Chapter 27 Times Square

I admired Colin–his fiery preaching, his bold, almost reckless forwardness in presenting himself and his ideas. But he got on my nerves in a way I could not make sense of. I couldn’t stand to have him near me, especially in the apartment. We bickered constantly. I felt guilty. It was his apartment. He was the minister. I was supposed to be helping him. I suspected I instead made his work harder. Ruth liked him. Everyone around me liked him. I couldn’t understand what was wrong with me.

The immediate environment of the Center didn’t help. It was several blocks to any of the four subway stations in the area. If I wore a suit, while walking between the Center and the subway in the evening, women in tiny skirts and tight tops called out, “Want a date?” If I wore casual clothes it was not uncommon for middle aged men to walk along side me and ask if they could buy me coffee. The first time a man used this line, I was handing out fliers on the street. I was thrilled thinking he had read the flier and was interested. Here was a divine appointment, an opportunity to share my faith. We walked to a small shop in the next block. I ordered hot chocolate, which he paid for, and we sat at a table on the street talking for more than ten minutes before I realized he, too, was “looking for a date.” I was deeply embarrassed, annoyed and a little smarter.

I learned to walk with a fierce directness. It violated both my instincts and my culture. I am addicted to people. I need them to smile at me. I want to connect with them. Besides, my Southern heritage placed an enormous value on courtesy. One was always pleasant in face-to-face encounters, even if privately you despised the person you were interacting with. But in Times Square courtesy toward strangers would be misinterpreted. Eye-contact was a violation of the social contract, unless one was prepared to do business. So every time I walked from the subway to the apartment, especially in the evening, I put on an artificial brusqueness. My body language had to say, don’t touch me, don’t talk to me, don’t notice me. I hated it. At the Center, I would ride the elevator to the sixth floor and walk to the apartment hoping Colin wasn’t there. Inside, Colin would look up from his reading with his enormous eyes. “How was it old boy? Welcome home!” I would tense. He wanted conversation. I knew of no courteous way to avoid it.

There was nowhere to be at ease. No where to rest. Except with Ruth. She asked nothing. Demanded nothing. Just seemed to enjoy hanging around.

God didn’t want me to date Ruth. I was sure of that. I knew my parents would not approve of my marrying someone who wasn’t White. Besides that, I wasn’t planning to marry until after grad school and that was a long time from now. There was no way I could date someone that long. So why date someone when breaking up was inevitable? Why should I bruise someone’s heart on purpose?

So I resisted–not her. She never pushed. I was resisting my own desperate craving for connection and sweetness and warmth and beauty. I complained bitterly to God in prayer: Why dangle her in front of me and forbid me to touch her?

My pay was 175 dollars a month plus free rent. I gave twenty percent to the church and paid for my travel and food and incidentals out of what was left. Not long after I arrived, I realized I did not have a coat adequate for the New York winter. Mrs. Toby gave me one she had received from somewhere. It seemed miraculous.
In the spring, I began to think of getting a bicycle for getting around Manhattan. This would save subway fare and give me some exercise. But how was I going to afford it? I could always call home and ask for money, but that seemed like a violation of the missionary venture. So I prayed.

A couple of weeks later, I received a check for a hundred twenty dollars for work I had done more than a year earlier. I bought a used bike. It was wonderful. It opened the city for me. On the bicycle I could traverse midtown faster than a taxi. The exercise eased the stress of living with Colin and pining for Ruth.



I lived in constant depression. My daily prayer time consisted of mournful, desperate pleas to heaven for help. I wasn’t sure exactly what kind of help I needed. I prayed for evidence that I was actually in God’s service. I wanted to see people changed. I prayed for a better attitude toward Colin. I prayed about Ruth.
Late in the summer I happened to weigh myself. I had lost thirty pounds. I could afford to lose it. But the loss startled me. I must be worse off than I thought.

One afternoon in August, a friend stopped by the Center. He was depressed and discouraged. We sat and talked for a couple of hours. I see the light coming back into his eyes. He left buoyant. I dragged myself upstairs and collapsed on my bed. I could heal others but could not help myself. Where was God? I was supposed to be an evangelist. My job was to persuade others to come join us, to believe what we believed, to live the way we lived. But why would I want anyone else to join a religion that was making me miserable? Our prophet had written that the greatest form of evangelism was to tell others what Jesus had done for me. But Jesus was making me miserable.

My evangelistic duties did bring enjoyment, at times. Just a couple of blocks west of the Center were the brownstone houses of Hell’s Kitchen. Three to six story walk ups. Cracked side walks. Stoops a couple of steps up from the street. I was responsible for knocking on doors there, to invite them to The Ark, to share with them gospel literature.

People opened their doors, welcomed my visits. I reveled in the rawness of their lives, the openness of their conversation. But there were no conversions.