My day: sweating, reading, & trying to be proud of myself

Stomping around in the soupy broth of New York City, wondering, wandering, & going to the dermatologist.

It was 5pm in the afternoon and I was lying on my bed with no pants on. New York City is experiencing what I would say is its tenth heatwave of the summer. Earlier in the day, I rallied myself for my morning run, which ended with me dissociating in the Whole Foods skincare aisle, grasping at my elderberry gummies that I swear have helped me stave off (most) colds ever since I started taking them.

Boredom struck around 1pm, and I remembered the cystic pimple that has been hanging out between my eyebrows for the past two weeks. Shortly after, I was on the train to my dermatologist in Midtown, who accepts me and my copay with open arms more often than I’d like to admit. One quick cortisone shot to my face later and I was back on the F train headed downtown.

I decided to get off at West 4th Street to do some shopping. I was on the phone on Christopher Street, leaned up against a homewares store, trying to get ahold of the 92nd St YMCA. I had been taking a watercolor class there for a few weeks, and I couldn’t be sure if today was the last week of the course or not. I watched the cars zoom by on Sixth Avenue, people walking and biking and eating and kissing, taking up space. Recently, I was in Tulsa, Oklahoma, where the streets were wide and quiet and I felt like I could hear the sun sifting through the clouds.

I am recently more amazed by space and how differently it is occupied around the country. How do I live on this island jam-packed with people and things, with everything I could possibly want at my fingertips, and the entire thing could fit in a small corner of a huge state like New Mexico or Texas?

I am afraid of a lot of things, and I will tell you straight away. But I project an air of fearlessness usually. One of the fears I try to disengage with is that New York City is not for me. That my time here is actually finite. Who am I without New York? But I saw myself watching myself leaned up against the homewares store. Sweating, on the phone, about to purchase some cards and look at overpriced melamine catchalls. I get so caught up in everything always, distracting my brain with videos and words and pictures.

Sometimes I forget that I once dreamed of doing exactly what I do all the time.

After trudging home across town and pressing my boobs against my AC unit for ten minutes straight, 5pm was right around the corner. My clean laundry lay in a heap on my bed, but I just rolled over it all and started reading my book. I only had a few pages left, and this particular book has struck me more than others. I’ve been watching this Copenhagen-based YouTuber lately who makes travel and lifestyle videos. I spotted this particular book in many of her videos; I figured she was struggling to get through it considering how many weeks of vlogs it was featured in. I started finding it in many bookstores, and eventually I gave in and bought it. The story was edgy and spicy and sexy and angry, but also sweet and based in New York City.

As I lay on my bed, with my eyes drifting to the shadows the fire escape cast on the brick building out my window, I thought about how much my life has changed in the last year. A year ago, I had no job and had just moved into an apartment by myself. It was my first time truly living alone after having spent my entire adult life living with someone who I did everything with. That girl could not imagine that I would be living this life alone right now. I know somewhere deep in her heart, she knew she was missing this part of her dreams. Freedom. I was blind to my lack of it.

I don’t know much about love but I know more than I used to know for sure. I thought love had to be all-consuming, sacrificial, overwhelming.

I thought I had to grab on to anything that felt right and safe because losing it and trying to find something different or better for me made me afraid.

I’ve always been afraid of losing what feels comfortable, even if that thing isn’t actually comforting. I am bad at letting go and being uncertain, but I am trying to change that. And then:

“Wherever you are going, it is waiting for you.”

I finished the book. I put on my shorts. I sat at my desk and just sat there. Why does the summer always make me feel so much? I feel like I am emerging. I am trying to change. And I never thought I would ever want that so badly.