Irish Breakfast tea in bed, by myself. Long gone are the days of sharing tea with someone on a Sunday morning. No toes touching, no newspaper ink wasting on fingers and sheets.
Here, I never thought I could be lonely. I thought this City would cradle me, take care of me, for always. How simple and naive I am.
I fill up pages upon pages with thoughts, but no amount of scrawl seems to leave my insides swept clean.
I think of my lovers- the past. I think of how I let go of some incredible people, for reasons hard and true. I wonder about, if things had been different...all those if's and but's I usually do not allow myself near to. No point pulling at old bell chords.
Tears come from seemingly nowhere. Where are they stored? How can there be so many kept in this small cavity? I don't mind crying, but it swells my nose, and this is never a good look.
I'm reading a beautiful book whilst I am here, "Enough about Love" by Herve Le Tellier. Of course, it is- all about love. But with tenderness and light humour, and enough of that to trick my slight sadness into an airier place (whilst still allowing me to dip into the lovelake, pleasingly warm and understanding).
My mind drifts lightly over to the things I shall do when I get home. Packing, cleaning, moving. In that order. A new place to learn guitar, cook myself better suppers, and have baths. The icing on the cake, or perhaps- the cream cheese in the bagel- is that I get to have my darling beast Cat back in my little life. How I have missed him, a wildish, scrambling part of myself, that I have been lost to, for months. He will lie with me at night again, and paw at my face. He will sun himself over in the garden for hours this Summer, as I watch, wishing I could let myself go, as well as he does.
Strangers have been so kind to me here. I notice it more as I am on holiday, so sharp focus comes into action, pioneering my experience in a foreign land. If I pull out my map on a street, someone almost always approaches to ask if they can help. Many smiles, many "sweethearts". People commenting on the purple's...more smiles, subway smiles...
Yesterday night, I was given a lovely moment. I was tired, on my way home, waiting for a train on a smoldering platform, when a train came into the opposite platform. I was listening to my music, plugged in, shuffling toes, when my absent gaze met with a handsome, full bearded man who was sitting in the carriage directly opposite me. He smiled through the glass at me, then I smiled back. Then he laughed, then I laughed. Then he waved, and yes, then I waved.
This small un-meeting made my heart effervescent.
Then his train rumbled off, and mine came. I stepped on, with my bubbly heart, and then, a stop down the line, it happened again, except for this time we were both enclosed in carriages. Twinkle smiles, and then, gone again. Croon a song to me- Magic Moments- perfectly fitting against the form of this tiny tale.
Soon I'll tell you what happened the day before at DIA in Beacon. That was worth a croon or two, too...just proving to me, yet again, that this life is for love, if nothing else.
Today I am going to try and regain my appetite, and head to a deli someone has told me about, very close by. I have to try a famous sandwich apparently, and hopefully then, stuffed with bread and awash with deli delight, I will take a turn around Court Street, or Williamsburg, or who knows...
Here is to the world *not* ending, and finding surprise joy around unknown corners. Deep breath...
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