Eastern

"New York ain't got nothing Chicago ain't, except a bunch of hustling people all squeezed up together— being 'Eastern!'"
Lorraine Hansberry, A Raisin in the Sun

New York Veins

Fifth Avenue (Wikimedia Commons)

"Everyone everywhere had already told me that it wasn't really New York anymore, that nothing was as good as it used to be and that it wouldn't ever be again. That all the magnetism and perfect ugliness had been sucked then squeezed out through over-tapped, collapsed veins, which were, in a slow panic, injected instead with money and inhumanity."
Selin Thomas, The Village Voice

Place of Worship

Third Avenue

"I whispered prayers of thanks that I was really and truly here in New York, beginning another life. I worshipped the place. I feasted on every beautiful inch of it—the crowds, the fruit and vegetable stands, the miles of pavement, the graffiti, even the garbage. All of it sent me into paroxysms of joy."
Siri Hustvedt, A Plea for Eros