Borrowing Manhattan: Sky in NYC

Since coming back from Alaska, I've really wanted to get hiking again. I scoped out the Greenbelt on Staten Island and was planning to go there today, but when I realized it would take over 2 hours each way to get there and couldn't leave until 2:30pm, it was no longer desirable.

Instead I left my phone, put on my hiking gear, took my good camera, and went for a 3-hour "hike" to the East River via Morningside and Central Parks. I had previously said that New York is about people, but this walk made me realize that it is also beautiful for it's own sake. And it was also an opportunity to reflect on the importance of that quality in a place. Sometimes New York feels very transactional, and as a person living here, I start to feel that I am merely a part of transactions. I am hired by someone and exist for how I can serve them. Or I hire others or pay for their goods and they only exist for what they can give me. We stop seeing one another as anything more than what we can offer and somehow we become objects. And so in this city, it seems very important to remember our humanity, and for the space itself, to see its beauty beyond the transactional quality of the buildings and modes of transportation. "Hiking" to enjoy the surroundings. Not to get anywhere or burn calories, but to be outside in a space, appreciating it.

The sky is still there and still beautiful, and only because we see it and think it is so.