Lost in the City

This morning, we were booted off the R train at City Hall. I stood on the platform for a moment before deciding to just walk to the office from there. It's a few short blocks and it was a nice morning.

(Side note: I think I left my future husband behind on the platform. This guy gets on at 8th street, sits down across from me, and right away I think, "mountain boy." He has that lean and strong outdoorsy look that I came to love from the Colorado year, sort of shaggy hair, and -- disturbingly -- sparkling blue eyes IDENTICAL to my sister's late husband Mark, and the same sweet expression. I looked up from my book and he was sort of smiling at me, then he comments to me, "That's a great book." Now, how many people are you going to encounter on a New York City subway who have heard of, much less READ, Lama Surya Das' "Awakening the Buddhist Within"? Shortly after that, we were booted off the R. I walked past him on the platform, we smiled at each other, and I pushed through the turnstile. As I started up the stairs, I looked over to where he was standing, and he smiled and gave me a half-wave. The people that you never get to love. Man.)

Anyway, I see that I have a message from that headhunter with whom I've been trading voice mails, and called him back.

Strolling along, selling myself as hard as I can over the phone, and doing quite well If I may say so myself, and when the conversation ends, I stop on a street corner, look around, and I have no idea where I am.

Literally -- I look around in bemusement, wondering if I've been sent by Wonkavision to another city. Hello? I don't even recognize my beloved?

Finally, I spin around one more time (feeling like Mary Tyler Moore, "you're gonna make it after all") looking upward, and realize, that somehow, I have ended up behind 7 World Trade Center. I was on the completely wrong side of the Hole.

So disorienting but in a kind of great way (like a head rush, ya know?).

I did discover that there is a really, really ugly bulbous glistening red sculpture back there. It looks like a mass of christmas colored entrails.

What ever happened to cool art in public spaces?