I feel as if I've come home from a different planet. Manhattan was so awesome, but I need this. Waking up to the rooster crowing. Birds peeping as they squabble over the suet feeder. Sunlight streaming through the leaves and blossoms of my orchids, my cat, Baby Sheldon, rubbing his nose over my chin on both sides, paws around my neck, purring. And oh, the quiet. Even the birds are quiet in the late morning, when everything in the world seems to take a breath.
In Manhattan, all hours of the day and night, there are sirens. They're like the reverse of wolves, howling as they coordinate to find and take care of people in trouble. Honking, though in the small hours of the night that tends to go away, as the roads meant to accommodate hundreds of thousands of vehicles finally have just the right number traveling through them. Bright lights of huge LED screens blare across the distances between the buildings like search lights. Though it's light, it feels like a sound, like a fog horn. The whistles of traffic cops. From the 36th floor, it's a symphony. I think it would be harder to be down in it at ground level.
It's all wonderful, all fun, but coming home, I realize why we live here. I think I could be happy living just about anywhere, but here I'm content. Our little farm is the perfect work environment for me. And here, I feel like there's just so much to do! People do complain that there's nothing to do in a rural area and there's so much to do in the city, but I think they're talking about entertainment. I'm thinking about work, about the things that I know how to do and want to do, especially in the garden and with the farm. I'm lucky that my work is extremely pleasurable.
I'm lucky overall. If there's one feeling I could pick to describe my trip to Manhattan, it's that I'm fortunate: lucky to have the means to travel and stay in Manhattan, lucky to have such good friends who took good care of me while I was there, and lucky to have this kind of home to come home to afterwards. Thanks, T&K, and H, for showing me around your awesome town. And thanks to my DH for bringing me along on such a neat adventure.
Thanks for reading. TTYL!