This past afternoon I gave a tour to a cool family from Long Beach.
I was waiting for them outside Di Palo's when two 60ish year old women in expensive clothes walked by and started talking about Di Palo's. I encouraged them to go inside, and as they headed inside one of them said "I was here ten years ago on a food tour."
"It's a great spot," I said.
"Is it yours?" she asked.
"No, I'm leading a food tour."
"You're kidding."
"I'm not."
"Get out. What's your tour called?"
"Bagels, Dumplings, Pizza, and Tacos. My website is wandering.nyc."
"That's crazy," she said.
I didn't tell her how an hour earlier, at Economy Candy, one of my group had asked me if Economy had any Mexican candy, and as I was walking over to ask, the woman behind the counter was telling another customer where the Mexican candy was. I asked her how often somebody asked her this. She said never.
Coincidence?
Of course.
But what is a coincidence?
I held the door to Di Palo's for these two women and we all three went inside, and they went over to the counter where one of my guests was buying some cheese and salami, and they all got to talking.
I milled around with the kids from the group for a minute or two - while one of the guys drank an entire quart of chocolate milk - and then the two women came back and started talking to me again.
Somehow we got on the subject of yesterday's election.
They were disgusted that Zohran Mamdani had won.
"He won Manhattan," I said.
"No, he didn't," they both said in unison. (He did.)
"It was the boroughs," one of them said accusingly.
Then they asked me who I voted for.
Decision.
Do I chase the business (they seem interested in my tour), or do I tell the truth?
My favorite thing about myself is that I will tell the truth, even when it's inconvenient for me. I don't do it all the time, but I do it a lot more than most people. I speak honestly even to my detriment because I KNOW that if we told the truth more often, and received the truth when other people spoke it, the world would be a wildly cooler place.
But these rich Manhattan ladies were testing me. Because they only care about the world working for them. Truth - and other people's points of view - are irrelevant.
Would I kowtow to their false reality, and pretend that Mario Cuomo was anything but a step backwards for New York City? Or would I tell the truth, and own my vote for Mamdani? I'm hopeful he can overcome some of the inertia of government, but I don't think he has any hope of overturning the stranglehold that private equity has on Manhatt - I mean everything.
Mamdani is still a long way from becoming mayor. Cuomo will get all the money in the world from the real estate creeps and run as a third party candidate, and they will play as dirty as they can to make sure Mamdani doesn't actually win. I've got 3 glossy mailers in my recycle pile urging me not to vote for Mamdani (which is a pretty good sign that I should).
In the end, I'm glad that these women will never contact me. I don't want to spend my time propping up their idiot bubble. But I am also sad, because they have enough resources to buy their way into a false reality, where they only have to interact with people who agree with them, and they have no idea why the people who fold their laundry and make their lattes would want anything to change.
Willful blindness is a helluva drug. 👍
