Cooler than You: Stupid Things I Say and Do

It's been a while, is an understatement.  Then again, those who know me remember last year.  2019 entered with double pneumonia and quarantine for a false TB scare, a month later I broke my foot and double tore the plantar fascia, the hits kept coming, and in December I had surgery to repair the foot and ended the year with influenza. Last year tried my soul, nearly killed me, and I was barely standing when it ended. Damn. I shut myself down, and I compartmentalized to survive, to find a laugh, to capture a sight, and to carry-on.  Then, by late February, I was finally coming out of the ashes, getting life back, moving again. I got back into shoes and some heels, made it back to pole dancing classes, but then the world stopped. COVID-19 hit. Well, it came. Hard. First, the suburbs of Seattle--my first hometown--and then it grew. Now, as the world knows, NYC is the US epicenter, and Queens is the epicenter of the epicenter. I live here. I call this ten-story town...

As the air chills, well freefall to six degrees above freezing, I find myself drinking tea in my favorite NYC cup with fuzzy socks on and my favorite university pullover.  My hair is up in a messy bun, and since I'm not planning on washing it tonight, the said style should make it bouncy for tomorrow.  Or . . . Or it will be a dry shampoo Monday, which sets an entirely new tune for the week.  You probably think I'm listening to rap and white girl rolling it out.  Not today, my friends.  It's late on a Sunday.  Sunday's are no place for rap.  Mondays, now, are a different story.  Instead, I've got an even whiter mix of mellow and slow songs going that I've had on repeat for two days.  I make no apologies, as sometimes we just need the same twenty songs to move us along.  Sometimes.  This is all sounding pretty white bougie right now.  I probably shouldn't tell you I had a gluten-free blueberry bagel this mo...

I can’t remember when, but years ago—or long ago as the literary vein would muse—I found the ideas of Sunday’s in the park to be romantic and the dream. As for the park, I’m not going to lie ... Central Park it is.  Leisurely strolls, bike rides, and perhaps runs always struck me as the ideal, epitome to a weekend’s end. Of course, to be blunt and a snob, scores of other New Yorkers find it the same. Today, I—with those New Yorkers and tourists from the four corners of the globe—found my source of vitamin D and sensory delights within the former pig boiling grounds and Native Lands. Perhaps Frederick Law Olmsted’s crown jewel of his parks, the rush of the city, the pace of life, and endless streams of people typically find a kinder, more peaceful balance within the bricked interior. Of course, not all people know how to—oh I don’t know—look both ways and cross the paths properly, but overall it’s pretty hard to remain beaten and angr...