“the day so empty yet ready and willing to be filled with last minute adventures”

Spending the majority of the second half of summer staying put in the city really has its perks. Trying all the restaurants I didn’t have time to try before. Glasses of wine in the park. Spending an evening up on the rooftop and taking in the sunset. More walks … everywhere. Getting into mangas all of a sudden and being very happy about this new addition to my life. A few weeks not filled with packing and travel and itineraries has come to feel like the most free thing. And you don’t even realize the feeling until you are already set in the motion of just living your life in the city. And New York City is a pretty great one to call home. We really do forget how lucky we are to live in this city this is as batshit as it is stunningly poetic.

I like the pace of how summer at home allows me to gradually coming alive into my energy in the morning. No rushing. Time seems endless and the day so empty yet ready and willing to be filled with last minute adventures. Like sleeping in on a Friday, and suddenly deciding to take the day off and go to the MET … two Fridays in a row. That’s a summer feeling. It’s bringing a blanket and a book all the way uptown to Central Park and just people watching and staying still, enjoying the buzz from a quiet little spot, going unnoticed and unbothered and just absolutely at peace with just being. It’s watching tourists flag down taxis. It’s grabbing a $1 water bottle off the street to cool off from the sweltering heat. It’s eating ice cream on a stoop in Fort Greene. It’s finding the treat in all the little everyday things that normally get overlooked. Not everyone gets the chance experience their city in this sort of way.

30 blocks in the summer feels like climbing a mountain but I love how my feet and legs feel worn from it. I feel grounded and connected to this city this way. I always think, in the summer, we dream of Europe and all the other place in the world that show up on our social media, but with a different perspective, a vacation can be made right here at home. Just an escapist sort of mindset just starts with looking around and slowing down and just taking in the feeling.

Don’t get me wrong, I love having a new destination to plan out, and I am in fact planning to get out of the city at the beginning of fall. Gabi and I are still deciding on where exactly we want to go, but for right now, being here in NYC is simply wonderful.