a tulip after a fresh spring rain.

This store jolted me to life in a way that gay bars and Vogue magazines rarely had. It was something about the exotic appearance of so many handsome bearded men. And before I even knew where I was headed, I found myself standing straight in front of David, a delicious young clerk at the Questions and Answers aisle.

Well, let me tell you, this David did not pull any punches. In a case of reality being stranger than fiction, it took him literally no time at all to acquire my First Name, Last Name and Telephone Number. (Technically for B&H company purposes... But as far as I could tell it was solely for personal reasons.)

I was at the store in the first place because
1. I needed a bigger memory chip to store photos.
2. I was concerned about my suddenly wobbly zoom.
3. I needed a proper camera case. (Carrying the $500 thing around in a small black trash bag for the past three months was beginning to feel more than a little ridiculous.)

But now that I was here, I was suddenly, instantly hooked. It seemed that with each fresh question David would ask and with every warm gaze that he'd beam down upon me I, subconsciously and entirely intentionally of course, would use the opportunity to manually re-apply another thick layer of my Burt's Bees Wax lip balm.

And the flirting didn't stop there. Oh no. I was in full attack mode and wasn't leaving without a circumcised and unshaven man. Nope, I needed somebody natural on top but trimmed on bottom.

So, it was time to get down to business. First on my list was the camera bag, which appeared from behind David's magic partition like a gift from beneath its wrapper.

"It seems awfully BIG...," I managed to whisper from below my five coats of "soothing, cooling, refreshing" gloss. Puzzled that the camera bag designed to match and fit my exact model seemed the wrong choice, my boyfriend playfully cocked his head and gave the casing another look.

"Hmmm!" he muttered. And with a deep jovial accent replied, "It is big. It's HUGE!"

Well darn right, I thought... But seriously.

"It seems WIDE though," I pouted.

I could tell David was crushed. "This is the one. Sorry." he said, trying to hide all his pain. I smiled. He was sweet. And really did want to see me leave happy. I guess that the case did match the camera, even if it was a bit large. So after a little time, a lot of evaluation and quite a bit of giggling, we both decided that the case in fact fit. And that size, in the end, really doesn't matter.

"Oh you're so helpful!" I grinned, eyes beaming and gleaming away.

"That's my job!" David replied. And with that it was officially love.

However, as these things so often go, once confronted with the bigger issues, my wobbly zoom to be exact, our relationship took a turn for the worse.

"Touch it. Touch it." I said. "It seems loose, not firm."

And this time I really wasn't trying too hard to lay it on thick. I sincerely wanted to find out if my zoom lens needed repair after months of being thrown about with nothing but a cheap layer of plastic protecting it from the dangers of the outside world.

"Touch it," I tried again.

But my David, suddenly impotent and confused, didn't know what to do with his hands. He was fumbling all over the place. And what it came down to was that he clearly lacked experience in the area.

It soon dawned on me that there would be no magic answer that David could pull from behind his special desk. All that foreplay and no big payoff.

He was really kind to point me in the direction of another Jew who specialized in the handling of zoom lenses, and I will always thank him for that. But when I realized that David couldn't handle MY zoom, well it would never last.

A bit later, as I headed towards the check-out line, I found that despite the demise of the short-lived affair with my chosen person, I was once again in high spirits.

"First time?" the bubbly, round checkout man asked, grinning from ear to ear.

"Yes Sir!" I responded. "I'm a Virgin!"

Oh, I was happy again, flirting away and generally satisfied with my camera case, memory chip and perfectly operating zoom.

That was until the One Fatal Error.

You see, I was just so filled with excitement and glee at seeing the magic overhead railroad system shoot my purchase across the store and directly towards checkout (It's amazing. You HAVE to see it!) that I inadvertently blurted out,

"IT'S JUST LIKE CHRISTMAS!"

Now mind you, in retrospect, the store continued to bustle. Business at B&H Photo Video and Pro Audio continued as usual. But in my mind every single organism in the universe stopped. And for that one brief second this whole entire earth ceased spinning.

Christmas?! In front of all these Hasidic men? Who in the world did I think that I was and just what on earth was I thinking? Oy. I shrank. Mortified. Terrified. Embarrassed at my insensitivity.

And after what felt like a hundred years of solitude I was finally able to manage lifting my head just enough to humbly gaze at the little Jewish man before me.

Would he hate me? Would he scream? Take away my purchases? Throw me from the store? What could this stranger possibly think of me now? And more importantly, what could he possibly think of CHRISTMAS?!

It was in this instant, and very much to my surprise, that after all my flirting and foolishness, the only thing that this kind, bearded figure did (in response to my horribly heinous remarks) was look down at me from his register perched high up above, smile ever so slightly and say,

"Yes, but I don't have my Santa suit today!"