A Clean Getaway

I love that when I get off at the 77th Street Subway stop I can move toward the correct exit alongside all the other scrambling mice as we find our way up the stairs and set off in a hundred different directions. I finally KNOW my neighborhood and am becoming quite the expert at the New York City transit system. And just when New York was beginning to feel like home... snap... my time here is coming to an end.

Tonight it dawned on me, really dawned on me, that I will be leaving the city in less than 3 weeks. Last night I loved traipsing through Central Park with a group of friends to see a Greek tragedy at the Delacorte Theater. The play was a bit of a disaster... an insular production that was so preoccupied with talking that I found myself listening more to the wind in the willows (literally) and the cricket opera that hung thick in the air. But, what a treat. I loved walking past the lonely Metropolitan Museum of Art last night, which is so very rarely lonely. It is a gift to live just 10 blocks from this mammoth house of art and see its empty stairs in the wee hours of the morning.

I have been so busy with work that I have not taken the time to truly consider an "exit strategy." Tonight I had dinner in SoHo with the Obaditch family, one of my favorite fam's from New Jersey, and ate divine frozen yogurt at a trendy little place called Pinkberry. I was telling them about my gig in Philadelphia and as I spoke the reality of the move began to set in. A new adventure awaits, but that means that there are many goodbyes ahead of me. Bleh.

I am preaching on Sunday on the Song of Songs, which is full of beauty and full of love (not to mention plum full of explicit erotic poetry). Kind of a fun way to say adios to my friends here at Madison Ave. Presb Church-- spend some time dwelling on the goodness of love and creation and sensual delights. Don't fret my pets, I do not plan to scandalize anyone. It's the end of August. Who has room for scandal at the end of August?

I plan to do many "lasts" in the coming weeks. I have already come up with a number of good ways to say goodbye, for now, to this wonderful city. I plan to put a black Sharpie pen in my bag and add a few notes to special places. An occasional "I was here" and "We were here" seems important. I want to seal some memories as I go.

But, I am always open to suggestions. Ideas for a "clean getaway"?