choices

Life, like a city, is such an unpredictable and weird place, beautiful, complicated, confusing, busy.  Choices can be described in the same way I suppose-sometimes you make them and sometimes others make them and somehow they affect you just the same-they almost become your choices too.  Maybe it's just like apartment hunting in a strange city that feels familiar in some ways but not in others- you look around, at a neighborhood, an apartment and while you're thinking about it, trying to make some choices, someone comes right in, makes their choice much faster and so their choice becomes yours but just the opposite of your original choice and so the apartment is no longer yours. Well, it makes sense in this foggy head of mine and if you believe that our lives have a path that they're supposed to take, then the choices aren't really ours at all-are they?

space

This morning, I was reading through the articles on the New York Times on-line homepage, as I do several times a day it seems and came across a story about a man who lives in the city-Brooklyn to be exact. His studio apartment is exactly 178 square feet-that's right, 178 square feet and, I love it! Everything in its place, arranged perfectly and it works.  While I'd have to downsize considerably, especially my closet (quite a ridiculous passion for clothes, shoes and purses), I'm sure I could make it work.  No more space for gathering too many things to make the space seem like mine.  This house I live in now-far too big, far too many things, far too much to clean-far too much.  A little square studio, all 178 feet of it, in the city could be just perfect.

drive

The weather has been quite snowy lately-well, very snowy and windy and icy and cold.  I've been spending lots of time inside, in the house with a few walks around but not many chances to get out, get away-and not really 'get away' but 'go to'-yes, that's right.  So, a couple of nights ago, I decided to go for a drive into the city to look around, have some coffee and well, see the sights and maybe a few apartments, houses and neighborhoods.  The drive down was lovely and luckily the coffee shop wasn't too crowded - there was a spot to sit, people watch and play around on my Mac for a while.  Quite different from the few days I spent at the same shop this summer, during the day with people coming in and out frequently. Most kept to themselves or chatted quietly with a friend.  After finishing my coffee, I drove around, getting a feel for certain streets and weird, foreign thoughts came-Where would I park if I lived there?  Who would my neighbors be? Would I walk to do laundry? Could I live in a large building or a house? Ride my bike? I haven't thought things like that in so long-city things I suppose.