Day One

Well, check in was easy, we boarded and left on time. the plane was nice, great seat, the drugs worked and the super-sweet, super-camp NY steward told me i was "Sooooo Cute" - it's started.

We landed, and it took two hours to get through immigration. I thought i was going to get the third degree from the very stern official when i said i was staying for two months, but when he asked me what i do, and i said i was a singer, writer and landlord, he said 'way cool' the officer next to him started cracking jokes and I WAS IN!

Slight turn of luck.... I had written down all the vital numbers and addresses I needed to get to my first night's accommodation in the super efficient file with all my bank, passport and insurance details....and left the whole lot on the 'side' when I was making sure I had organised myself properly before arriving tired, anxious and alone in NYC. These numbers were especially important as there would be no reception at my accommodation - you had to call them half an hour before you arrived, then they would send someone there to let you in. FUCK. So, as predicted, I am tired, the Valium has worn off and left me with a headache and a raging thirst. I am alone and stranded with no way of getting to my sanctuary, hells bells, I don't even know where in Brooklyn it is.... I don't even know where Brooklyn is. FUCK.

It's a long bus ride into Manhattan from Newark I tell you. My teeth are still very tight. I get off the coach, get my bags and think, right, crying isn't going to help so just start walking, New York will either take care of you or kill you, either way the 'no plan plan' is active.

I just start walking. Dragging them leaden bags and a heavy heart I head to Grand Central Station hoping there'll be a place to get into my emails. Hope comes sooner than expected; as I pass Starbucks I see a little wifi sign in the window - inside I find my first NY angel by the name of Vanessa, a tiny ray of light just like Rosie Perez who does every thing in her power to help me, but it's a fail on the email front. I will never forget Vanessa. Closer to defeat I head back into the outside world and feel like the Midnight Cowboy.

There's still no point in crying. When you're down, look up.... THE HYATT!!! hahaha, if they can't help, fuck, I'll just have a room, Brooklyn feels so very far away. Three men help me with my bags in the revolving door and the concierge has the number of my Royal Apartment in seconds. She writes it down on a small piece of paper and presses it into my hand. I close my fingers around it and call them from the front desk at the Hyatt. Hallelujah, I'm heading home.

K! TAXI! NO CHANCE! FUCK! The subway in rush hour from Grand Central to Brooklyn it is then. FUCK. I know I turn around ten times on the sidewalk, I think I was literally spinning, but spinning was not going to get me to my sanctuary so down the steps to the subway I go. My first experience of the ridiculous MTA intercom system leaves me non the wiser on how to get to my destination, but to tell you the truth, I had no idea where I was going anyway, I just got on a train that said Downtown Brooklyn.

I don't know why but I got off at Atlantic Avenue, hauled them two suitcases up the stairs and surfaced into another world. I was so weary by this point I felt no fear, even though the area seemed edgy, I just wanted a taxi or a quick death.

I was taken care of by two elderly taxi guys and whisked off towards Coney Island. I arrived at my Regal Apartment; a huge crumbling art deco building divided into studios with the institutional feel of a once sophisticated building that's lost it's way, and is slightly embarrassed by it's faded grandeur. The driver puts me out and with a kind but apprehensive smile nods to the Building. I walk up to the huge doors and go inside. The foyer is utterly plain and painted mental hospital green. The alcove where the concierge would have sat with a warm "welcome home Ms Wallace" greeting was long vacated, the only sign of life I could hear was from the continual bagging of doors in the cavernous hallways, and the presence of a small Hispanic man who is behind me.

The small Hispanic man does not speak English but we establish that he has the keys to my sanctuary, and he has been waiting a very long time for me. I have many questions like how do I get the Internet? How do I lock the door? how does everything work? What time is check out? Do I just leave? What do I do with the key? Does the front door bang all night? but he doesn't know the answers to any of these questions and the owners are not here as it is passover. FUCK. I am frazzled, unravelled but I got sanctuary. I nip out to the nearest shop I can find, the place is so quiet and I am a stranger in strangeville. I go into the store and the young guy looks at me like I am lost, together we get a meal of Melba toast, Philadelphia cream cheese and two pears for me and we laugh at the strangeness of my purchases and presence. I go back to my room that looks like something out of the movies and eat, shower and wash my hair. There now, all trace of England is gone, I am now covered in New York. I am EXHAUSTED but I think I've missed my slot, relief is not found, it's too late and either my pear is poisoned or it's all been too much but the night is spent throwing up and freaking out.

Still, I am here, and whatever else I'm in New York for the next two months with out a plan, a friend or a clue what to do.

Day Zero

It's two minutes to the day I leave for New York and I can't tell you how I feel. I can tell you this though, my teeth fit tight, and this time tomorrow I will not be in Bristol, I'll be in Brooklyn, alone.

One endless night three weeks ago I was lying alone in a freezing cold, lumpy, superking-sized bed with it's own second hand residue of cigarette smoke, in a freezing cold rented room, in a miserable tiny house in St George, Bristol. I decided the time had come.

I had left London on a similar impulse a year earlier. It had taken two weeks to decide, rent out my flat, pack up my stuff and drive away from my life that had ended in Docklands. At 5.15pm on the 14th of December 2008 I set off in my Transit into the night.

I was going to sit out the winter in Dorset hatching a Grand Plan. I realised I had made a terrible mistake within 20 minutes of arriving in Tincleton, a tiny town twinned with Darkness. By February I was living in Bath, better but still no biscuit. By March I had moved to Bristol with Le Plan - I was going to be a country singer and go to New York with a Show next Spring.

Bristol, the birth place of the Crustafarian, is awash with Cider, home to Ketamin, ruled by dub step and the streets smell of skunk, but it was very kind to me. Even though it wasn't interested in me painting the town white, the people are warm and gentle, and several musical car crashes and incarnations later "One Night At Betty's" was born with the darling Jimmy The Fingers at the keys.

One year to the day of arriving in Bristol I was leaving. I had found new friends, old friends, and a future in Vintage American Cabaret. [holds guitar in air] "Good Night Bristol".