Riding Metro North. With Leaner.

Claustrophobia_I_by_RGreene

The mercury tipped 27° F.
It’s the fifth day of Spring. Spring. Right.

It was one of those March days when the sun shines hot and the wind blows cold: when it is summer in the light, and winter in the shade. (Dickens)

The only thing Dickens got right in this passage was the book title: Great Expectations, and mine for the weather.

It was one of those March days when the sun doesn’t shine at all and the wind blows cold: when it is winter in the light, it is winter in the dark and it is winter in the shade. (DK)

It’s 5:45 am. I’m standing on the platform with a handful of others.  The remaining commuters wait for the 5:57 train in the warming station.

But not me. No Sir. I refuse to cede my place at the front of the not-yet-formed line.  Close to memory are my last two rides — unable to find a seat, I stood the entire 55 minute ride. Technical correction: there was an unwillingness, a steadfast refusal to sit in the middle seat.  Just not an option. I need my space.

I board the train. I’m the first on, my wait paying off.  I find an empty two-seater and sit next to the window. I settle in and start into the morning papers.  The warm air from a vent caresses my feet and legs. It’s going to be a good day. Continue reading “Riding Metro North. With Leaner.”

The Proper Way

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The proper way
to thank someone is:
a note written by hand.
To me, that’s special.
And I write spontaneously —
not too thought out.
Maybe it will just be the person’s name
and three words
I feel in the moment.

~ Alessandro Sartori, Berluti Menswear Designer in 20 Odd Questions


Image Source: sallymankus.com

Gulping down undigested experiences

fingers,

As it is, we are merely bolting our lives—gulping down undigested experiences as fast as we can stuff them in—because awareness of our own existence is so superficial and so narrow that nothing seems to us more boring than simple being. If I ask you what you did, saw, heard, smelled, touched and tasted yesterday, I am likely to get nothing more than the thin, sketchy outline of the few things that you noticed, and of those only what you thought worth remembering. Is it surprising that an existence so experienced seems so empty and bare that its hunger for an infinite future is insatiable? But suppose you could answer, “It would take me forever to tell you, and I am much too interested in what’s happening now.” How is it possible that a being with such sensitive jewels as the eyes, such enchanted musical instruments as the ears, and such a fabulous arabesque of nerves as the brain can experience itself as anything less than a god? And, when you consider that this incalculably subtle organism is inseparable from the still more marvelous patterns of its environment—from the minutest electrical designs to the whole company of the galaxies—how is it conceivable that this incarnation of all eternity can be bored with being?


Notes:

Monday Morning Wake-Up Call

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Image Credit: welynsbanana

 

Yet, another miracle.

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“The moon blots out the sun during a total solar eclipse over Longyearbyen on the Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard in the Arctic Ocean on Friday. The total eclipse was only visible on Svalbard and the Faeroe Islands.”

Source: wsj.com: Photos of the Day March 20, 2015. By Jon Olav Nesvold, Reuters.