New Roosevelt Islander Has Pity for Time Warner Building Residents

A new Roosevelt Island resident has this to say about Roosevelt Island in the NY Observer.

Sometimes I don’t even leave my room and just stare out the window. We pity Manhattanites, even that hedge fund guy who lives on top of the Time Warner building. We’ve been playing tennis—six courts right outside our door.

As well as this:

And the kind of people Roosevelt Island attracts—a friend of mine went for a bike ride on Roosevelt Island and it was so strange, because you see completely opposite ends of the spectrum. She rode past a beautiful family of people speaking French, these adorable perfectly-dressed angelic children, and then right beyond them, there was a group of people having a big cookout and my friend heard shouting, a wife or girlfriend yelling at her boyfriend or husband: “All you do is sit around and drink all day and watch the game!” and it was kind of ghetto-like. And you have all the people who are in rehabilitation on the island, tons of wheelchairs, and there’s one nice guy who lives on a gurney—“the Gurney Man.” And then there’s “Party in a Wheelchair,” he’s kind of like Radioman but in a wheelchair, with James Brown blasting. Every time you see him, it’s the same thing, in the middle of the ecological sanctuary, this protected garden like space—beautiful wildflowers, and you’ll see a child flying a kite, and seagulls will fly over—and here comes Party in a Wheelchair, zooming past at Mach speed. The other day I got on the tram, and it was packed, body to body—and it was kind of hot, it was gross—and the doors shut, and I realize there is a guy in a wheelchair on there, and he had one of these machines that says insults, profane insults: `Fuck you! You’re an asshole!’ I can’t remember the other one, but over and over, the entire ride. Finally, the tram landed and everyone was like, “Oh, phew,” and I got on the little red shuttle bus that takes you to our building—he got on there, too, and he kept on playing this thing the entire time.

Maybe we are becoming cool.
Image is from The Shops at Columbus Circle.