Imagine it is cold and dark 
And you are very ready to be home 
And you're waiting for the uptown C
And a train comes chugging by
And you do a double take 
Because it's not the regular train
The cars are different
The upholstery is different 
There's something old timey about it 
And it's decked out in Christmas lights 
You later discover it's an "Arnine" or City Car
In use from the 1930s until 1977 
And now re-purposed for Holiday Nostalgia Rides
The Special was on its way uptown 
You better watch out, you better not cry, 
Stand clear of the closing doors please 
The festive season is on its way...

​When you’re in a room with several hundred people
And you collectively experience a night of transformative theatre
That makes you laugh and weep
And hold your breath
And turn to each other and say
Are you feeling what I’m feeling?!
And you walk out into the New York City night
On the autumnal equinox
And there is a man in a t-shirt and tattered jeans with grime-blackened feet at the end of them
Passed out on the pavement

​The thrill of standing in line
At 8 in the morning
With hundreds of your fellow theatre nerds
My first time in the David Koch Theatre
(I need to come see a ballet)
The thrill of seeing the dress rehearsal
Watching how it all comes together
How it looks in real life v. on the screen
The amusing speeches of the stand-ins
The Dad jokes for Father’s Day
Being in awe of the performers
Who are rehearsing this morning
Doing a matinee this afternoon
And coming back to do the show tonight
The thrill of it
The exhaustion of it
The anticipation
The rush of joy

Running through the parks of
Upper Manhattan
Uptown = UP
Downtown = DOWN
Reveling in the hills
Even when they’re hard
They will make me better.

The joy of sitting in the park
On a warm and sunny afternoon
Watching a family kick around a ball
Their goofy retriever rolling in the grass
People watching
Meeting Jan for dinner
And getting to see
Titanic at City Center
The all-star cast of musical theatre royalty
The stunning score played with a full orchestra
Feeling lucky and spoilt
In the best kind of way

A gorgeous blue sky day
The heartbreak of passing nearly a dozen people sleeping rough on the park benches
The plethora of trash on the ground
The beauty of the parks
The green of the trees
The cool of a tree-lined avenue

You choose a different path today
Run north along the Hudson
Toward the GW 
It is awe-inspiring up close 
Immense and grand 
And then the hill begins 
And you are in the Heights
And you get to run back down the hill
All the way home to 
Harlem 

At the end of a long day
You're out of spoons 
But you meet up with a dear friend
For dinner and a walk
And you stumble upon the Wicked garden
And eat the most phenomenal noodles 
(The Hand Pulled Noodle in Harlem
You have my heart forever) 
And watch the sunset over the Hudson 
And feel oh-so-thankful 
You get to be here 

The delight of a game of 
Musical chairs 
In the middle of New York City 
With 900 strangers
Who become fast friends 
How long has it been since you last played musical chairs?
In another millennium 
Literally and figuratively?! 

6 miles / 9.6km 
Along the Hudson 
Stumbling upon a 
​Tree-lined trail
In the middle of Riverside Park and
Thinking 
Am I really on the edge
Of one of the most densely populated cities
In the US?