I got off work early on Friday, which felt illegal, and I decided to wander the LES with absolutely no plan.
This is a rare thing for me. I'm a planner. I have a Google Calendar for my Google Calendar. But my boss let us out at three and instead of going straight back uptown, I took the F to Delancey and just walked.
The Lower East Side in late September is my favorite version of New York. Golden hour comes early now, slanting down Orchard Street, hitting all the little vintage shops and the fabric stores that have somehow survived every wave of rent. I ducked into one where the owner let me touch bolts of silk I could never afford. He didn't mind. He could tell I was in love, not in the market.
I wandered the LES like a person with nowhere to be, which is the greatest luxury this city offers and the one nobody talks about.
Got a coffee. Sat on a stoop on Ludlow. Watched two skater kids fail the same trick eleven times and cheer each other on every single time. That's the whole city right there. Everybody failing loudly and rooting for each other anyway.
Ended up at a dumpling counter I've walked past a hundred times and never gone into. Six dumplings, four dollars, eaten standing up. Best decision of my week. Reminded me of eating chaat off a street cart on CG Road back home, that same standing-up, hands-slightly-dirty joy.
To wander the LES with no agenda is to remember I didn't move to New York for the jobs or the parties or the résumé. I moved here for exactly this. An unplanned Friday, a good slant of light, dumplings I finally tried.
The city doesn't reward you for wandering. It just quietly gives you back to yourself.
Go get lost somewhere on purpose this week.
Love,