The Comfort in Being an Outsider

If I had to choose, I would say my favorite place in New York City is Russ & Daughters, an 'appetizer' that has been on Houston Street on the Lower East Side for four generations. I found Russ & Daughters my freshman year, when I used to just walk. I had no idea what it was, but I loved the sign, especially the neon light-lined salmon. I went inside and I remember being sensorially overwhelmed. There were pristine display cases gleaming with foods I had never heard of before, smells of fish, pickles, chocolate, sounds of numbers being called, orders being shouted, the slap of lox on the wooden counter behind the cases, tissue-thin slices of brilliant pink fish crossing the counter, disappearing into waiting mouths, containers of cream cheese stacking higher and higher. The walls were lined with sardine tins, vintage caviar cans and photos of the neighborhood from the last 100 years. I sensed there was an enormous history here- and there was a sense of order I didn't want to disrupt. There were ways of doing things. There were certain items you did not ask for together. I felt like a stranger. Everyone else seemed to know what to do. What to order. How to order it. I hadn't even taken a number. I didn't even know what a bialy was.

But I wanted to be there. I wanted to find a chair and sit for hours, breathing in the smells of herring, whitefish and unfamiliarity. I was drawn to the difference. I wanted to learn and understand. As I stood, clueless, taking it all in, I noticed the workers behind the cases. They wore crisp white lab coats with embroidered name tags, but they didn't look like I expected they would. Some spoke Spanish to each other; one was named Sherpa. This drew me in even further-how do you find this place if you are from the Dominican Republic...or Nepal? There was something inherently welcoming. Something that said You found us. Come in.

I think I ended up buying a bialy that first time. And I was afraid to ask for cream cheese on it, because I didn't know if that was how it was done. But I knew, as I walked out, that I would be back. I wanted to learn how to be at Russ & Daughters.

Over the next four years, despite its distance from school, Russ & Daughters became an enormous part of my life in new York. I went pretty much once-a-week, at all times of day, and tried as much as I could. I took friends there, but only the worthy ones who I thought would 'get it;' who would feel, as I felt, that there was something about the place that demanded a closer look. I worked on a project for school about Russ & Daughters that introduced me to the current owners and the oldest employees. From then on, I was a known entity: I was recognized, greeted warmly: I belonged. I shot the shit, tasted new salmon and bought a t-shirt. I felt like I became a part of Russ & Daughters, but I remained just one in the sea of people that had their own, regular and distinct relationship with the place. Almost every time I went in, there was someone else also shooting the shit, buying their usual weekend lunch, their breakfast, their holiday fish. I came to love these interactions as much as I loved Russ & Daughters itself.

It was hard to leave Russ & Daughters when I graduated from college. Moving home meant I was farther away, but it remained a required stop every time I went into the city. When I found out I was moving to Kenya, Russ & Daughters was at the top of the list of things I'd miss, in New York or anywhere. I was content to say 'bye for now,' my hands full of pickled tomatoes and everything bagels with scallion cream cheese. It wasn't until my first discouraging day here that my thoughts turned back. I was feeling aimless and unrooted. I thought about what comforted me, and Russ & Daughters came to mind. I needed to find something here that made me feel that same way.

Last Saturday, I went to my regular fruit and vegetable place, but this time I saw it with new eyes. All of my favorite guys were working and I suddenly felt stirrings of the way, almost exactly five years ago, I had felt when I stepped uneasily into Russ & Daughters for the first time. I sat down with a heaping tin bowl of fruit salad, a bag full of produce at my feet and let the place wash over me: the lilting Kikuyu, the soft rumbling of shifting potatoes, music from the street. Customers came and went. The staff stood around, sorted carrots, piled eggplant, forgot me in my corner, and I had a sense of contentedness I haven't yet experienced since coming here. I find a strange comfort in this kind of pseudo-belonging. I'm not sure I will ever find my place, but being content with the interstitial is not a bad place to start.