A film maker and I are at work on a documentary.

This feature-length film would be about the world’s most interesting person: Me.

I say that with a self-deprecating chuckle.

I have been circumspect about going into much detail about this. To some people it sounds a little pretentious, while to me talking about a work-in-progress feels like I might be jinxing things.

But I cannot tell this story, about an unusual encounter on the RFK/Triborough Bridge last week, without putting it in the proper context.

I will call the filmmaker Cheryl, because that is her name.

Inevitably the subject matter of the film will include payphones but the goal is to reach beyond that obsession of mine, into subjects of religion, mortality, and other mental cud on which my mind chews.

We have covered a lot of ground already, with my quest to find surviving etchings of the famed scratchiti artist PRAY an early focal point. Much of the narrative, it seems, will come from my Payphone Radio, an audio project I’ve tinkered with since 2010.

With that introduction I can now explain what brought Cheryl and me up to the RFK/Triborough Bridge last week, and what happened as a result.

WE FILMED THE PHONE

I wanted to talk on camera about the Suicide Prevention/Crisis Counseling telephone I was instrumental in having installed on that bridge, with help from Gabriel Sandoval’s article at TheCity.NYC. I regard my role in getting that phone installed as one of the best things I’ve ever done in New York. You can read my account of this here.

The phone is housed in a weather-proof cabinet. With Cheryl filming I opened the cabinet door several times to reveal the actual telephone, while making comments about the role I played in getting it installed. We were at the phone for just a few minutes. From there we moved on to the middle portion of the RFK Bridge’s walkway, en route to Randall’s Island.

This is the phone’s cabinet.

The middle part of the RFK/Triborough Bridge pedestrian walkway makes me nauseous. The portions of the path over Astoria Park and Randall’s Island contain fencing. The middle portion, over the water, has only a chest-high metal railing. Looking over the edge of that railing, straight down at the churning waters of the Hell Gate, could make anyone nauseous.

The railing is low enough that I do not think it too far-fetched to imagine a scenario where two bicyclists on this path might collide, sending one or both them over the railing, accidentally.

I told Cheryl I did not like being on this part of the bridge, that it felt like I was walking a plank, and that I would go ahead to the island where we would meet after she recorded some b-roll footage.

THEN THE COPS SHOWED UP

As I made my way toward the island I saw a police officer ahead. I have crossed this bridge hundreds of times without ever seeing police presence. As I neared him I heard the officer speaking into his walkie-talkie, describing a white male wearing khaki pants and carrying a black shoulder bag. That sounded like… me.

He asked if I had earlier been with a female carrying a video camera. I said yes. He said it’s illegal to record on the bridge without proper permit. I responded that we saw no signage with that warning, which is true. I did not say that I thought he was wrong, and that filming is allowed without permits as long as you’re not using tripods or lighting gear.

Per his request I handed him my ID. He said he needed to escort me back to where my “female” was. It seemed funny to me how he used that word. At one point another woman walked toward us, going the opposite direction toward the island. The officer asked “Is that your female?”

I explained we were documenting the crisis prevention/suicide counseling telephone I played a part in getting installed. He knew all about the new phone, and asked if the documentary was entirely about the phone. I laughed and said no. It might not even make it into the documentary at all.

I felt dizzy, since this perp walk took place on the nausea-inducing portion of the bridge I wanted to get off of.

As we approached Cheryl’s location I saw several other police officers on the scene. I thought: Why so many? It’s just a video camera, not a shoulder-fired missile launcher. The quantity of police raised a little bit of concern in me about what to expect up ahead between them and Cheryl.

GOOD NEWS!

By the time we reached my “female” everyone was smiling and laughing. The senior officer approached me and said “Good news! Your phone works.”

It turns out that simply opening the door on that cabinet set off an alarm somewhere, at the bridge headquarters or at the 114th precinct. When that alarm went off multiple times police thought it signaled a distressed individual who could not make up their mind about actually picking up the telephone to talk to somebody. I had, in fact, been careful not to pick up the phone because I knew that doing so created an instant connection to a live person at NYC WELL. I assumed picking up the phone also sent some kind of alarm to law enforcement. Little did I know that simply opening the cabinet door had the same effect.

I explained, as Cheryl already had, that I was simply showing off the phone itself. I had no idea about that alarm going off. We were filming a documentary and looking at my role in getting that phone put in. I explained that I eventually reached out to the media after seven years of badgering the MTA, etc. You can read that whole story here.

The officer nodded his head, agreeing with me that a phone should have been put in years ago. He shared the same complaints I had about a sign saying there was a telephone “up ahead” when no phone existed on the walkway.

It felt a little eerie to have unwittingly set into motion the wheels of intervention, and suicide prevention. All these police officers, as many as 8 by my guesstimate, looked at me as a distressed individual bent on self-harm.

But after my stories checked out with Cheryl’s I felt a collective sigh of relief among the officers. Many tense shoulders relaxed, and the officer who had my ID handed it back.

The chief officer suggested I avoid opening the cabinet door like that again, tactfully adding “Unless you really need to use the phone.”

ON TO THE BRONX

The last question he asked was where Cheryl and I were headed next. I said “To the island and on to the Bronx.” Cheryl later mentioned that she gave the exact same response to that question minutes earlier. We had not planned ahead of time to get our stories straight. It just happened. Once in a while honesty actually works. The officer and I shook hands.

Unlike the first officer I encountered, the senior dude had nothing to say about us filming up on that bridge. In fact his last words to Cheryl were: “I hope your film turns out really great.”

ONE LAST THING…

For however many times I have crossed the RFK/Triborough Bridge I had never, until this, seen bicyclists dismount and walk their bikes across, as the law requires. Word obviously traveled down the line that the fuzz was up ahead, but some cyclists either didn’t get the word or didn’t care. They blew right past the cops at full tilt.

I do not know if the police ever enforce no-biking rules on this span. But I would think their attentions on this day were better directed at what they feared was a distressed and suicidal individual. While still thinking there might be trouble for Cheryl and me on account of us filming without permits I thought — but did not say — to the officer that if cyclists are free to ignore the rules than we should be, too. It’s only fair.