A friend from out of town complained about shopping in the city: Wasn’t it all chain stores now? Although I snorted, I felt secretly ashamed, for I had seen neighborhood after neighborhood go from emptiness to luxuriance to blandness. I looked for refutation. Three times a week I walk 600 yards to my gym, down a street between the sleekness of midtown and the funkiness of downtown. It is the artery of average; when God gives us this day our daily, this is the way it comes. What could I acquire there if I paid attention?

I could begin by acquiring money. The first building on the first corner was a bank, with its girdle of ATMs foremost. Next was something that would appear again and again, a shoe store, this one devoted to running shoes. Why so many running shoes? Because they are not just for running, but also for youth fashion display. An African working a sidewalk table advertised $3 sweaters, then, dropping his price immediately, sweaters for $1.50. A computer-game store was the first to make a dramatic pitch for attention. I have never played a computer game, but I have respected them ever since I read that games make as much money annually as Hollywood. What the gamesters of America are getting, if these display windows were any indication, is apocalyptic violence. ASSASSINS CREED REVELATIONS said one poster, over a hooded figure; CALL OF DUTY answered its mate, featuring a futuristic grunt. A cellphone store greeted the Incarnation with a window filled with red and green balloons. More shoes — boots this time. Duane Reade — they are everywhere! Chain drugstores are the new 5-and-10s, heavy on snack food and cosmetics. A dry cleaner, run by Orientals (the old-fashioned moniker matches the old-fashioned venue). China bids to overtake us as a superpower, but its children still come here and become dry cleaners; their children go to Yale. A threading salon will fix your eyebrows, and wax your skin. Where? Let Leporello sing the catalogue: Half face, full face, full arms, under arms, half legs, full legs, bikini line, deep bikini, Brazilian. A man imagines the geography, even as he flinches from the pain; women know allure involves suffering. Two fast-food places follow, one promising to be HOT ’N JUICY, just the thing after your deep bikini. More shoes. Then a store of jeans. There is actually a chain, I learn, called OMG. “Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain; for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that takes his name in vain.” That seems pretty plain, even without the repetition, but what does the Lord know about jeans, He doesn’t even have legs. More shoes, a second bank, and a vast hole, awaiting a new building, round out that block.

Next block is longer. It begins with a store selling eyeglasses, and — sign of the times — a sign advertising the insurance it takes: a blizzard of names, from big companies (Oxford, Aetna) to labor unions (Local 1199, UFT). Last month, the pita store next door was decorated with turkeys. Eat at the melting pot. A rarity, a bookstore, owed its existence to specialization: wisdom of the East, including astrology readings, “Vedic and Western” (can you comparison-shop destiny?). A nails spa offered attention to the feet, with a chart of reflective zones, explained however in Chinese, so not aimed at my demographic. A hair salon, more shoes, a model-management company. Another cellphone store (for that call from your agent). An electronics store had set out a display, oddly, of luggage; above the roller bags, TVs played a movie of some helicopter chase scene. Then a long and forbidding storefront: NYC Human Resources Administration. It was built like a bunker, and seemed as cheery as Hitler’s. Next to it, the first of several, a vacancy: FOR RENT. 2 Dollar Jewelry is still holding on. A second eyeglasses store also advertised dental groups, laser aesthetics, and chiropractors. Read their fine print. A clearance sale (EVERYTHING $10 OR LESS), a mattress store, more luggage, a serious if homely effort at holiday cheer: artificial Christmas trees, toys in boxes, dolls. The gym was not yet mine. A vast party store, with literal thought balloons: Get Well, Congratulations, Happy Birthday, Thank You. Two running mannequins wear more running shoes. A cute poster blonde shills outerwear. Then the economic gradient drops: WE BUY GOLD & DIAMONDS, and offer NOSE & EAR PIERCING. Between two empty stores, “Get your holiday fashion — Naughty or Nice” (you know which one she’ll choose). Between two shoe stores stood the lone building of distinction: symbolic ladies, scrolls, curves, cornices. No sign what it was built for and no occupants now. Starbucks, Urban Outfitters, and a quilted-aluminum breakfast cart end this block.

Half a block to go. Pizza slices, then a gold & diamonds store that frankly says, WE PAWN. The window is filled with crosses. Candy, cigar, soda, tobacco all fill one awning and one store: Where is Mayor Bloomberg? RENT. The promise of FASHION is slightly undercut by NURSES UNIFORMS REGULAR & PLUS. More cellphones, another spa, more gold, this time particularized: wedding bands, engagement rings, name rings, charms: all the broken hopes. DVDs, more shoes, more luggage. Back and foot rub incongruously share space with an International Christian Fellowship. More DVDs: Conan, samurai, porn. Office supplies and UPS. Almost the last, the biggest space on the block, the Salvation Army. General Booth makes his pledge: “While women weep as they do now, I’ll fight. While little children go hungry, as they do now, I’ll fight. While men go to prison, in and out, in and out, as they do now, I’ll fight. While there is a drunkard left, while there is a poor lost girl upon the streets, while there remains one dark soul without the light of God, I’ll fight. I’ll fight to the very end!”

Then I come to my gym.