December 7, and cold has come

"It's 27 degrees? No shit - my nipples are fucking hard." Someone was talking on the phone next to me outside of the Lotus tonight. I was evesdropping. In NY, it's hard not to.

It's really cold now. Finally, i guess, being December. Not as cold as in some places, from what i hear from Tornadia in Champaign with seven below last night, and midday temperatures of three (oh...). But it's still pretty fucking cold.

And, uh, to be honest, i'm not minding it too much yet.

Since getting back from PR with my nasty savage burn, pulling out all my long underwear and space-aged polymered winter-weather gear, along with my space heater Tornadia and S-A-Double Lizzy got for me last winter (best present EVER), i've been able to find the cold pretty darned -- get this -- refreshing. Never thought i'd say that. Especially in outdoors-all-the-time, carless, nowhere-to-hide NYC. But it's true.

With a whole layer of skin peeled off of my face, my cheeks feel kinda like an obstinant stream in some artic tundra refusing icy sprawl to, instead, bask in the sunshiney rippling of its surface by crisp winds, lusty salmon, and polar bears. It feels really primal. And really good.

Working in midtown, i get to walk by the red velvet-roped department store windows in transit. Decorations are part of my commute these days, as are crowds of familes walking in Red Roverish rows down the streets pushing urban baby strollers filled with tykes tightly zippered into over-downed, faux-fur-hooded, emmense jackets. When the kids are taken out of their carriages and put down on the sidewalks to walk on their own for a while, they are all jacket and hood and spindley legs. Little gravity defiers. Wrapped so snugly with snaps clasped to their pushed-up chin, all land with a flat-shoed sturdiness basing a wide sway, and each of them looks exactly the same to me this winter -- like disgruntled sumo wrestlers ready to hurl. And i find that really, really great.

Also, with my new non-travel schedule, i've been making myself jump on the subway at night with my ipod (that continues to kill my computer), and get off in random places to wander about and find my way eventually home. A couple nights ago, i was on a brooklyn-bound J, got off at Church St. (i think), and walked through a hallowed-out Wall Street. Passed a really amazing pair of electronic billboards with red neon street-crossing-like line drawn computer generated characters of a woman and a man on opposite sides of a museum's stairway just walking in place. Kinesthetically so phenomenal.

Just after passing this, a woman coming up the block paused to me to ask me something. She was older, bundled up in a big coat and a kinda jaunty warm-looking winter hat. She was a bit laden down with bags, but not too much, like everyone these days in NYC, i guess. i say this cause, on these empty streets, she really did look just straight-up normal.

Yeah, so she asked me a question, and i took my earphone (stupid stupid! my earphones are idiotic. i do NOT at all dig em) out, to listen. "Do you know where the McDonald's is?" she asked, kinda loudly. But it was freakin cold. And lips work poorly in cold weather. So loud talk didn't register much. i stopped next to her, "No, im sorry, i don't."

"I looked down that street" she pointed to that street "and that street" she pointed to another street, "and couldn't find it. i know there's supposed to be one here somewhere."

Now, i don't know if she first started walking past me, or if i first started walking past her, but, somehow, we were no longer face-to-face, but walking away from each other. i called to her, "Well, i came from that direction" i pointed past her in the direction she was walking "and didn't see one there. Hope you find it!" and i put my earphone back in as i turned around and walked on.

We were now about 20 feet apart, and, in hearing something, i turned back around to find that the noise was her. She had, at some point, stopped cold and was just going off crazy-person style yelling ferociously and waving her arms, eyes wide and head thrown back and shaking something fierce while still looking in my direction. Since i was the only one around on these dark streets, i do believe she was yelling at me. But she was also yelling past me, through me. i don't really know. Uh, yeah. So i kept walking. Didn't feel that stopping for clarification on the problem was the thing to do in this particular sitch. But i did think, "uh, hey lady, maybe taking the subway to closed down parts of New York City after midnight just to get a little winter tolerance and maybe make yerself start to wander again isn't the wisest of things to do." Then i kept wandering. Danced some in the streets as i approached a familiar Canal Street (random play on the ipod is brilliant), and had a really nice walk.

It did make me think some, though. Exploring new stuff's good. Especially potentially scary new stuff. It's really important, i think. But it's its own thing for its own purposes. Can't expect others to be helpful or even not-unhelpful along the way. And to get thrown by this easily threatens to ruin the whole thing. Crazy McDonald's woman as exibit A, maybe. Also, like, the station worker at the stop i got off lost and asking for general directions "north east" at was really surely. She just grimaced and just pointed up. Ok, then! It might be somewhere up either of the stairs! Down any of the sidewalks up there on street level. Well, alright then!

Um, like anything, luck does come in play too, it seems. And metaphors, schmetaphors. But the wander, she just makes life bigger. And if she's also assisting me in appreciating the cold weather, we're talking some really big stuff.

Yeah, so, wandering, she has been good. Lightened winter's narcissism some. Brought back some curiosity, lessened some aversions, had me meet some of the locals. Good stuff. And, can i just say geniuses, GENIUSES!, who invented Terramar long underwear and space heaters. Straight up saintly fucking geniuses. i owe someone big. BIG!

"You're walking? You're drinking beer while you're walking?"

i'm inside the bar now, but evesdropping still.

Happy winter from NYC, y'all.



p.s. - Admittedly a little trepedatious for the move ahead, but, like the wander, open to whatever the hell might be next. And pretty excited to see what that is. Or at least trying to be. Just get warmer, ok?

ok.