Full Swing

So ever since we moved here I've wanted to go out on the rowboats in central park. It's an iconic experience I've romanticized plenty in my head. For some reason we just never get around to it. It doesn't help that we're always gone somewhere else over the summers for internships and the boats are only open during warm weather, but for some reason every year I've thought and thought and dreamed and dreamed about it, but I've always put it off for one reason or another- better weather, fewer crowds, a time we both have open, and, of course, I wanted optimal scenery- which in my mind, would be autumn at its peak. So this year as soon as we got back to New York I meant serious business and told Ryan how much I wanted to go this Fall, since it might be our last one here (Ryan graduates in April).

So I waited for the leaves to turn. and waited and waited. I took trips to the pond just to monitor those trees around the boats. October came and went and everything stayed brown and green. A few days ago, some yellow and red finally started blooming around the park, and the weather was staying in the mid 50's to 60's. So I hopped online and double checked the boathouse hours and information, spent longer than makes sense concocting my ideal 'boating in central park in the autumn' outfit, complete with leaves in my hair, only to get to the boathouse and be told they had closed for the season. I am an idealist. Like, really, badly head-in-the-clouds, over-anticipatory and over-romanticising- and this level of disappointment, when I've been storyboarding these images in my head for weeks, and building up hope and excitement around the whole experience- really knocks me sideways. I felt like the whole day had been a waste of time, like I shouldn't have even bothered showering or putting on makeup or getting dressed- and just wanted to go straight home instead of waste how carefully I had gotten ready on nothing. Luckily, Ryan is far less dramatic and pretty overall chill and tried to lift my spirits as we searched for a good picnic spot to spend the dwindling daylight. He pushed to take photos anyway even though I was being a cranky little sh*t, and good thing he did, because even though it was really dark and they're kind of blurry, who know if those beautiful golden leaves are even on that tree anymore after today's rainstorm?













We had a happy little picnic with some homemade onigiri, snow sembei, pumpkin cream cheese sandwiches, and some veggies. It got dark alarmingly fast, and our hands were pretty cold and numb after about 15 minutes, but I'm so glad we can still be eating outside, because the winter lasts so long here and every year by march I feel like I don't know how to be alive anymore. Please stay warm a little longer, New York! So this whole experience taught me: I shouldn't get so invested in things, and I should take a step back before getting so disappointed in something that's pretty inconsequential in the grand scheme of things, and most of all made me realize I'm living too much in blog-land and not enough in real-land. I should be happy about wearing what makes me happy whether it gets 'documented' or not….in fact I'm going to have to let go of documenting the way I'd like to for the next few months just because there's no way to take them when there is light, and life is getting busier with lifey things.