Weirdest Thing I’ve Seen At The Chelsea Hotel

Does anyone call it Hotel Chelsea? Very fortunate to have spent an enchanted youth there on it’s last legs of residency. Thanks to my buxom friend Alix and her baby sister Lauren. Their German designer parents were always out of the country for work, so they pretty much lived alone. Incredibly grateful for the major parties and memories, like the legendary artists before us.

The weirdest thing I’ve ever seen at the Chelsea Hotel? It was a chill night with a relatively small group. Liza, Gina, Derek and I were going in and out for various reasons, to gather adult provisions, smoke Marlboro Gold’s, and get food. Cut to we’re kekeing making our way down the hall, when an ajar door catches our eye. Lying on the floor, atop a bunch of spread out newspapers is a bespectacled, elderly white male, bald on top, with shoulder length gray hair, and absolutely butt naked. Stunned to silence is an understatement. He wore only a smile, enjoying the fact that we could do nothing as he watched us. Yes he was a pervert, but he was confined to his room, his privates hidden, his bare flaccid cheeks his only crime. Right on the brink, this guy was sick in the head. We made several trips, wondering each time if he’d still be there. Yup, he was, watching us lasciviously as we journeyed to and fro. I’ll never know who he was, nor what he got out of it, but I’ll NEVER forget him. Via: Lynn Goldsmith

“Smokers Club”

Watching two people pull out Marlboro Gold’s at a stressful work day was the first time in a LONGGGGGGGGGG time I craved a cigarette. However I did not and will not cave. I was shocked by the urge. In the long run it wouldn’t be worth it. It took forever to quit, it’s been six years. Nice try satan. Do you have a vice it took forever to give up? That was just one of my many. Artist: Tall Ass Illustrator

“Teenage Smoker”

I’ll never forget being in front of the Pinkberry on 82nd and second with my friend about to start the night, when my dad randomly pulls up in his car. We walked over to say hello and I COMPLETELY forgot there was a cigarette behind my ear. I tried to pull it out low key, but it was way too late. My friend jumped in and said it was her cigarette that I was holding. The dumb shit.

Now when I see teen smokers I’m like what are you five? They look like babies, but when I did it I thought I was so grown. Now I know how infantile we looked to adults giving us the side eye. Adults we asked to get us cigs when we had no other choice. I quit one million times before finally kicking the habit five years ago. Now I can’t believe I smoked (Marlboro Gold’s) at all, crazier still is that cigs were $5 a pack when I turned 18 and now they’re three times that.

The first time I smoked a cigarette I was five and my grandmother threw one out in the yard. It was still lit so I picked it up and inhaled, the way she did, my idol. I coughed like mad and stamped it out after one pull. That didn’t stop me from starting forreal in high school, how lovely it was relieving stress and topping off substances. What is your relationship to cigarettes? Photographer: Ed Templeton