At booktv. Org or consult your program guide. Now its a look at new york city neighborhoods during the coronavirus pandemic with author bill hayes. Welcome to powerhouse arenas virtual event. My names chris, im the events coordinate ifer, and were happy to be hosting the launch for how we live now with bill hayes. You can buy the book at powerhouse bookstores. Com. The link is in the event page, and it is also posted in the chat. Well send out bookplates is that true . Yep, signed bookplates, and if you have any questions, you can use the q a function at the bottom of your screen, and bill will take your questions at the end of the event. Leapt let me introduce roz chast. She has published more than 1,000 cartoons. She wrote and illustrated the number one bestseller, can we talk about something more pleasant, a National Book critics sir cull award and circle. What i ate from az. Bill hayes is the hour of insomniac city among other books, and a forthcoming history of exercise, sweat, to be published by bloomsbury. He is a frequent contributor to the New York Times. A collection of his street photography, how new york breaks your heart, was published recently. He has completed a screenplay for a film adaptation for insomniac city, and he is coeditor of oliver saks posthumous books. Ill hand it over. Thank you. Huh, billy. Hi, billy. Hey, roz. Hi, everyone, welcome. Huh, everybody hi, everybody. Great to see you, bull lu, and very excited about this billy. Were here to talk about your upcoming book yes. How we live now, and we certainly do. [laughter] i guess i want to start by asking you when did you first realize that this wasnt just like another news story about some virus, that it was actually something that was going to change the way we all live . I think probably towards the very end of february, beginning of march. As i read about it in asia and europe and just felt like it was almost like a tsunami approaching our shores. And sure enough, by the first week of march, it had hit the u. S. Im actually surprised in a way, because its actually kind of great, because i think for me i was very knew e eve, you know . There were so many stories that i hear all, you know, on the news about a virus here, a disease here, and i dont know, like the moss key toe thing, and i just never really thought i never took it that seriously. Lord knows why i was so, you know, blase about it, but i never thought thered ban Ebola Outbreak in the united states, i never gave much thought to the mosquito west nile virus, any of that. Right. So i was much later to realizing the seriousness of it and that it was here. Yeah. Well, how could one ever have imagined what this would become . I mean, yes, i sort of felt like it was coming, and it was going to be serious, and perhaps because i lived through the aids pandemic in the 1980, i lived in san francisco, i moved there in 1985 and experienced that entire pandemic which, of course, has been devastating and continues to this day. There still is not an aids vaccine, and too many people around the world have died of aids. And i think i remember how in the very early days, you know, it spread just basic air travel, International Air travel. And, but, of course, i could never have imagined it would become the Global Pandemic it has become and that we would be on lockdown and stay at home and that our lives would change virtually overnight. Right. And the thing with aids, i think you and i have talked about this a little bit, is that they figured out how, more or less how it was spread. Not at the beginning, you know, because at the beginning there was so much pair now what, like you could paranoia, like you could get it sharing food with somebody. But here we still dont even know with this. We know its breath, we know its respiratory, but, you know, do you remember at the beginning when they talked the about washing down groceries and stuff . Yeah, yeah. [laughter] its awe amazing how much has happened in the past six months, isnt it . Yes. And also how little. And also how little. True, yeah. You know, i mean its a very, very i think were all sort of feeling that. I remember something that one of my kids said in may, he said in talking about just how short of is shrunken their lives have all become. Like we dont travel right. We dont eat out the way we used to, you know, as blithely, we dont go into stores, we and this was back a couple months, but going to the Grocery Store was like, hmm, do i really need that, or maybe i wont go to the grocery and he said its like we all got old at the same time. Thats really a good, good way to put it. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, i think, you know, in some ways i think thats what i tried to capture in this book, how our lives changed virtually overnight in ways we never could have imagined. Yes. And for me to try to capture in realtime what has this been like yes, yeah, i wanted to ask that changes. You keep a journal, right . I do. At the behest of my late partner, oliver saks, god bless him. Really when i first met him in person, i wasnt really writing much in those days, and he said you must keep a journal. And i followed his advice and started a journal in 2009, and i still keep it. Maybe not as closely ive gone through stages. But i did keep a very close journal during the pandemic, and a lot of the material from this book came directly from those journals. You still keeping it . Oh, sure, yeah. Still making notes, and thats really how this book started, just with notes from a journal with. Things i was noticing, things i was hearing or not hearing, how our lives were changing so quickly. At what point did you realize this might actually become a book . Well, i have to give credit to mid editor, nancy miller, whos also your editor and our friend. We share an amazing, brilliant editor, nancy miller. Yeah. Believe me, i had no idea that i would write a book about the pandemic in 2020. And, in fact, at the end of january i completed a draft of a different book, a very different book on the history of exercise called sweat which id been working on for years. And i sent that in to nancy at the end of february, i also finished this screenplay for insomniac city, so i thought i was just going to sit back for a few months and relax and that this would be the year of my book on the history of exercise. But not long into the pandemic after it hit the u. S. , maybe