I'm in love with Alphabet City

Dios mio. I am sorry to report that the wall on 2nd Street and Avenue A that had been covered with the words You've been Shampoozled has been painted over. I'd gotten attached to that sign; I felt that it really spoke to me. In a way, somehow, that Nabokov, bless his heart, just never quite will. Now, the wall is solid white except for black spray-painted words that read Reserved TatS CRU.

I stood on the sidewalk, my arms full of laundry and dry-cleaning that had been dropped off weeks and weeks ago, and stared up at the wall, disbelieving. A man with a spotted dog on a leash walked by and I said, "It's gone. The sign is gone." Both he and his dog looked at me to see if I was serious and then the man said, "It's alright, baby. Go for a hike and by the time you get back, I'll be ready."

Someone remind me, please, when I'm fifty and I have a whole house and garden and goat and acres of green, how it's possible for strangers to bring each other joy in crowded places.