Tuesday, May 04, 2004

911 and generosity over-extended

I suspect that 911 had an effect on me more so than I realized then. There was a keen desire to be generous especially around that time, throughout the city. It was right around this time I'd met Shareef Jenkins, the original founder of FUEL Model Management. He'd originally approached me about taking me on as a model, but I was more interested in helping him build the company, since that was where my professional experience lay in. It was around this time that I met John Antaramian and Michele Alfonso, two good souls.

Which was why, aside the work I'd begun to put into the company, I'd bought the agency a printer/fax/scanner on the company's behalf and even brought in my old TV/VCR to the office/live space as a gesture of generosity. I'd helped them design logos, the web site, and even went as far as delivering packages myself. One of the many things I regret is getting the agency involved in the lives of Kylee & Mike, with whom I was friends with for a little over two years at that point.

For whatever shady reasons, FUEL no longer could stay in its original office at 119 West 23rd Street. They were desperately seeking another space, and I happened to know that Kylee & Mike were looking for sublettors for their apartment on 8th Street in the East Village, because they had just moved into a new building. I connected Shareef to Kylee and they agreed to let Shareef move into their space.

Fast forward to December. By this time, Jeremy Tick had joined the team -- I believe he came down to NY around Thanksgiving that year. Shawna McBean, who had just gotten a Courvoisier campaign, had suggested we take the agency cut from her check, despite the fact the agency didn't book the job for her, so that that money would help in setting up the agency. One December morning, I touched base with the people at the office/apartment, and Shareef had apparently disappeared after having gone off to run some errands. I show up at the office, and at this point, it is 6PM. Shareef had been missing for the entire day. We'd attempted to call Shareef, but the cell phone was going to voice mail.

At about 8PM, we receive a call from Shareef's friend in Philadelphia, informing us Shareef was there with him and that he didn't want to talk to anyone. We scramble to figure out what is going on -- we manage to find out recent bank activities and discover that Shareef had spent the $7,000 or so of the Courvoisier check in its entirety within a matter of a week. Not good.

I then receive a frenetic call from Kylee. Apparently, rent hadn't been paid since October, and the landlord was threatening to sue Kylee & Mike.

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All text © 2004
Posted @ 22:50
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Sunday, May 02, 2004

9/11

I will say, that, living where I do, sandwiched between Bellevue Hospital and the Armory (which became the crisis center for the missing), the amount of missing peoples notices in the neighborhood, pasted on walls of buildings, telephone poles, cars, even the pavement, became somewhat overwhelming, and that is aside the strong military presence with the hum-vees parked all along my street, side-by-side with the news vans. It was a painful month -- that is aside the fact that an acquaintance, who was in WTC1 and managed to get out in time, only to be dragged into a side alley and raped. It was truly one of the worst, stressful times in my life, although it was heartening to see the city come together in a way that this city has never done in my memory.

Of course, WTC was a big deal for me personally as well, since I was born in 1973, and the twin towers were the big topic of town as I was growing up. Thankfully, there were no one I knew personally in the towers, except for a childhood friend who had just joined the Fire Department, who was on WTC7 when it collapsed -- he was fine, save for some minor eye injuries...

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All text © 2004
Posted @ 23:29
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Prelude to Jeremy Tick...Hail Jeremy Tick!

Jeremy Tick...what a piece of work. I guess the best way to demonstrate how he would certainly make an excellent study for the psychiatric community is to start from the day that I got introduced to him.

Which would be the year 2001. What a year that was -- I was working for Andersen Consulting at the time, after they'd just won the big lawsuit with its former parent company, Arthur Andersen. Although bitter about the fact that Andersen Consulting (which became Accenture as part of the settlement) lost its box seats to all the hockey games to Arthur Andersen, I was happy to be there as Accenture was gearing for its IPO. I'd received a fair share of grants as I'd been hired in laterally at a relatively high position.

Then came September.

I was letting a friend of mine's little brother, J. Harry Edmiston (whose sister, Pandora is gorgeous, btw, and was best friends through tennis camp with a high school friend of mine, Teru Bower...Harry has since been working on an interesting project, the British Luxury Council) stay with me for the summer. He came running into the apartment yelling: "the Twin Towers are gone!" I had no idea what he was talking about, but given his sense of urgency, I turned the TV on. I don't necessarily know if I want to go into the tragedy of that day and how it has affected the city and myself here, since I don't believe I can do its magnitude any justice.

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All text © 2004
Posted @ 22:22
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