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When I got my driver’s license at 31 and started driving alone for the first time, I began encountering two types of potentially dangerous situations about which no friend, instructor, driver’s manual or internet forum had warned me.

Having spent my first thirty years (minus the few before I could walk) as a pedestrian in New York City, I learned to tune out the constant wailing of ambulances and fire trucks. Unless an emergency vehicle was about to cut through my walking path perpendicularly, the siren sound’s only relevance was to make me sometimes wonder what catastrophe had befallen someone who wasn’t me. In highschool, we actually had an assembly where a troupe of performers encouraged us to hear that common car alarm tune that goes from oscillating cries to robot-like beeps to a sort of slide whistle, as a song and they taught us dance moves to go along with each part. Such was the drive to reinterpret sounds of alarm into something benign. In a city as dense as New York, if you don’t learn to at least ignore those noises, you’ll be on edge all the time.

Now, behind the wheel, I still think of the siren as something to tune out, a distant cry in a Law and Order episode. I only really get it once the cars in front of me mysteriously slow down and pull to the side. And then there’s still a slow-motion thought process:

Hey! Wait a minute! What’s that guy doing? What’s that other guy doing? What’s going on? … Oh… Right… Shit! Is there room for me to pullover? I’m not sure!

By the time I slow down and pull to the shoulder or parking lane the ambulance has figured out a way around me and my fumbling maneuver was an empty gesture.

Pulling over to yield to an emergency vehicle is one thing in a manual, it’s another in real life. So far, the scenario has not occurred with enough frequency to break my 30-year habit of ignoring sirens. I hope that writing about it here will make this important rule sink in.

While my first unexpected driving hazard is heralded by a warning sound I should heed but do not, the second hazard functions oppositely. I have SIRIUS satellite radio in my car and I switch back and forth between NPR and BBC. It seems like BBC correspondents are always interviewing people on the street during rush hour. In India, China, London… there is so much traffic that it’s all a driver can do to honk out their frustration. Or, is it a tradition to honk at BBC reporters? I’ve stopped short more than once at an alarmingly urgent beeeep meant for some poor driver on the other side of the earth. But, the more time I’ve spent listening to BBC the easier it’s become to hear these horns as background noise. It’s been far harder to break the habit of not paying attention to very real sirens.

The hazards are not the ambulances or radio programs, but my habits, my non-driver ways of processing sound and confusing real and fake signs of danger.  Much of the California driver’s manual is geared toward teen drivers. Perhaps the DMV should add some instructions specifically for late-bloomer drivers.  I’m sure these dangerous habits will change in time like some of my other pre-Los Angeles habits have. Last time I was back in New York City I had to relearn to jaywalk!

P.S. When you’re taking the road test and you come to a yield sign, crane your neck all the way around really exaggeratedly even if you think you saw out of the corner of your eye that no cars were coming. I just saved you a few points.

Last week I noticed that a mess of leaves and yard debris had accumulated inside the can. I turned it upside down and shook, but nothing came out. I reached my hand in to grab the stuff but recoiled at the feel of something sticky like cotton-candy.

It was time to give the can a good wash. In the kitchen, I ran a lot of precious LA tap-water through it, but the bits of dried leaves and petals stayed suspended in the middle, vibrating slightly. Then, out of the tip of the spout, a big brown spider sidled out, glaring at me with its presence (do spiders have eyes?) for several seconds before hustling back inside.

In a panic, I filled the can with dish washing liquid, ran another minute’s worth of tap water through, shook it violently, and reached in with a paper towel, but everything was still stuck in a sticky, silky, messy web – even the spider. And, I didn’t have the room or the co-ordination to maneuver the paper towel effectively while being grossed out. So, I put the can in the backyard, ceding the territory to the spider, and decided to buy a new watering can.

Actually, I was determined to buy a used watering can to avoid contributing to the proliferation of cheap stuff in the world. I was tempted by many elegant and whimsical designs on eBay, but they were all potential spider houses and I couldn’t pull the trigger. I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised by this whole ordeal. One of the first songs I learned as a child was “The Itsy-Bitsy Spider” but I never understood its real-world implications. Also, the song is not accurate. Water does not wash a spider out.

Then, while shopping for toilet paper at Target, I found the perfect watering can. Its wide open top probably uses less plastic (pat on the back) than most, and its rare anti-spider function will make it a family heirloom. I’d have to neglect it for months before a spider would dare take up residence inside. This less than six dollar can is so exclusive it’s not even listed on Target’s website but you can find it elsewhere by searching for “Arrow Stackable Watering Can.” By the way, this stackable can was made in the U.S.A. of Polypropylene (Plastic #5).

P.S. The new watering can is very difficult to pour without water gushing out everywhere. Still worth it.

For those of you not familiar with Jeremy’s Place, it was the premiere children’s birthday party venue on the Upper East Side when I was little. Jeremy’s Place was run and hosted by Jeremy Sage who played Jesus in Godspell in 1977, and Thomas Garbutt who, during the party, acted as Jeremy’s sidekick, Chief.  Located in a brownstone on East 81st Street (which is now a consignment store) you entered through a gift shop where the birthday kid’s parents picked out the contents of the party favor bags.  My favorite was the glow-in-the-dark spiderweb with suction cups.

Me on stage with Jeremy.

Upon entering the main room, the first thing you saw was a large vitrine holding a complex train set which was running and making noises.  From my childhood memory-

we kids were seated on the floor in front of a red plush stage where Jeremy and Chief performed magic tricks, gags, told jokes, and gave out prizes.  Actually, the birthday kid sat next to Jeremy on stage.  Then we all moved to another area to eat cake, but first the room became dark and a real robot came out and joked with Jeremy, and then there was a dancing hula doll and the birthday parents had to talk into an echoing microphone.

A few years ago I posted some photos on facebook from my two birthday parties at Jeremy’s Place.  I then received a message from a girl I went to Spence with and hadn’t seen for at least ten years, saying she was sorry to inform me that Jeremy had died of A.I.D.S., which he had contracted from his sidekick, Chief.  Now, I hadn’t spoken to this girl in years and didn’t remember her having a dark sense of humor- but still, if you knew what Jeremy’s Place was (despite the creepiness of the Calvin Klein ad), this smelled like an nternet rumor. And it was.

It was 2009 and I set about finding the true whereabouts of Jeremy Sage, whom I had last seen at my 6th birthday party in 1988.

I came across an article in the New York Times, April 2, 1995, (which at one point I somehow figured out was researched by Steven Garbarino years before he was to become editor-and-chief of various publications) which reports that after the pair were “dissatisfied with the standard cookie-cut vomit and plastic-looking doggy do,” Chief (Thomas Garbutt), who it turns out was the technical genius behind the scenes, created a way to “freeze sticky substances with a polyester compound” in order to create better looking fake spills and messes and that Ben & Jerry’s actually uses Sage & Garbutt spills for it’s own gag gift.

At this time, if you visited jeremysplace.com you found an extensive catalog of fake food ranging from baguettes to salad, and a special category of silly spills. Here’s a pic I grabbed when it was up.

Now it appears to be a blog for a temporary fencing and port-a-potty company. It’s really pretty confusing.

In 2009, I found a Jeremy Sage listed in the phone book on East End Ave, near the former Jeremy’s Place.  He did not return my message but I then got confirmation from a family friend of his, that he was alive and well.

I don’t have any updates but just thought I should post this sooner or later.

If you have any of your own Jeremy’s Place memories, please share them below or e-mail me at rebeccaschiffman at gmail dot com.