THE HUNTINGTON Y was under construction again. There were just beams and cement floors. I was given a tour by an old friend whom I did not recognize but who seemed to know me quite well. He had on a blue jacket, his hair was cut short, and he wore glasses. In short, he looked rather like a real estate agent, or Mormon missionary lite. There he was, showing me around. The entire floor plan of the old Y.M.C.A. was recognizable to me. I remembered the first day I went to that school. How I had promised myself that I would not be a baby like the others and would not cry for my mother. I could remember it all so clearly. Like yesterday.
That was at least one day I had succeeded. We walked together to the room, which was the first on the left, or actually the right, because we entered from the rear side of the building. It looked smaller there. I could see its outline, and had a vague memory of doing some kind of arts and crafts at a table there. I remembered one of the girls, who had platinum blonde hair.
This girl seemed to stick out in my memory.
The place had been gutted of course, but in a way it was refreshing. The sunlight poured through the beams. I could look out on that part of Huntington and see the athletic fields. The breeze smelled fresh. After, we walked to the end of the hall. That’s where we had classes our second year of preschool at the Y. I remembered many things from that room, especially a small book called Ten Little Indians and an accompanying cassette. I could remember some of the lyrics from the song, “one lost his prayer-stick …” When Thanksgiving came, we were all divided up into Pilgrims and Indians. I wanted to be an Indian. They got to wear feathers. But the teachers put me into the Pilgrim group. I got the Pilgrim black hat with the gold buckle.
Looking around this empty room, it was hard to believe that it had all happened here. Those memories seemed so cloudy, they seemed to be submerged in in a gray haze of time. The 1980s? When was that? But now all had been reduced to its bare essence. Only the walls were left, with some scattered wires too. My friend and I decided to walk down the hall toward the pool. It at least was still there. Entirely intact. There were still people swimming in the pool.
Later, we descended the steps of the Huntington Y to the first floor. This had been turned into a sort of open air market, like the one at Balti Jaama Turg in Tallinn, or the Baltic Station Market, as it’s called in English. A woman, who looked something like a flapper from the 1920s, or at least had that kind of haircut, came up to me, and asked me if I would go fetch her dress. I went into a back hallway, which was also well lit, and saw an array of silver dresses hanging suspended from hooks along the wall in the light. Those 1920s la garçonne dresses. Which silver dress would fit the woman? I didn’t know anything about dresses. Which one would fit?
north! 