The Long Walk

In an effort to increase my overall health, I recently purchased a pedometer. The goal is to reach 10,000 steps a day. When you work in an an office, though, it can be tough to reach 3,000.

My brilliant solution, which has led to the last couple of OC posts about the subway, is to walk from the West 4th Street Station to my office in Hell's Kitchen. It is about 40 blocks uptown and three long blocks west. It is only about 6,000 steps, but with the walking around the office, I make my goal. Yay me.

What a difference Seven Minutes makes
The great side effect is that I take a great walk through the West Village every morning. I walk down Greenwich Street. If I don't get delayed by the F-train, Greenwich is practically empty. The shops are closed and it is one of the most peaceful ways to start your day when living in the city.

Yesterday, being seven minutes late, the street was much more crowded and cafes were beginning to open up and people were getting their morning coffee. One of my favorite moments in film is in a movie called, "Smoke." Harvey Keitel plays the owner of a cigar store the story revolves around his customers at the store. Every morning, Mr. Keitel's character walks out the front door of his shop at exactly the same time, raises a small camera and snaps a picture. He adds it to his "photo collection." It is his way to track those small changes that happen in a small corner of the world, which seems to be the same day in and day out. Being out and about in the Village always makes me think of that movie. I don't know if it is a "great film" but it is one that has stuck with me through the years. Walking each day, I wish I could capture that feeling of motion and compare it to yesterday and tomorrow and store it in an album.

Decaffeinated
I've mostly given up caffeine. For those of you who didn't know, I was the first kid in high school to become addicted to coffee. It took me through the long days and short nights of undergrad, the courtship of Kitty (we met at the copy machine, but fell in love in Starbucks) and through the tribulations of simultaneously managing grad school, my apprenticeship and my first major database job. I am now down to one half cup of "half-caff" per day and sometimes a cup of decaf in the afternoon. I sleep better at night and I'm less edgy during the day.

My walk through the Village is a test, though. Quaint pastry shops abound and there are vendors on the street in small metal cubes on wheels that provide our fair city with carbohydrates, caffeine and chemicals to make it through the long work days. If that weren't enough, there are delis that sell an egg and cheese on a toasted hard roll and a cup of coffee for $1.50. It's enough to make a grown man cry out for mercy. The Seven Minute difference means that instead of being practically alone, I see New Yorkers walking down the street with small cups with greek key designs, large cups with mermaids, or cell phone and sandwich in hand.

Barcelona and Modernism
Getting to work has become harder since my last trip to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. I saw the exhibit on Barcelona and Modernism. The artists who were a part of the movement, met at Le Quatre Gats, a cafe. They talked politics and talked about their art and were inspired to create. The Village makes me want to turn into one of the cafes and sit and leave behind the obligations of a day job. I could just sit and plan out my singing career and beyond. I could meet my neighbors and get inspired to put on a show in the city. I could find out about the next great revolution that is being planned in the, now bourgoise, heart of artistic New York. Instead, I turn up my music and walk out of the Village and on to Chelsea and my job.