It was a beautiful September day. With temperatures in the 70s, cool breezes, and a whiff of fall in the air, the tourists wore sweaters and windbreakers. <\/p>\n
When I got to the fountain, Rakeem, the saxophonist, was playing center stage. This was the first I\u2019d seen him working in years. Small, powerfully built, Rakeem knew how to gather crowds; I once saw him collect $30-40 in a few minutes from a small wedding party. During the Quiet Zone Wars, Rakeem told a reporter he made $125,000\/year. That may be so, but he didn\u2019t make it by busking. At 40 hours\/week, 52 weeks\/year, he\u2019d have to have collected $60\/hour, every hour.<\/p>\n
At the top of the path, Yevgeny played Mozart transcribed for bass and violin. The violinist was a young man approaching 40, dressed in dark pants and a white shirt, almost certainly another refugee, like Yevgeny, from the National Philharmonic of Ukraine. I tried to catch Yevgeny\u2019s eye as I passed by, but he was lost in the music.<\/p>\n
I set up at the edges of the umbra of the maple tree, so I could step out into the sun when I felt cool, and back into the shade when I felt warm. A French-speaking Swiss girl was happy to hula. She hopped and jumped and swung her arms with gusto, while her friend got it all on video. <\/p>\n
Much later, a pregnant woman and her husband walked by as I sang \u201cI Can\u2019t Give You Anything But Love.\u201d They stopped about ten yards away to confer. The husband then came back and gave me a quarter, thereby bringing my total for the day to $1.25.<\/p>\n
On my way out of the park, I saw that Yevgeny and friend had joined John Boyd in the Arcade. Rakeem was gone, having made, I presume, his daily quota of $240.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"