Orchards

Early morning is crisp as I race across the Williamsburg bridge: October. Lazy sunshine, a familiar face down Broadway, a familiar car along Kent and the early risers stumble toward their hipster coffee. We make our way back across the Brooklyn Bridge, weave across a whole island topple out into a valley on fire. Leaves do not care for your apocalyptic years, they still fulfill their timetables and dazzle on schedule. We hike through whistling woods and sit staring at the enormity of the world. For a short moment, we are rendered irrelevant, and it is a most comforting tonic. 

Hours later, in the golden afternoon, the great spikes of Manhattan appear at the end of the river as the car careens down the hill. Did we get what we came for? It's hard to know. I sneak the car into a newly appearing spot along the gleaming skyscrapers, make my way back across the bridge just as the last rays of apricot sunshine make their way over the top of the skyline. Saturday evening bounces in the East Village, we try to squeeze just a few drops of joy out of the year that nearly killed us. 

It's a worthwhile endeavor,
if we do nothing else.