Sutton Place Park

How bright was the sun this morning! How warm, how convincing. I fall head over heels and without reservation, while giant piles of snow reduce to steam on the sidewalks. It's trash day, you're out. Spending my day with that smiling face on 59th street. I tell her it's a new day, a new life. I beam at her; she informs me that she has a mind of her own, but she seems content enough in her convictions.

We take a walk around her new hood and are soon made aware it's a whole other world. Dirty, scraggly Chelsea backalleys wobble in comparison to New York Old Money. People who have nothing to prove do it anyway, simply by pairing their Monday Morning sneakers with opulent fur coats. We sit at a park on Sutton Place. I am grateful that the River is public property, the air, the sun. I look up at the imposing townhouses, and see my worth in money. It doesn't amount to much.

As she sleeps soundly in the fresh, free air, I read about Hunter S. and his romping about in the West Village in the 50s.

I remember money is not what matters. Madness is.

We walk home again, both beaming now. It's a new day, it's a new life. I'm buying the ticket. I am taking the ride.