Touching Down

I didn't kiss the ground when I stepped off the plane but I did feel relieved to be back. Rain fell gently as I paced up and down in front of "Parking Pick-Up Area C". I had plenty of people to call but no phone, plenty of things to do but no urgency. In short abstraction: I felt unconcerned with the typical restraints of time and space. I put on my I-Pod and strolled back and forth, watching the cars roll by.

Soon enough I was driving away with Charlotte, who sacrificed a few hours of her morning to save me from navigating the Subway with all my luggage. Nine months of separation felt more like nine days once we got chatting and we touched down in Cobble Hill after 45 minutes. I dropped off my bags, scrubbed 24 hours of plane grime off my skin and greeted Laura in the kitchen, then bought Charlotte brunch at one of my favorite spots on Smith Street. The coffee was strong and delicious and the place was empty in a good way. There's no place like Brooklyn for brunch.

The middle of my day featured a familiar commute into Wall Street for lunch with some former coworkers / current friends. I shed a single tear when I learned that Andrews, my favorite lunch-time diner, had closed, but we grabbed sandwiches while I tried my best to catch up with eight of them at once. They smiled and made good eye contact as they shared updates from their lives: they were dating new people, had moved to new neighborhoods, gotten accepted into graduate school, published new books (nice one, Dax!). Only after about 20 minutes did I realize that some of them were sharing information that they had not yet shared with each other. It reminded me of the counter-intuitive axiom of New York intimacy-- it's sometimes easier to stay close with someone who lives on the other side of the world than on the other side of the city. Additionally, I no longer had any professional stake in divulging personal information, and it felt good to be sharing whatever felt relevant without fear of professional repercussions. I decided it was better to be friends than colleagues with this bunch, and after they spent ten minutes discussing whether or not they would get "summer Fridays" this year I felt sure that friends was better.

After a few "so longs" and a cup of coffee from the Mud Truck on wall street (which has shamelessly jacked-up prices since last June) I met-up with Charlotte and her little brother, Angus, and we headed for SoHo to do some shopping. Since clothes cost at least twice as much in South Africa, I decided to buy as much as I could while I was in New York. Similarly, Angus had just landed his first real job at an architecture firm this summer and was determined to bolster his business casual wardrobe with some one-stop shopping. After an hour of vying for position with other international bargain hunters under fluorescent lights with dance-pop playing in the background I was ready to retreat from UniQlo to a mountaintop monastery with my nylon socks and linen-cotton-blend shirt to contemplate the infinite nothingness inside of me.

Instead, I hopped a downtown F Train to visit my recently injured buddy, Kevin, in park slope. Kevin separated his shoulder messing around on the soccer pitch and was doped up on a fair bit of Oxycodone, which only added to the joyful nature of our reunion. We shared a beer at The Gate, the same vantage point from where, two Halloweens ago, we watched the costumed locals haunt the neighborhood. I told Kevin that the only weird part of the day was the lack of weirdness, and he smiled. I told him about my job in South Africa, my feelings about living there, my relationship with Indra, and he smiled. I asked him about his job and he smiled. He was also talking, but the smiling is what really stuck in my mind. Pain pills, engagement and a bit of a hiatus from his hectic job as an administrator at a Brooklyn-based charter school seem to be agreeing with Kev.

After what felt like a few minutes but turned out to be an hour, I was late for dinner. I hoofed it back to the Page residence, where I enjoyed a wonderful meal in the company of my Brooklyn host family. While living with the Pages we shared countless delicious meals and engaging conversations around their round, green, marble dining room table. This night was no exception--the wine was flowing, the chicken delicious, and laura even surprised us with a second batch of tater tots! After dinner we made the somewhat ill-advised decision to enjoy the evening ambiance of Floyd's, where we consumed several buckets of beer. Somewhere around 2:30 a.m. my jet-lag finally lapped me and I passed out face down, happy, and back in NYC.