NYC

We just spent the weekend in New York City.  Some find it's important to be prepared for traveling.  You know with maps and plans and recommendations for great restaurants, etc etc etc.  We didn't do any of those things.  The extent of our planning was having my nails painted Big Apple Red and a vague idea that we should check out something called the High Line.

My Mr. lived in New York when he was younger. It's a part of his past.   It's just the City to him.  We live in Philadelphia, but New Yorkers (current and former) will only ever acknowledge one real City. He suggested this trip because it's pretty new to me.  I've not spent much time there and he knew it was something we'd both enjoy.  Much like I enjoyed seeing him explore being in another country for the first time on our honeymoon, he wanted to watch me see his City.

We stayed in a well situated hotel just a few blocks from Penn Station, which was wholly New York. It was maybe 12 x 12, but it had a neat view of the Empire State Building.  It also had a distinctly New York price tag.  Fortunately, we got a great deal on the room because of our kind nephew who works for the hotel chain.

Saturday morningish we head out in the general direction of the High Line, which is an elevated park made out of the train tracks that were previously used to transport "cargo" in and out of the meatpacking district. It's 20 blocks long and there are supposed to be a bunch of galleries in the area, so we can't really lose. It sounds like fun.

We're walking along W 28th St on a pretty, not too brisk, winter morning.  Holding hands and chatting.  Feeling really present in this moment and loving it.  Then, I see this...

I am in awe of this contraption.  It's a flipping multilevel parking spot!  Not a whole garage, but a spot. Clearly, I stopped to take pictures.  I'm marveling at the whole thing, trying to figure out the system, watching the guy operate it, wondering if I'll get in trouble for taking pictures...  My Mr doesn't say anything, but he's standing back watching with his hands in his coat pockets with one of my favorite smiles on his face.  I smile back and go return to my investigation.

Then I hear my Mr. say, "We're not from around here, can you tell?"  At first I'm annoyed because I feel like he's minimizing this perfect moment.  I spin around, ready to be angry, and then I see the most amazing thing.  This woman, this famous for being rude New Yorker, has stopped to watch too.  She's watching me watching the cars and she's talking to my Mr and she's smiling.  Seriously? Is this happening?

She's stopped to tell us that she used to get annoyed with tourists.  They get in your way, they never know where they're going and that they are generally obnoxious.  (In more typical New York fashion, she asks us if we're going in her direction because she wants to talk, but she doesn't have time to stop, she's trying to catch a bus.)  She goes on to tell us that she's a lifelong New Yorker.  Never left the City, not ever.  Then one day, her girlfriend tells her to pack a bag because they are going to Washington DC for the weekend.  So she packed her bag for a weekend in the nation's capitol and hops in her friend's car, ready for a weekend of monuments.  Once they're on the highway, her friend tells her they aren't going to DC, they're going to Florida.

"I was like, WHAT?!  Are you crazy?! Then this crazy woman drove all through the night and I woke up in Florida!"  She tells us she got to Florida and she was running around like a fool.  Taking pictures of everything.  Getting in people's way.  All the while, never knowing where she was.  She loved it.  She said ever since that experience, she always talks to tourists and tries to help them out.

She asks us where we're going and we tell her we're heading towards the High Line.  She tells us that we'll like it and that we can get there the way we're going, but we should go down to 23rd instead because it's got a nicer entrance and it's safer.

We thanked her and said goodbye.  As it turns out, she was right.  We liked it and the entrance at 23rd was really nice.