2001-03-20 - 11:59 p.m.

Stone Giants

In order to help me with my chess class, another local chess teacher got me some simple chess software designed for kids. The disc are very cheap and he agreed to just give me four of them if I would come get them from him. He lives about an hour away, but early this morning he was going to be in Albany, about halfway between our two houses, so I agreed to meet him there.

He was doing some sort of lawyerly arbitration and he was doing it in the Common Council chambers in the Albany City Hall.

I've lived in this area all my life, but I've never gone in the government buildings that populate the far reaches of downtown Albany. All within sight of each other you have the State Capital Building, The Albany City Hall, The Governors Mansion, and so on.

Now, what do you get when so many important buildings are packed into a very small area? That's right, you get hellish parking. I made a point of getting there early and every square inch of curb space was taken up by one sort of vehicle or another. Every parking lot seemed to be for Official Use Only. I drove in circles for about fifteen minutes, looking for a parking space. While I was doing this I was looking at all the old, official-looking buildings.

Most of the buildings in this are were built in the 1800s when houses of government were built to impress. Lots of heavy stone, marble, copper and brass went into the making of these buildings. It gives them a presence that is utterly lacking in the impersonal glass and steel monstrosities that make up most skylines these days.

I was starting to worry that I was going to miss my appointment so I decided to park in the place of last resort: an immense eight-story parking garage attached to the big hotel downtown. They were charging $5.50 (ouch) for a half hour, but better to pay than miss my appointment.

However, once inside the parking garage I was astonished to find that it seemed to be almost completely full, even at those usurious rates. I finally had to park on the very top level, out under the open sky. On the way up I was very annoyed to keep finding half-parking spaces because people with SUVs kept taking up a space and a half. Grrr.

Once down on the street I must have been gawking like a yokel at all the stolid 19th century buildings. I was dressed casually while everyone else I passed on the street seemed to be dressed in business suits - no doubt all of them were legislators or aldermen or somesuch. They seemed completely at ease, wandering among these stone giants. Adding to the eerie feeling was the fact that the plaza was almost deserted - it was 9:30 a.m. and everyone was probably settling in at work.

I found the Albany City Hall and went inside. The interior was all pale marble, and the scale of the place seemed to be designed to dwarf ordinary mortals, I felt like a child again because everything was outsized.

I found the Common Council Chambers on the second floor. It looked rather like a library at an ancient university - A wall of books was along one wall and there were dozens of desks made of dark wood, each with its own little green desk lamp. Once again, I was impressed with the opulence of the chamber: everything seemed to be made of brass and marble.

I found my friend at one of the back tables. The dispute he was mediating didn’t look to be going well - the guys seated at either side of the table didn’t look very happy. He gave me the discs and I went on my way. It must have taken all of two minutes.

A few moments later I was back on the roof of the parking garage, getting in my car. I noticed that at this level I was almost even with the top floor of the City Hall and the other massive buildings. Once again I was aware of the presence of the buildings around me, like I was being watched by them. Just because I was high enough to look them in the face, so to speak, I didn't have any illusions that I was their equal. They were here long before I was and they'd be here long after I was gone.

Am I weird to feel like this about a simple trip to city hall? Maybe I shouldn’t be allowed out of the house before 10 a.m.