the second week of march or so, i was posting some things on facebook, little vignettes about things i was seeing in my neighborhood or at my bookstore. And as you know, im a photographer, so posting photos. And nancy arranged for facetime meeting. And i thought it was going to be a meeting about talking about this other book, sweat. And instead she said what would you think about writing a short book and photographing a short book about the pandemic . And i was sort of taken aback, but i immediately said, yeah. Yeah, thats a great idea. [laughter] and in retrospect, it feels like a great gift, it was a gift to have this book the work on. Especially in those early days when we were really on lockdown, and i live alone, and it kept me from climbing the walls. I wrote and photographed the book in go months. In two months. Wow. Thats fast for for a book. Yeah. I mean, i know you, and i do books also, and thats, that is fast. And its wonderful, wonderful book. I love especially the way it combines pictures and words. And that, to me, is one of the reasons why i love cartoons and why i love graphic novels and also why i love this book so much, because there is this wonderful its not just with images. Theres, like, a story. Right. Theres a whole story. And its not just separate images and then descriptions of what youre seeing. It places alongside the narrative that, you know, is very moving in a way. I mean, can you talk a little bit about looking out your window . Sure. I mean, the cover of the book shows eighth avenue, which is right out there. I would turn the computer monitor, if i could, completely empty. I think i took the photo april 1st. Now, this is a very, very spooky and unusual sight, because what i was used to was seeing eighth avenue clogged with traffic. And, in fact, i found it very beautiful. I would look out at, lets say, 6 00 and see eighth avenue just a sea of red lights, of brake lights and traffic lights just clogged from here to central park. And, in fact, the first photographs or one of the first photographs in the book is of eighth avenue in december, december 2019. And a few pages later its fouled by eighth avenue followed by eighth avenue completely empty. And throughout the book this sort of before and after yeah. Photos and stories. New york before the pandemic and after. And so those two photos side by side really tell that story. And i think, you know, i think photos can tell stories as well as prose. They absolutely do. I mean, i think thats why for me they appeal so much, because theyre very, they do tell stories. All of your photos tell stories. And a lot of them tell stories of another thing that you and i have in common which is our love of this amazing city. Yeah. I mean, new york, there are people who i think are more they move around and they love the place that theyre in, but they dont loving, they dont have that extreme love for a place. And for me, new york is a sort of magical place. I know i moved out of the city when i had my second kid, and we raised our family, public schools, blah, the usual and also lack of, you know, the funds to bring up two kids in the city. But every time i came into the city, every dime i got every time i got into grand central, ah, i can take off this little suburban hat and just be myself. So, yeah, you were there throughout this whole, this whole thing. I mean, listening to people talk about it a lot, and i think you mentioned in your book the sound, how quiet in march and april. Yeah. I just talked about seeing eighth avenue completely emptied out at rush hour, what would normally be rush hour. But just as eerie but in a certain way kind of beautiful was how quiet it became. Is so quiet, i could hear birds singing. Instead of traffic and horns honking and people, i could hear birds singing, i could hear a single is voice on the street, i could hear someone at the gas station kitty corner from me talking on a cell phone. So that was extraordinary. I mean, its been a tragic and frightening time, but there have been moments of real beauty. That is also what i tried to capture in the book. You did. I mean, theres a real finish kind of quality. Pictures of the city empty, i mean, that was seeing the city from outside those first couple months i didnt come in at all, it was really very scary looking. Your photos, also, of the subway yeah. Did you take the subway at all . When did you take it and what was that like . It was the last time i took the subway before the lockdown which was march 13th, it was a friday, and i had to go puck up some prohibits. I have my photos printed at a printer in long island city, and its a really nice, easy subway ride. On the e train. Yeah. But by that time, things were getting spooky, and i thought about taking a taxi or an uber, and then i thought its such a quick subway ride. Yeah. But inside the car was unlike any id ever experienced. There was this tension. And keep in mind this was before people were wearing masks. But theres a sense that, you know, everyone wanted to keep away from one another. And i remember feeling glad when i got back home. Yeah. And then i didnt take the subway again until, gosh, maybe late june or something . Yeah. It was a while. But, yeah, i did go down into subway stations and enter trains just to take photos. And that was probably one of the spookiest things id ever done because i went deliberately at rush hour when the subway stations would normally be so packed and train would be so packed. Yeah. And they were just empty. So scary. I mean, those were the images that got me so much when with i would be watching, you know, on tv or whatever pick cures of the city in march pictures of the city in march and april, especially in april. This is the train at rush hour, and thered be, like, nobody on it. Right. It was really creepy. Yeah. In fact, you want to look at some photos . Yeah, i would love to. Okay. Ive got a little slide slow. Cool. Quick. Bear with me. [background sounds] there we go. Yeah. Those before and after pictures of eighth avenue, thats awe amazing. Yeah. And there was one subway shot there, in the book itself theres a shot into the l train. And as you know, the l train especially at rush hour can be so packed. It goes from here to brooklyn and back. Yeah. And i i think there might have been three people in the entire line of a train that was idling. So i went in, i took a bunch of pictures very