i can’t stop loving you

have you been to new york city? have you pushed your way through the rush-hour crowd on 5th avenue? have you seen the full moon rising over the skyline from the window of a cab racing up the fdr? have you heard the roar of industrial music clawing its way out of an apartment window on far east 9th street? have you stood in grand central station late at night, deserted after the last train has left, and stared at the constellations in the ceiling?  remember when you turned the corner on 90th and 5th and saw the guggenheim for the first time? when you wandered chinatown, with the markets and the smell and the mysterious produce stacked in open boxes on the sidewalk? when you found the overgrown garden in the middle of a block in the east village? remember when you pressed your ear to the doors of radio city and listened to the queen? new york has chaos and struggle, but more than that it has moments of magic – some simple, some magnificent. when you least expect it, a building with astounding architecture. an undiscovered restaurant, a museum, a gallery.  a forgotten favorite song on the radio in the deli. you can stand breathless in a room full of colossal rothko canvases. be awed by the a cappella quartet in the crowded subway car bursting into ‘on the street where you live’. you can wait on line at magnolia bakery and pretend to be in a scene from ’sex and the city’. or maybe don’t do that, but definately get a cupcake, if only for the frosting.

watch your step

if a blog is written and posted in cyberspace, but no one knows, does it still exist? like a tree in the forest that falls with no one around, does it lay there silently until it is covered with snow, discovered only when some unsuspecting person stumbles over it? i’ve contemplated writing a blog for a couple of years.  yet i’ve hesitated, procrastinated. friends have told me i should “write” and i scoff. then i realize these are people with opinions and taste that i respect, so isn’t it insulting to laugh at their suggestion just because it involves me? must i turn this into a major life decision? and haven’t i used up my allotment of question marks by now? and did i spell allotment wrong? ultimately it came down to one person, at the right time, saying “do your blog”. with that, the tree tipped over soundlessly into the snow. be careful not to trip.