Matthew Gallaway

The City Plants Project (Evening Light)

The best part of summer is getting home from work and sitting in the garden, where the light is generally gone except for about thirty or forty seconds when a few beams of dying sun somehow find their way in and illuminate all of the plants and cats. 

The City Streets Project (Monday)

It's still hot and humid, but there's a muted quality to the light in late July that tells you that fall is on the way.  

The Sunday Morning Report (Garden Walks)

The Project Involving Drops of Water (Garden Metaphors)

The weather today is overcast but cool, which after the past month or so is actually a relief. As I do most mornings when I'm home, I started the day with a stroll through the garden, where I checked in on the plants.  Some of them were laughing about the angry queen/"look at all these countries I used to own" meme that materialized out of last night's opening ceremonies.  
Some of them didn't even know that the Olympics had started.  And some didn't even know what the Olympics are. 
The garden always offers a very diverse array of perspectives, in other words.  Meanwhile, the drops of water were busy trying to figure out what to do next. 


They seemed to be everywhere, and there was no denying their beauty, but they also seemed a bit aimless and distracted, lacking the purpose of the storm that had brought them here in the first place.  I was reminded of non-heterosexuals in the current era, when after the first and second-wave storms of Stonewall and AIDS there seems to be a fractured quality to our collective third-wave existence. Should we be protesting idiotic corporations? Should we be making art? (Should this art be "gay"?) Should we be resisting absorption into the restrictive mores of mainstream, heteronormative culture? Thirty or forty years ago, to be openly gay seemed to offer an identity in opposition to something massive and belligerent but relatively obvious, namely those who wanted to deny our right to exist (or who wanted to kill us), whereas now to be gay seems to just scratch the surface of something bigger but amorphous, something arguably even more frightening or dangerous than homophobia or inequality under the law. To be gay is less inherently political than it used to be, meaning that it doesn't automatically confer the status of an outsider, that in fact, you might be very openly gay and a big part of the problem, undefined as it is. I'm not just thinking of Log Cabin Republicans, either, but of the hordes of mostly young gays I see (both IRL and online) who seem to be very angry (and with good reason), but oddly oblivious to their anger, as if they are possessed by demons they have yet to identify, let alone understand.  I don't envy them. 

Every generation needs to define itself. Mine was raised on fear and political anger that has now left us exhausted, unwilling to do much more than to sit on the edge of these trembling leaves of existence and take in as much (or as little) of the world as possible.
As always, it will be interesting to see what happens next.
Or maybe I'm just imagining this unrest, this sense of being pushed over a steep cliff and tumbling into a very different and dangerous unknown.    

Life on the Other Side of the Street (Opening Ceremonies)

Almost every day when I walk home from the subway, I notice a tree on the other side and think to myself, that's the best-looking tree on the block. You might even say it's a gold-medal tree. I usually don't take a picture of it, though, because I'm stuck under some scaffolding or because it's hard to get a good shot with all of the cars in the way. Today, however, I decided to cross the street, where I introduced myself to the tree.  As usual, the tree was looking great, but like most trees in Washington Heights, it was not at all pretentious, so we spent a few minutes chatting about all the new construction on the block. We agreed that it was nice to see some change after so many years of abandonment and stagnation. The tree was also excited about all the new trees that have been planted in the neighborhood as a result of the city's One Million Trees program, although it expressed some fears about whether very many of them would live for very long. The streets are never an easy life, as the stray cats will tell you.

After a while I continued down the block, where everything from this new perspective looked familiar but strange, like I was in a dream.  The flag on the firehouse was wrapped around the pole to protest the corporate hijacking of the Olympics. 

Most of the architecture in Washington Heights is boycotting the Olympics, as I learned from some of the buildings across the street. 
I wondered if they would have any regrets in a few years, once they were middle aged and beyond the age of competition, but they seemed very dedicated to the cause. Sometimes it's good to look outward, they admitted, but at other times it's better to shine a light on problems closer to home.  

