You know those nights in a great, great city? Well, New Yorkers, this is for you. I may be a fairly new New Yorker in body, but in spirit, it feels like I've been here since 1944.

As I was working/recovering today, I flipped on TCM (Turner Classic Movies, for those of you that aren't familiar with my limited TV regimen) to find "How to Marry a Millionare" (1953) - a splendid little film adorned with high-waisted A-line skirts, full evening gowns, sashes, 3/4-length gloves, black patent stilletos and hats - lots of hats - and one of the greatest women to ever grace the silver screen: Ms. Lauren Bacall

This woman, not only intelligent, classy and stunning, captured and held the heart of one of Hollywood's greatest leading men and for that, I have much admiration. Anyone who is ok by Bogie, is ok by me. And she was more than ok, she was perfect. Please, please, please put the screen-version of Hemingway's "To Have and Have Not" on your bucket list. I don't care if you watch it tomorrow or in 50 years, just watch it and understand how it looks when a woman sees the soul of a man without even speaking to him and a man can know a woman's whole life by noting the way she's walked into frame.

I would love to give you their entire history (which I know, by heart, like a favorite fairytale), but I'd rather explain what Bacall has to do with a photograph of an old cash register, softly lit by tea candles taken by a wildly excited, slightly intoxicated photographer sitting in a bar on the corner of 7th and A.

Well, I guess nothing that standard logic would follow really...but as I stare at this photograph, I remember why I pulled out the camera, why this image was so important to me. A wonderful and fascinating soul owns that bar with the old cash register and he, he is nostalgic for something he's never experienced. My fascination is not about the machine, but his thought to put it there, the thought that it must be there to be his place. I know a few people like this and I cherish them more than anything, but this one in particular is special. With a leather-bound journal and a pen, which travels with him everywhere - or everywhere I've ever been with him, he's been able to master the art of being an astute observer as well as the lively participant. He literally writes his own history as he sees it. Whether he writes lyrics from it or not, it's the greatest art in its raw form.

Well, I didn't think this entry was going in this direction, but it just did. Sometimes writing is like that. Sometimes pulling out your camera at 3 a.m. is just like that. And this still is for you, New York.