The city and the country – 7 – July 16 2014

His ‘daily Gethsemane’ was what the great John Cheever called his Long Island to Manhattan commute, from the mid-century suburbia he immortalized to the thronging Main Concourse of Grand Central Terminus which features memorably in a number of his stories. Mine is more down at heel: from the Port Authority to Flatbush Avenue terminus and back to the Port Authority, magnet to the lost, the mad, the desperate, to prophets and highwaymen, pickpockets and seekers after love or a dollar.

I’ve never been able to resist the eyes of these leeches, whether on the streets of Marrakech or New York City. They know I am their kin, their longlost friend. I know it too. Once, as I cycled through London’s Camden Town, an elderly lady stepped off the curb and accosted me. ‘Will you look after me,’ she recited, ‘and take responsibility for me?’ She knew this was my earthly portion, whether I accepted it in this case (I didn’t) or not.