Lilotchka

Times Square: A big TV, a bunch of outdoor advertising and chain stores you can find anywhere in the United States.

Locals avoid it with almost the same assiduity as empty cabs do, meaning once you’re in, there’s no quick escape.

After all, when faced with a trade-off between doing and buying, many people opt for the material good because “it will still be there” long after the experience would have been enjoyed. In one sense that’s correct: The material good lasts while the experience is fleeting. But psychologically it’s the reverse. We quickly adapt to the material good, but the experience endures in the memories we cherish, the stories we tell and the very sense of who we are.

Experiences are often also more satisfying because we tend to evaluate them on their own terms, not in comparison to what others have. Imagine that you’ve just bought a new computer and are psyched to discover what it can do. Then you hear that a pal just spent less money to buy a computer that has more memory, is faster, and has a longer warranty. How bummed would you be? (We’re guessing plenty.) Now imagine you’ve just come back from 10 days in Tuscany, only to learn that a neighbor spent less for a full two weeks there at a nicer villa. This wouldn’t be pleasant to hear either, but it’s likely you’d get over it quickly. After all, you’ve still got your memories, your photos and your time with loved ones — experiences you’d be unwilling to trade for your neighbor’s trip.

Well, I honestly did have lot of trouble finding work, including even waitressing, but so do lots of people. So needing work and money was only part of my reason for getting into it–the rest was, you know, my issues. It was easy–I just walked by one of those places one day and asked if they were hiring.

There was also a certain laziness involved on my part–I didn’t want to work long hours at a boring job. So I worked short hours at a weird job and had time to pursue other things, including a lot of internships. Whether it was worth the psychological toll it took is still up for debate, and I’m not, you know, recommending my route for anyone else. But that’s what I did, and my book is a story about what happened and what I saw and experienced there in an obscure line of work.

Another time, on the Ta-Dah tour, we were scheduled to play this festival in Germany. We were on before Kraftwerk, and we were not what the minimal house-heads wanted. Everything I said on stage went down like a lead balloon, and I got the feeling nobody understood what I was saying, so I started using the biggest words I could think of. At the end I said: “Thank you for your benign Teutonic countenance,” and I don’t think they got it. After gigs like that I tend to go backstage and beat an inanimate object with a shoe.

- Ana Matronic