A Primer on Times Square

“WAKE UP PEOPLE”. The large red billboard advises the public. It’s telling us to wake up. To smell the coffee, as it were. But why is this an ad for the new Nokia phone? Across the street, another billboard from Virgin Mobile responds with “YOU RULE”. The large black print lies sprawled across the side of a glass building. The neon lights of Times Square are reflected on its walls and, slightly blurred, are the words “WAKE UP PEOPLE”. I am standing in the middle of the shifting crowd, it is night-time - around ten - and Times Square is screaming at me from all directions, praising me, commanding me, its billboards transformed into orators of truth, justice and the American way. Maxwell Games assures me that this is indeed “WHERE PERFORMANCE LIVES”. This billboard leers down at me from its vast height and I have a sudden vision of it breaking free of whatever screws are holding it in place, a vision of it crashing to the ground right on top of me.

I am standing in the middle of the shifting crowd, it is night-time.

“PUT OUT THE GOOD STUFF”. The dancing peanut with his top hat and cane is smiling at me. There is a giant bottle of Corona Extra sitting beside the peanut, a fresh lime clings to the inside of the glass which floats, shadow less on a blank canvas. I can almost taste the lime in my mouth, the sweet flavour on my tongue. Heineken assures me that it is “IRRESISTIBLE”. I am still. I am like the stone in the middle of a stream. The neon lights leave spots in my vision as I blink. “IT’S BRIDGESTONE, OR NOTHING”. Is it this, or nothing?

I am still. I am like the stone in the middle of a stream.

“EXPERIENCE THE MAGIC ONE LAST TIME”. I see the Beast embracing the Beauty, they are gazing into each other’s eyes, they exist only for each other. How sweet that kind of dependence can be. I want to experience the magic, but from where I stand, I wonder why this has to be the last time. I wonder if Times Square is the future and the rest of the world the past with me caught in the middle. I wonder if this feverish consumerism will soon engulf the magic of the world. Times Square responds by telling me that “YOUR POINT OF VIEW MATTERS”. It reassures me that it “BELIEVES IN HIPS, NOT HIPBONES”. But I see through that half a centimetre of poster board. I see beyond it to the sky-high buildings and rapidly rising real estate prices. I see the sweatshops in China that produced the clothing that I’m wearing, those shoes, these earrings, this purse. I know that we really do believe in hipbones.

I wonder if this feverish consumerism will engulf the magic of the world.