A Short Story about Clouds of Fear (Flying Snakes)

As the sky grew dark, everyone in the garden prayed that it was just a storm of rain, and not a cloud of flying snakes.  "I'm prepared for either option at this point," said Dante. "I'm not happy about it, but that's life." Yet even as he settled into the weeds, he wondered about the extent of his conviction and realized that a part of him wanted to give up, or at least let fate take its course. 
As Zephyr watched the sky, Dante felt his attention wandering.   Zephyr seemed to read Dante's mind. "I used to think that by the time I reached this point in my life," said Zephyr, "I would be done worrying about flying snakes. But it never really stops, does it?" 
"I don't understand why this is news to you," said Elektra. "Flying snakes are a part of life. Deal with it." Elektra sometimes wondered if anything she said resonated with Zephyr, but rather than engage him in conversation, she decided to focus on the hellebores, which reflected that last of the dying light.   At different points in their lives, each of the cats had envied the unwavering tranquility of the plants, no matter how great the apparent danger.   "I would love to be a fern in my next life," said Zephyr.  "Oh my god snakes!" cried Dante, whose earlier doubts did not prevent him being genuinely startled by the imminent prospect of his death.  
"I don't see anything," said Zephyr.  "That's because you need to open your eyes for a change," said Elektra, still frustrated by her earlier exchange with Zephyr, but unwilling to let him suffer at the hands of flying snakes just to prove a point. 
As they had done so many times before, the three cats set aside their philosophical differences and stood guard in silence.  Time passed and there were no attacks. 
"Do you ever think that we should spend less time worrying about fears given how infrequently they actually materialize?" As the oldest of the three, Dante sometimes regretted the more dogmatic nature of his youth. "When's the last time we actually saw a flying snake?"  "I'd like to be less worried, but I'm not sure it's something you can just turn off," said Zephyr. "I'm also not ready to be eaten alive by a flying snake, either. You can pretend all you want, but can you really eliminate the fear? Would you even want to?" 
"Better safe than sorry," said Elektra, who was surprised to find herself agreeing with Zephyr.  Now that the danger was gone, however, she realized that her words felt slightly hollow, as if she were uttering a political slogan that had no bearing on her actual life. Not that she was about to admit to lacking confidence after expressing skepticism for Dante's position. She sighed and admitted to herself that she felt very alone. 
She decided to say nothing as the light returned and turned the air to gold. 

The George Washington Bridge Project (La Marina)

Last night with a group of friends, I went back to La Marina, the swank new island resort/nightclub on Dyckman Street in Inwood. No joke, it was hard to tell if we were in New York City or the Bahamas. Or well, at least after a few three-berry frozen mojitos.  

In the Weeds: The Mid-Summer Crisis (Outtakes)

I wrote a new piece for the Awl on introducing some color into our (very green) mid-summer garden. Click through to read, and below find some pix of the bignonia, clematis, and cosmos (in that order) that didn't make the cut. 

The City Streets Project (Monday)

This afternoon the sky grew very murky.
Outside the buildings sweated dust in the dull heat.
Someone get me a drink of water, please.
Ugh, why did I make the decision to lug two giant suitcases down Broadway?


The humidity drained all the color from the street level.
The New York Times building was impassive.
The subway on 42nd Street beckoned.   The train took me north to Washington Heights, where I was released. 

Cats Versus Evil Flying Orchids (Science Fiction)

Dante: Orchids are okay I guess...except when they attack.  Elektra: Orchids can attack? Since when? 
Zephyr: Since you started spending all your time worrying about flying snakes. 

Dante: There's more than one problem in the world, you know. Check out those little blue orchids buzzing around right now, for example. 


Elektra: They don't seem that scary.  Dante: Oh really? 



Elektra: Well, are you going to take care of them, or should I?  Dante: We're on it! 
Elektra: Nice job, guys.  Dante: Anytime.