Naïve Super (17 page)

We are on our way to the Empire State Building. As we approach it, I try to tell my brother how time and gravity are connected, but every time I open my mouth, he raises his right hand and shakes his head to shut me up. While my brother is buying the tickets, I take down the number for a coin-operated telephone on the ground floor: 502 5803. I have a plan. I’m not going to mention it to my brother.

We have to queue to get to the elevator. An elderly lady standing in front of me has a brochure with facts about the building. I peer over her shoulder. It says it’s 443 metres tall and that it has 77 elevators that travel at between 200 and 400 metres per minute. I know very well that the Empire State Building is not the tallest in the world. It’s not even the tallest in New York City.

A few days ago there was an article on skyscrapers in the
New York Times.
It said the Petronas Towers in Malaysia is the tallest building in the world right now. It is the first time in over a hundred years that America hasn’t held the record. Sears Tower in Chicago has for a long time been the tallest, but a body called the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat has just decided that TV aerials are no longer going to count when measuring height, and that makes the building in Malaysia the tallest. Soon the World Financial Center in Shanghai will be finished, and then that’ll be the tallest.

The leader for the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat, Dr Lynn Beedle, refused to call this a sad moment for American architecture, the article said. And he was quoted having said;
No, no, no, there are still many great things about American
buildings. Oh, many, many, great things
.

To me none of this really matters. The Empire State Building is the biggest. It’s the one I’ve seen in movies. It’s the one in the middle of New York City. It’s the one Paul writes about. The other ones can be as tall as they like.

Now we’re taking the elevator. After a few seconds I feel my ears go thick. The digital counter inside the elevator only counts every tenth floor. It goes from fifty to sixty in just a few seconds. Paul should see me now. I feel like clapping my hands.

The view is fantastic. I can see everything. The sea. The city. The mountains on the horizon.

My brother is very systematic. He is taking his time, and he is reading in the guide book about what lies in the various directions. He wants to point and explain, but I move away a little.

I find a phone and make sure my brother can’t see me. I’m dialling the number to the payphone on the ground floor now. It’s ringing. When someone answers, I plan to ask whether he or she is aware that time passes a little faster up here with me than down there with them.

It rings and rings. For a long time. Nobody is answering. It’s bloody annoying. I let it ring just a little longer. Now there’s a man picking up the receiver.

Hello?
he says.

Hello, I’m calling from the top of the building
, I say.

Yes?
says the man.

Are you aware that time runs slightly faster at the top than it does at the
bottom of this building?
I ask.

No, says the man.

Well, it does
, I tell him.

All right
, says the man.

Are you impressed?
I ask.

Not really
, he says.

But that means that time doesn’t exist
, I tell him.

Oh yeah?
says the man.

So what do you think?
I ask.

I couldn’t care less
, says the man, and hangs up the receiver. Idiot.

For revenge I drop a coin into one of the binoculars and focus on the street below. It’s full of people and cars. I see a man coming out of a bank. He is trying to hail a taxi while at the same time glancing at his watch.

He looks like you and me. Completely ordinary. He probably has a wife and kids and a little house in the suburbs. He is doing everything the best he can. I follow him with my gaze, thinking; I can see you, but you can’t see me. We shall never meet, but there is something I want you to know. My time is not the same as your time. Our times are not the same. And do you know what that means? That means that time does not exist. Do you want me to repeat that? There is no time. There is a life and a death. There are people and animals. Our thoughts exist. And the world. The universe, too. But there is no time. You might as well take it easy. Do you feel better now? I feel better. This is going to work out. Have a nice day.

I follow him with my gaze until he disappears. Then I direct my binoculars upward, past the skyscrapers, upward and upward still. To the sky. And I feel the good sensation spreading throughout my entire body.

In a sense this is enough. I can’t force it much further. I have already gained more perspective than I had dared to dream about. I’ve seen enough. Besides, I have things to come home to. Lise. The Owl and the Pussycat phone line. The reply from Paul.

Three things.

Today is our last day in New York. I am buying a toy car for Børre. It is green and can drive across the floor if you wind it up.

Kim is going to get a book about the weather in New York, and for Lise I’m buying a pocket kaleidoscope.

It makes 24 representations of everything I look at. The most trivial things become attractive patterns. I am forced to reassess the way I see things, things that have become so commonplace that I’ve stopped noticing them. My brother, for example. He looks great through the kaleidoscope. Different. Lise will probably be glad when I give it to her. Presents are important. Little presents are often better than big ones. And those in between don’t often amount to much.

On my way back to the apartment, I pass some workers who are cutting down old trees and bushes and planting new ones. Some pretty large trees are lying on the pavement, waiting to be put into the ground. It makes me happy to realise that somebody is thinking about trees in a metropolis like this one.

A bit further up the street, I find a fax with instructions for the workers. It says which trees and bushes are supposed to be cut down, and which ones are supposed to be planted. The fax is lying in the street. There doesn’t seem to be much use for it any more. The workers seem to know what they’re doing. I pick up the fax as I walk past. My grandfather can have it. It will please him to see that somebody in New York is concerned with trees and bushes.

Trees are one of my favourite things. Water and trees and girls.

I used to climb all day long. And often I would just sit there quietly, in a treetop. For several hours. When the foliage was thick in summer, nobody could see me. I could see everybody, but nobody could see me. I felt I was far away. And when I climbed back down, it was almost like returning home after a long journey. And I would make swings. I was dead good at making swings. I would climb up high and tie the rope to a branch. Then I’d swing. And spit. It was always fun to spit while I was swinging. If I’d been drinking milk, the saliva got nice and gooey. I’d spit incredibly long milk wads from the swing. I want to take up swinging again.

The next time I have some money, I want to go to a sports shop and buy fifty metres of climbing rope, and then I want to find a big tree, preferably right by the water, and make a swing with an enormous pendular radius, and maybe jump from the swing into the water. While Lise is watching. I look forward to that.

Now my brother is telling me to hurry up and pack. We are going home. We’re flying home to Norway. I am going home to put my hammer-and-peg to the test.

As I pack the hammer-and-peg, my brother confesses to having borrowed it a couple of times while I was out. In return he wants me to admit that the trip has done me good. I admit that it has. It has done me a lot of good. I’ve seen a lot of things. And I have both thought and not thought.

At my best I have been completely untroubled and pleasantly thought-free. We’ve had a couple of frisbeeing sessions that were almost Zen. I thank my brother for it. And for the whole trip. It hasn’t been cheap. My brother tells me to think nothing of it. I look well, he says. That’s the important thing. Money is not important. Money comes and goes. But brothers are important. Brothers are more important than money, my brother says.

We are on the plane. There is just sea below us. Water. I am full and sleepy. And I have a smile on my face. Something is different.

I still don’t know if things fit together, or if everything will be all right in the end. But I believe that something means something. I believe in cleansing the soul through fun and games. I also believe in love. And I have several good friends, and just one bad one. And my brother is at least as friendly as I am. He’s sleeping now.

I have a window seat this time. It is dark outside. But it will be light before too long. We are flying toward the light.