what to do in nyc | jazz age lawn party on governors island

For as many years as I've lived in New York, I can't believe this is the first time I've been to the Jazz Age Lawn Party on Governors Island. Food, booze, dancing, big bands, and enough red lipstick and suspenders to keep a girl going for months...I'll be going back again and again.

And just a ferry ride away.

round these parts | summer begins

(the Bowery Hotel has a lovely bar right off the lobby, in case you were wondering...)

(one of the best bits of a Brooklyn summer? the free concerts in Prospect Park)

(if you ever get the chance to see Fitz and The Tantrums live, YOU MUST)

i love summer in new york. the heat is nearly unbearable and i find myself wishing it away, but there is so much to do here. free concerts and outdoor bars and pop-up markets. the city becomes a veritable cornucopia of opportunity--i mean, it is always, but it's more evident in the summer. everyone is out and anything is possible. i knew that when i crossed the brooklyn bridge last saturday night just as the sun was rising (after a night of karaoke), that summer was off to a roaring start...

snowy New York

 

 

i've been sick for nearly a week with the stomach bug that's going round and have barely left the apartment, but for the really necessary things.

waking this morning to an absolutely white carroll gardens was such a treat--for all the fuss about the snowstorm a month ago, it's been a pretty snowless winter here in new york and this texan really loves a white winter. i took a twenty minute walk as the snow pummeled down (and then promptly had to take a three hour nap), but it was totally worth it. something about a blanket of fresh snow that makes it feel as though the world is taking a deep breath and so i can too.

i hope everyone has a happy (and healthy) weekend.

(and that spring is just around the corner).

xo, meg

standing in the shower. dreaming.

i took a long shower tonight. let the water rush over me.

closed my eyes and dreamt.

of the corner of 76th and columbus. and its blue storefront.

of cafe aroma's israeli lattes. foam sticking to my upper lit.

of blossom's vegan milkshakes.

of the hudson river and its flourish of green.

of boots and tights and winter hats.

of fall.

of a dingy basement bar open till four that plays nothing but marley.

of the foyer of my apartment building. the marble steps. yellowing light.

of the corner coffee shop on saturday mornings. white counter top before me. coffee and croissant.

of my towering black bookcase and the white speakers my brother got me last christmas.

of my bed. my own bed.

and the lovely family i've cobbled together in that city of millions.

soon enough. soon enough. still got some mountains to climb. figuratively and literally.

a vision quest.

when i first arrived at school (juilliard), all those years ago, my father would say, i went to school right here. right across the street. and never did i dream i'd have a daughter who would end up here.

from my first year dorm room the words Fordham Law School sat in perfect view. situated right there on the stone-white building. and my father would look out at them and say, all those years ago, i didn't know. things come full circle, don't they?

again and again he would say this.

and then again.

so often did he speak these words, i stopped listening.

now, though.

well,

sometimes we'll speak on the phone and i'll say, oh i'm downtown trying to find such and such and Dad will say, oh my first job was just around the corner.

and something is illuminated. and i feel connected.

because i stopped listening, i never actually heard what my dad was saying. it never occurred to me that i was crossing paths with his younger-self. navigating the same terrain. standing on the same corners. experiencing the same late-afternoon sunlight.

yesterday i headed up to the bronx near riverdale (which is where my father was born and raised) to run some errands, and there on the platform i thought, perhaps my father once stood right here. perhaps he waited for the same train. perhaps, perhaps...

these thoughts come to me now. not too often. but just often enough.

people ask me why i don't just leave new york. there's no reason to stay and clearly i'm not in love with the city. and i think the answer--more than anything else--is that i'm not ready to. there is a reason to stay, even if the reason is unclear at best.

in some ways new york is my version of the vision quest. i am looking for an answer. trying to figure out where i come from. to piece together a history.

i'm looking for an answer, i'm just not completely sure of the question.