rain on city sidewalks

it rained today, i guess. (i don't have a great sense for weather, what with having to sit with my back to the offices with windows.) when i went outside the sidewalks were dark and wet, but it wasn't still raining. which i was disappointed about. i know i've blogged before about my love for city rain, so you know why i wished i hadn't missed the mist. (ha! such a good play on words, right? ok, ignore me.)

so anyway, i was walking to the train by myself (i worked late tonight) and someone in front of me was smoking a cigarette, and while i hate cigarettes (do not smoke, do not think anyone else should smoke) the combination of wet pavement and smoke took me back. my freshman year at nyu, i remember standing outside in the rain on broome st, pretending i knew how to smoke cigarettes with the hip kids who would stick out the remaining three years. that new york then, my new york then, had so much promise and excitement. i had left my sleepy oregon town for new! york! city!, the only person i knew to make such a move. i was proud of my bravery, glad i had made it more than a week (like i think some people thought i might not), pleased that i was standing on a street with girls who wore eyeliner and cursed like sailors and drank absinthe and would be friends with me. i was seventeen, or maybe eighteen by then, and totally idealistic about new york and my future, about making art and theatre and bringing about cultural change, and all of the other things i still think about but do not always have the energy to act on. my new york was huge and full of possibility. and my new york then was smaller, too, confined by classes and studio work and dorm rooms, it was safer and easier, it was an idyllic new york, but it is one i still cherish. i didn't "make it" then, i left (for myriad reasons), but i clung to my new york, knowing i wanted to come back, to try again with some experience under my belt. my new york made me something more, reminded me that there was a world beyond my little college towns, first in oregon and then in indiana. it made me push myself, not give up or stay put, made me leave the men who might've held me back. ("you could act in d.c.", the politician said to me, ignoring the fact that it was my new york i wanted back. of course when i was in d.c. this summer, he wouldn't even talk to me. i guess i hurt him more than i thought.) i think little towns are dangerous; life is easy, it is safe, it is clean, it is nice, it pulls you in and inertia keeps you there. but i always had new york to motivate me, to keep me going. i have always known i wanted to live here (and always known i would not live here forever, but that is its own post.) i have always known i could live here; let not my blog fool you, i am pretty damn tough when i need to be. i have always known that i should live here, that i need a city that keeps me on my toes, that intimidates me and teaches me, helps me grow as a person, never lets me give in to the temptation to settle. and so my new york, i am here again, i am more ready that i was six years ago, i am anxious and excited to keep experiencing whatever i can. and i was reminded of all this from the mingled smell of wet pavement and cigarette smoke.

i told s i think about this blog a lot, that it makes me really happy to have this to work on, because it reminds me to look for the positives in my life and my experiences here (and encourages me to seek out new things, if only to have something to blog about.) and i have always loved to write, and think i am occasionally moved to greatness, and if nothing else this keeps me thinking. so thank you, blog, for being here.

and also, because i talk a lot about being boring (though i am NOT married), i found this hilarious and thought it was worth a share:
spring is a great time for zinfandel