New York rarely lets you do nothing. There's always a brunch, a birthday, a text that says are you around this weekend. So when a Sunday opens up empty, I guard it like a dragon.
This week I took the N train out to Astoria with zero plans. That was the plan.
I started at a Greek bakery on Ditmars where I ordered a bougatsa and a coffee and pretended I understood the conversation happening in three languages around me. Astoria is one of the few places in this city where I feel comfortably foreign — everyone here is from somewhere else and nobody's performing about it.
Then I walked. No destination. Past the little Egyptian grocers, past the old man watering plants outside his building, past a family arguing beautifully about parking.
A slow Sunday in Astoria eventually pulls you to the water. I ended up at Astoria Park, under the RFK Bridge, watching the East River do its thing while kids screamed in the pool nearby. I sat on a bench for an hour and did nothing. Genuinely nothing. It felt illegal.
Back home, my Ahmedabad self would've called this a lazy day and felt guilty. My New York self is finally learning that rest is not a failure of ambition.
I didn't take a single good photo. I didn't network. I didn't earn anything.
A perfect Sunday in Astoria, and my only accomplishment was breathing.
Protect your empty days. They're rarer than good apartments.
Love,