As the city speeds past me, with its yellow cabs and Wall Street brokers, it overflows with people, ideas and deadlines. It walks a constant line somewhere between potential implosion and awe-inspiring existence.
In that sense, I often feel a bond with the city. Instead of overflowing with people, my head seems to overflow with possibilities and walking a line between self-destruction and extraordinary existence is nothing new in this life.
December was a challenging month for me. Between 50-hour workweeks, whirlwind road trips to Georgia for protests, and all of the wonderful people who visited me, I was simply exhausted. By the time Christmas came, I was too tired to even think about the fact that I wasn’t going to be home with Colorado with my family. I just wanted sit down. Hannah and I spent our Christmas in the Upper East Side at John’s apartment since he was going to be in Michigan for the holidays and we needed to get out of Astoria. On Christmas Eve, we trekked our way to the Upper West Side for Christmas Eve service at Riverside Church. It was cold and rainy and having accidentally gotten off at the wrong stop, we walked 20 blocks to get there. We walked in, simply looking forward to sitting down and warming up and were greeted with an awe-inspiring church, rivaling some of the most beautiful cathedrals I experienced in Europe. It was the beginning of exactly what we needed.
Christmas Day we woke, made our way to the grocery store down the block and made ourselves a Christmas feast of biscuits and gravy, apples, orange juice an
d coffee. We then made our way to Penn Station to take the Long Island Railroad to a fellow GSV’s family’s house in Garden City. I think both Hannah and I were nervous about this. Christmas traditions are things that are hard to bring other people in, and were acutely aware
of how gracious they were to let us into their home and their Christmas. As I boarded the train back to the city that evening, my face literally hurt from laughing and smiling all day. Kate’s family was not only gracious; they were funny and easy to talk to. I never once felt like I was intruding upon their Christmas. As I fell asleep that night, I still wished with my whole being I was home with my family, but I felt extraordinarily fortunate to have been welcomed into such a wonderful family. It was exactly what I needed.
And so came New Years Eve. Sara, Hannah, John and I ended up at a bluegrass show in the East Village and successfully avoided tourists completely. As the countdown commenced, I was blissfully unaware of the ball dropping some 30 blocks from where I was. I had champagne, bluegrass and three wonderful people who bless my NY life, it was exactly what I needed.
Without skipping a beat, on New Years Day Hannah and I boarded the Chinatown bus to Boston for the weekend. The first thing I asked Hannah, who went to college in
Boston, was “Where are all the people?” I have become so accustomed to New York City streets bursting at the seams with people, little Boston seemed empty to me. But I soon realized that in Boston, I felt I could breathe. I hadn’t realized I couldn’t breathe in NYC, but the refreshing full breaths of Boston air took me by surprise. The sprawling aisles of grocery stores and wide-open spaces of Barnes and Noble made a stark contrast to my cramped NYC. I found Boston to be a city after my own heart, with beer and history at every turn. It was nice to get out of New York, and Boston seemed to be exactly what I needed.
And I went back to work feeling somewhat refreshed for the first time in months. Have things slowed down since the sales season ended as promised? Not really. Things are still crazy and some days being in an office of overworked women is wearing, but the mission remains the motivation.
Still, though the city exhausts me, there are days when I know why they call this the greatest city on earth. Being able to go out for street food and cupcakes before going to see the dress rehearsal of Saturday Night Live reminds me of the opportunities I have here, and how I need to learn to take advantage of them. Its not often I get to sit 5 feet from the SNL stage, as cameras are all around me and Rosario Dawson, running form skit to skit. This city moves fast, but there are plenty of times that I have to simply stop, and appreciate the awe-inspiring existence of it.
