{"id":"01KG6FJ3CTHMH8NT7E4ZRT8RPR","cid":"bafkreifityrb6zqv3mnhrncq54g56gn6zc5qah7avdlum2ttpkqo6cuyeq","type":"file","properties":{"cid":"bafkreif7rw7fe2chfmvj4a7zw24hxrplgqmmb4cvh3mtgvn5ggetbdklqu","content_type":"image/jpeg","filename":"Rye_page_0106.jpg","height":2400,"key":"pdf-page-1769744174309-8485hio6fk6","label":"Rye_page_0106.jpg","page_number":106,"pdf_type":"born_digital","size":823870,"text":"stomach. Anyway, I got over it, and I figured I'd feel better if I had something to eat. So I\nwent in this very cheap-looking restaurant and had doughnuts and coffee. Only, I didn't\neat the doughnuts. I couldn't swallow them too well. The thing is, if you get very\ndepressed about something, it's hard as hell to swallow. The waiter was very nice,\nthough. He took them back without charging me. I just drank the coffee. Then I left and\nstarted walking over toward Fifth Avenue.\nIt was Monday and all, and pretty near Christmas, and all the stores were open. So\nit wasn't too bad walking on Fifth Avenue. It was fairly Christmasy. All those scraggy-\nlooking Santa Clauses were standing on corners ringing those bells, and the Salvation\nArmy girls, the ones that don't wear any lipstick or anything, were tinging bells too. I sort\nof kept looking around for those two nuns I'd met at breakfast the day before, but I didn't\nsee them. I knew I wouldn't, because they'd told me they'd come to New York to be\nschoolteachers, but I kept looking for them anyway. Anyway, it was pretty Christmasy all\nof a sudden. A million little kids were downtown with their mothers, getting on and off\nbuses and coming in and out of stores. I wished old Phoebe was around. She's not little\nenough any more to go stark staring mad in the toy department, but she enjoys horsing\naround and looking at the people. The Christmas before last I took her downtown\nshopping with me. We had a helluva time. I think it was in Bloomingdale's. We went in\nthe shoe department and we pretended she--old Phoebe-- wanted to get a pair of those\nvery high storm shoes, the kind that have about a million holes to lace up. We had the\npoor salesman guy going crazy. Old Phoebe tried on about twenty pairs, and each time\nthe poor guy had to lace one shoe all the way up. It was a dirty trick, but it killed old\nPhoebe. We finally bought a pair of moccasins and charged them. The salesman was very\nnice about it. I think he knew we were horsing around, because old Phoebe always starts\ngiggling.\nAnyway, I kept walking and walking up Fifth Avenue, without any tie on or\nanything. Then all of a sudden, something very spooky started happening. Every time I\ncame to the end of a block and stepped off the goddam curb, I had this feeling that I'd\nnever get to the other side of the street. I thought I'd just go down, down, down, and\nnobody'd ever see me again. Boy, did it scare me. You can't imagine. I started sweating\nlike a bastard--my whole shirt and underwear and everything. Then I started doing\nsomething else. Every time I'd get to the end of a block I'd make believe I was talking to\nmy brother Allie. I'd say to him, \"Allie, don't let me disappear. Allie, don't let me\ndisappear. Allie, don't let me disappear. Please, Allie.\" And then when I'd reach the other\nside of the street without disappearing, I'd thank him. Then it would start all over again as\nsoon as I got to the next corner. But I kept going and all. I was sort of afraid to stop, I\nthink--I don't remember, to tell you the truth. I know I didn't stop till I was way up in the\nSixties, past the zoo and all. Then I sat down on this bench. I could hardly get my breath,\nand I was still sweating like a bastard. I sat there, I guess, for about an hour. Finally, what\nI decided I'd do, I decided I'd go away. I decided I'd never go home again and I'd never\ngo away to another school again. I decided I'd just see old Phoebe and sort of say good-\nby to her and all, and give her back her Christmas dough, and then I'd start hitchhiking\nmy way out West. What I'd do, I figured, I'd go down to the Holland Tunnel and bum a\nride, and then I'd bum another one, and another one, and another one, and in a few days\nI'd be somewhere out West where it was very pretty and sunny and where nobody'd know\nme and I'd get a job. I figured I could get a job at a filling station somewhere, putting gas","text_extracted_at":"2026-01-30T03:36:14.309Z","text_extracted_by":"pdf-processor","text_has_content":true,"text_source":"born_digital","uploaded":true,"width":1855},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KFHMJM2J9JHQAQM1Q9SKBJWF","predicate":"derived_from"},{"peer":"01KFF1K6A8V452X8SQKY55DD16","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG6FJ3DFA4YYYCGBGVZ7E9XP","predicate":"prev"},{"peer":"01KG6FJ3D3248ACZC5ZRNYJG2Z","predicate":"next"},{"peer":"01KG6FNQE0E9KNQXXG9MJ0RFY6","peer_label":"Rye_page_0106_medium.jpg","peer_type":"file","predicate":"has_derivative"},{"peer":"01KG6FNTSDSHF1MJR3YJNJKA12","peer_label":"Rye_page_0106_thumb.jpg","peer_type":"file","predicate":"has_derivative"},{"peer":"01KG6FT59BXAZ3C5HRJ6SW8F58","predicate":"has_assembly"}],"ver":6,"created_at":"2026-01-30T03:36:14.490Z","ts":"2026-01-30T03:40:42.680Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFFC4A8W8939TXGEXCK439ZK"}}