Photo-essay: A Bubbleologist on His Day Off

Posted on by jgrebes

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“It’s too bad you couldn’t do this Wednesday,” said Jack Kocher, 48, as we walked through the pouring rain. “You can’t blow bubbles in the rain.”

Kocher is a bubbleologist, a title he came up with himself. “It took me, like, a half hour,” he said, adding that it took even more time to figure out what the correct spelling of “bubbleologist” ought to be. (It needed the “e” in order to make sense, he decided.)

On Wednesday, he was scheduled to bubble for a production company that would use the footage to show off the high quality of a new HD TV. On Tuesday, though, unable to bubble due to the downpour, Kocher ran errands, picking up the materials he would to blow massive bubbles the next day.

Kocher came to bubbles after living in Central Park for a year, after doing all sorts of odd jobs and activism. He soon became very good at it, drawing a small income from pleased park-goers as he improved his technique. He now makes a living mainly through bubbling. After a couple months bubbling, he realized he was a “homeless guy with $1,000 in my pocket,” and was able to rent a small apartment in rough part of Staten Island, though he intends to leave by the holiday season.

Kocher is taking classes to rebuild his credit score, hoping to move out and into a nice place closer to the park where he can try to be a writer, and hopefully become a grandfather. He has two 24-year-old twin daughters.

Jack Kocher grew up in New York, but left when he was 17. Between when he left and when he returned last May, Kocher lived in Oregon, was a wild land firefighter, appeared in federal court for his activism, participated in Occupy Miami, grew pot for a short time, and once spent a month living at the top of a 200 foot Douglas Fir Tree.
When he came back to New York, Kocher initially lived in Central Park for about a year, until bubbling got him enough money to rent a small apartment in Staten Island. Kocher still hides the bucket he uses fro bubbling in the park, in a spot now occupied by a homeless person's camp. Kocher says the homeless man is okay with him keeping his bucket there, but that he "doesn’t really talk."
Kocher displays two pieces of art drawn by David Albert Mitchell, better known as "The Beast of Central Park." Arrested in September last year for allegedly beating and sexually assaulting a 73-year-old birdwatcher, Mitchell was the only person who ever stole from Kocher when he was living in Central Park. Kocher plans to frame them once he gets an office to hang them in.
Kocher plays the "Star Wars" theme on his low D Irish whistle. When he was first living in Central Park, he played a flute to make money, before he started bubbling.
In a convenience store on 72nd Street, Kocher selects the soap he'll use to bubble. He says he makes between $1,500 and $1,600 a month on average as a self-described "bubbleologist" in Central Park.
Eating breakfast at the Gray's Papaya on 72nd and Broadway, where Kocher bought most of his coffee while living in the park.
Despite having moved out of Central Park and into an apartment, Kocher has his mail delivered to a homeless shelter in All Angels' Episcopal Church on the Upper West Side. Kocher was expecting two important documents; details about a photo-shoot he was doing the next day, and his adoptive father's will. Neither one was in today's mail.
Kocher was adopted in 1977 by Nathan Weiss, an attorney who represented the Beatles in America and was a close friend of Brian Epstein. The relationship between the Wiess and Kocher grew tenuous, as they didn't want to live the same kind of lifestyle, and Kocher says Weiss neglected him. Weiss died on July 31 of this year. Though he had been told he had been written out of the will, Kocher was actually included, though he's not sure exactly what he's inheriting yet. "Great. Whatever," Kocher says.
Kocher displays a book he rented from the New York Public Library. An activist who has appeared in federal court for occupying a tree sit, Kocher describes himself as "a democratic globalist," and thinks the world should switch to a resource based economy. "Scarcity itself is a myth," he says.
"If the world's resources were distributed evenly, there's enough for everyone to live comfortably," Kocher says. "Maybe nobody would be rich, but nobody deserves to be rich."
At a plant store on 96th and Broadway, Kocher looks for long, straight bamboo sticks to use in his bubbling. Kocher says he has put a lot of time and effort into refining his bubbling technique, sometimes to the resentment of the bubblers who got him started, but never innovated themselves.
On the ferry back to his home in Staten Island, Kocher demonstrates how he makes his bubbling gear. By attaching a large loop of yarn to the bamboo sticks with nonabsorbent string, he is able to make bubbles big enough for a person to fit inside.
After years of activism, "bubbling helped turn me back into an optimist," Kocher says. "I'm making people happy. Maybe 25 percent of people give money, but 99 percent of people smile."

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