Bill Cunningham Made Me Feel Like a New Yorker

My now-husband and I were on our third date—five years ago this week—when Bill Cunningham took our photo. For nearly 40 years, Cunningham—who died on Saturday at the age of 87—pedaled around New York City on a bicycle, snapping photographs of people on the streets. I count myself lucky to have been among them, because seeing myself through his lens changed how I related to the city.

I met Cunningham at Midsummer Night Swing, a dance party that sprawled across the plaza at Lincoln Center. It was a sticky evening. Sweat beaded down the back of my legs; big-band tunes bounced off the theaters’ grand facades. My date, Jason, was performing at the event. He wore a jaunty red-and-white striped shirt and flare-legged, blue polyester pants, white buttons marching up his hipbones. I was not dressed like a sailor poised to break out into a nautical-themed musical-theater number. In a crowd of swing dancers, that made me underdressed. That night, I was acutely aware that I wasn’t wearing the right thing, which would have been more in the vein of apple-red lipstick, pin curls, and shorts that nipped in at my waist. I hadn’t felt especially at ease in the plaza—but I also felt out of place in the city in general.