fast. I didnt really want to go on the ride and ducked back out. But i didnt, you know, i did subway photos for a couple of weekends and weeks and then just picked the very best ones for the book. Well, theyre wonderful. You know, its funny, i think the subway probably pretty safe yeah. Right now. We talked about that the other night. You and i had dinner on the Upper West Side which, as we said, dinner outdoors and distanced, and its one of the very few upsides to this whole pandemic, this Outdoor Dining during the summer. Yeah. We both talked about how the subway feels very safe. Yeah, yeah. Ive been riding it recently, and everyone has masks and is socially distanced. Yeah. Its never been cleaner. Yeah. I do feel that the subway is not where im going to get sick e. Right. But i wonder about, i mean, what ive heard from people is that midtown is still pretty empty because people havent right. Gone back to work. Right. I mean, do you have any feelings about or any intuition about how this will, you know, play out . Do you think that people will come back to offices or i, you know, its hard to know and things have changed so quickly, i think that question really depends upon, in some ways depends upon treatment and a vaccine. Yeah, yeah. And, you know, at the same time it has been amazing to see how new yorkers have adapted very quickly. Yeah. To this new normal. Whether at a bookstore or at a restaurant or a shop. Have you seen any, like, things like during this that are just sort of inexplicably just made you weepy . Sure. Sure. I mean, one, one thought that just comes to mind is, you know, theres that that in fact, i write about it in the book, there was a head in the New York Times that said Something Like nows the time to make your own face mask. Because before that they were, authorities were sort of hedging and saying, no, only for frontline are workers, dont hoard them, you dont need to wear a face mask, and then suddenly they were saying wear a face mask, and there were all these videos about how to make face masks. [laughter] and i, i couldnt find a bandanna or scarf [laughter] so i imto vised, and first i tried a vacuum cleaner bag which i cut up [laughter] new, i hope. Yeah, a new one, a clean one. I was is so sick, i couldnt breathe. I said this is going in my time capsule. But i made a face max out of a cloth napkin with shoe laces. Oh, that has a very, that has a lot of connotations to me. Like what . Okay. When i see that, i think of, like, pioneer women and sanitary napkins. [laughter] i mean, its just not good. Its just not good at all. It was a touching moment. Touching or it can be something that just unexplicably reached you. Like, ill tell you whats happened to me. In march, it must have been about the third week in march, and i was already feeling very fragile about all of this, and i started thinking about this is going to sound insane the, not mr. Papaya, one of those, like, its a papaya king grays pa pay ya papaya, thats it, on 72nd and broadway. Probably once a year i buy a hot dog there, if that. Its not like i always go to grays papaya. But it has always been there. Its a new york institution. Its a new york institution, it was there in 1978 when i moved into my apartment, when i moved back part time to the city or back to the upper e west side, its still there, you know . It just made me happy for some reason to see it. And i started to sort of imagine that it was going to go out of business, and i got, like, hysterical weeping. Like, thousands of people dying from coronavirus, no. Grays papaya disappearing, thats what made me cry. I mean, its just its like hysterical crying. I think it was like, for me, it sort of symbolized what new york is going to lose right. And what would not come back. And im happy to say that grays papayas doing very well, so check that one. I know, i know. I i mean, im telling you. Is so check that worry off my list. Right. Well, you know, i think thats something i also tried to capture in sort of before and after and what we have lost probably, you know . In some cases weve probably lost. Hopefully, aspects of new york will come back, but as you read the book, their recollections of subway rides or experiences in crowded bars or in restaurants or a tax su ride, you know . Yeah. Yeah, just discussing the before and after. All the things that we did without really thinking. Right. And it does seem like, i mean, you think of it as like the before time, like before corona, b. C. . I think so. I do think new york will come back. Theres no place like new york and new yorkers. Yes. Yes. For sure. And it will be a different city, but it will come back in a different way, i think. Yeah. Yeah, i mean, i worry about some places that, i mean, its one of the things that i love so much about new york which was going down some weird side street in midtown and running into some shoe store that made orthopedic shoes and, like, everything in the window was covered with dust, but they still were operational, and they had those weird, like, polio shoes. I wonder, like, how is that store going to come back . Yeah. You know . It wont. It wont. And one of the things that made new york, makes new york to special is the sort of layering, you know . You have this, you know, condo or very freshfaced store, you know, for some kind of cosmetic youve never heard of next to orthopedic shoe store thats been there since, i dont know what, the precam by january era or something. And its all mashed together and all different eras, and, you know, a store that just sells, like, dowellies from the doilies from the 1950s, doily supplies. Anyway, i think it is almost time to take some q a. Okay. Paul asks what would a typical journal entry be . For me, a typical journal entry might be well, a couple things. It might be a story. Aning encounter i had on the street. In fact, there are a lot of those in the book. You know, its part of my practice just to, even before the pandemic, to go for a walk, open myself up to chance really, follow the green lights like with no destination in mind. If the light is green, ill go that way. With my camera. And see what happens. See who i mightif meet. See who i might. So in the course of this book meeting three young daughters from nyu who were sitting on a stoop doctors, having dinner and drinks on their stoop. And it was at a moment where no one else was doing Something Like that. So, of cours