Greenpoint Fashion Watch: The Aviator

I have lived in Greenpoint for over nine years now. It certainly doesn’t feel like I have lived here the better part of a decade but this in fact the case. I guess time flies when you’re having fun. As time has gone by I have witnessed a number of highly unusual things in my neighborhood of choice. This includes (but by no means is limitied to):

1. Watching an old Polish woman drop her underwear and go to the bathroom at a temporary stop of the B43 bus.
2. Having as a neighbor a woman who wore a sleeping bag wrapped around her head like a turban.
3. Finding a man passed out cold on the stairs leading up to his stoop at 2:00 a.m. in the morning. His car keys were still in his hand but someone had seen fit to steal his shoes.
4. Jessica.
5. Learning that a one armed man is one of the junk shops most ingenious shoplifters: he even succeeded in stealing a pair of shoes once. (Think about this one for a moment.)
6. And of course there was the legally blind guy who wanted me to “model” for some “pin up” photographs.

Suffice it to say the Garden Spot of the Universe had (and still has) some highly unusual people. What would probably merit a 911 call in Brooklyn Heights would not get some much as second glance here. Have I become jaded? This is a distinct possibility. However I know something (or someone) special when I see it. Which brings me to this guy.

I apologize for the poor quality of this photograph. The truth of the matter is I was in awe at the sheer sublimity of what the Greenpoint gods had seen fit to send my direction. I have christened this chap “The Aviator” and he is too fucking amazing for words.

I quietly (but very excitedly) stalked this man until he stopped to pause in front of a liquor store. I got up the nerve to speak with him. I mean, how often do you see a guy walking down the street who  is a dead ringer for one of the frogmen from the movie Delicatessen? Don’t everyone answer at once.

Where did you get those goggles? They are fucking amazing.

I asked. To wit he replied:

I really like this absinthe fountain. Every time I try my prepare it at home I just don’t get it right.

Why don’t you go inside and ask about it? I am certain he will sell it to you.

I replied.

Oh, he is selling them. I like that because I won’t have to order one.

And with that remark he went on his way.

InFUCKINGcredible.

Miss Heather