Sinking into Sweet Uncertainty

Another cup of coffee, and another. All day, so tired, so apathetic, so unable to fill the empty sheet with the words that would pay the bills, would appease the Very Important Person on the other end.

Patience, said a voice within. Trust that it will return.

And then there it was. The tickled rush through my synapses, the insatiable hunger for loud music in my ears, the complete disregard for anything going on around me. How much easier when the rest of the world grows dark and silent, to spread out one's ideas and energies on the floor and begin to piece them together again. Hours pass, without food or break or weariness as the deadline adrenaline writes its story, as it will. Years of this, and I never learn. Not to do differently, but to accept the process.

There is, at the end of such a night, a feeling more delicious than any other. The free soul, the tired body. The quiet room while my mind races to wind down. I enjoy this bit the most.

I chose the right life for myself, it seems.

If I Could Come Home

I rode the train with the suits, as usual, but then I switched to an uptown local to a stop I barely recognized, amazed how every train carries a different population. Here in this undiscovered part of town, lay an apartment that maybe, maybe would be the first New York home of my dear friend and fellow immigrant. I had promised to look at it, even though who was I to judge whether such a place could be hers.

We have lists of requirements, or requests, or even wild fantasies of our dream home. We walk through endless apartments, we open cupboards and imagine ourselves sitting in the window sill. We hmmm and we oooh, all the while jotting down pros and cons and checking off the dreams, or not.

Is there something better out there? Could this be good enough? If I pass this up, will anything at all be waiting around the bend? You walk back down the four flights of stairs and try to know if this was the place, and how much you are willing to fight for it. You hear a creak in the step and wonder if that is the dealbreaker.

But then, there they are, the moments when you walk into an apartment and your heart smiles, when you see your list and toss it out the window, when there is no flaw you are not ready to love entirely. The feeling in your very core that says that whatever may come up, you will accept it and make it work, because this is your home, and this is where you belong.

How much finding that apartment is like falling in love. How much love, is like coming home.

The White Box

I was late, I was exhausted, I walked right past it. I needed to be working, I needed to eat dinner, I needed so many things that were not what I was doing.

But spring is back, and my resistance crumbles quickly. So I went to the opening at the hole in the wall on Broome and tripped along the Lower East Side streets to dinner and drinks and silly giggles until work was further from my mind than a Mad Hatter. On my way home, my high heels kept the beat to the music in my ears; I knew I looked too happy for these cynical streets, and I didn't care.

Perhaps I'll pay for it tomorrow when the deadline bites at my heels. But it turns out that there is more to life than deadlines.

And Central park in a carpet of croci and snowdrops is magic.

There's no competing with that.

The Blind Side

Like a beaten puppy, I hesitantly crawled out of the dark, musty room and stared unbelieving into the sun. Here it was, how simple it seemed now. A million people were already lining the pier; how could they have no doubt in their hearts? I followed the throngs, hesitantly, reluctant to share this space which all winter was mine. The Hudson lay like tin foil; I could feel my pale skin sizzle. A short breath to fill my lungs, and I had to go.

But then, against moody Grey Dog brick, I could feel the change. Like little ants of adrenaline, marching through my body, igniting flames so long extinguished. My hands telling a hundred tales, my breath quick, my eyes lit. The first spark of madness, so long awaited, so dearly missed.

Words spring back into my awakening heart. I know there is more, much more, to come, when sticky green buds speckle the view from my bedroom window. But this moment, too, is priceless, when I remember what light is, what life is. Tomorrow, I face the blank sheet of paper, and I remember why I came.

They Build Buildings So Tall These Days

Houston Street Subway stop and never any trains stopping on my track. Express trains rumble past, my heart vibrates in my chest. Too much time to stand still and think; why did I not bring a book? As though I got caught in this brief but unending wait, and I have nowhere left to run.

We are not safe anywhere. We cannot escape ourselves.

Just a few steps upstairs, the spring sun is warming the hearts of New Yorkers and concrete without discrimination. I could feel my back straightening, my steps getting longer as my legs stretched in the mild, still air. Yesterday, I turned on 62nd street and everything was quiet, save the birds. I thought it is here. Today, I remembered how bright sunlight reveals the dust in my kitchen, exposes every last hidden flaw.

In my dream last night, we were hanging off the edge of an impossibly tall building. I said Can you believe some people let go? The height was making my toes tingle, but before I knew it, we were in the subway car. Safe, grounded.

I had forgotten how sad spring can be, just at that moment when it stops being an impossibly bright and beautiful future and becomes the same Reality it always was. We cannot escape ourselves. The local train came, stopped, let me on, took me to Brooklyn. It didn't have the answer, either. But it didn't pretend to.

Aqua Vitae

We needed to meet up on Columbus Circle anyway, how convenient that the little Scandinavian place lay tucked away just at the edge of it. Is Swedish food scary? she said. Who cares? The waiters are hot, we replied, and so the matter was settled.

I haven't been to IKEA in months. I haven't walked past Scandinavia house and sighed longingly or complained about American superficialities. I filled my coffee stores while I was home over Christmas, and I have been satisfied.

But there was something in the light wood of the floors, something in the spaciousness and newspapers hanging for patrons' morning reads. Something in the simple quiet of the room that felt like home. Like pain francais near our therapy supervisor, where we'd go after supervision, share a large pot of coffee and a pastry, and while away many hours of laughter and camaraderie.

The softness of the birch tree, the smell of the pine, will forever sift through the blood that runs in my veins. I would not have it, any other way.

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.