Destination - Queens

Jamaica, Queens was my destination this week. I had a work trip with a colleague. It was my first time stepping foot on New York soil, which was extremely exciting and also upsetting since the closest I got to the Manhattan skyline was my hotel window.

On the way there, the opening lines from Christmas in Hollis by Run DMC kept running through my head. “It’s Christmastime in Hollis Queens. Mom’s cookin chicken and collard greens.” Since I never got out of Queens, I had to find some musical associations to the area so I could feel like the trip wasn’t all work. G-Unit is from Jamaica. So these were the streets where 50 Cent got showered with bullets? It didn’t look as tough as I expected. We also ate dinner in Astoria, birthplace of John Frusciante! Okay, now the trip was successful. Forget the effing Statue of Liberty.

The flight home was hell. I was in the dreaded middle seat next to a woman with a nine month old baby, an egg-headed baby. That might sound mean. It was cute but had an enormous head. When women become moms, sometimes I think they get ultra strange. This woman was no exception. When I made eye contact with her baby, which made him smile by the way, she looked at me as if she smelled something bad. As if to tell me, don’t stare at my child! I was thinking to myself that a strange face, especially one with glasses, always entertains a baby for a bit. You’ll need me later in this flight! The young woman on the other side of me said aloud, “That baby is so cute!” prompting the mom to look at the baby and say, “They are nicer than the people we sat next to on the way out, aren’t they?” It always cracks me up when instead of talking to you, people tell their kids stuff aloud for your benefit.

I put on my headphones and chose a little Saturday Night Fever soundtrack as we departed LaGuardia. Then the wailing began. This kid wouldn’t stop and the mom was whipping him around in various positions, trying to get him to stop crying, bumping that noggin of his into me repeatedly. For someone who seemed so protective the baby’s personal space, she thought nothing of letting that flat head of his rest on my arm for his all too brief nap. Then he was back up screaming and I couldn’t even hear a word of the Bee Gees’ Jive Talkin’. There would be no comparison of The Bee Gees or Tavares’ versions of More Than a Woman on this flight. I needed more than disco to drown this kid out.

Foo Fighters’ Monkey Wrench

Sleater-Kinney Entertain

Yeah Yeah Yeahs Cheated Hearts

I could still hear that baby. Thanks Baby, Thanks A lot!

--J