just flying back to nyc from l.a.
l.a was 75 degrees and sunny when i left, and apparently there’s a big snow storm about to hit new york, although the snow will be mixed with freezing rain. it’s a weird form of masochism/familiarity/stockholm syndrome that compels someone to leave a warm, sunny, cloudless place in order to return to a place where you couldn’t stand outside naked for 5 minutes for fear of freezing to death. i love new york. it’s my home, the city of my birth, and arguably the most interesting and tolerant and diverse city on the planet. but let’s be honest, new york in february (and/or march. and/or, well, january) sucks. that feeling every morning as you walk outside and feel as if the weather is punching you in the face, and then it sits back and smugly gloats, mocking your powerlessness.
migration is starting to make more and more sense to me. birds do it, and they seem pretty happy when they’re not flying into airplane engines. maybe a civilized spring and autumn in new york and an even more civilized winter somewhere warm. perhaps that tends dangerously towards senior citizen snowbirds who flock to florida and arizona to play golf in january, but so be it. if in the future i decide to live in l.a during the winter you can mock me to your hearts content. you can mock my weakness, you can mock my intolerance for all things cold and slushy and grey, you can mock my loathing for brown puddles of freezing water and mud. i will gird myself and stoically accept your mocking as i lie in the grass at griffith park, possibly annoyed that the january sun is just a little bit too warm and that the ice in my lemonade has melted from the heat.
being an object of seasonal ridicule is a small price to pay for not having to stand 10 feet away from the curb (kerb) so as to avoid being soaked in freezing brown water by passing puddle jumping taxis.
i know: weather. seemingly mundane, but perhaps less so when you’re heading into the maelstrom after being coddled by february trade winds. ‘coddled’ is a nice word. like a cozy swaddle. no more coddling now. time to gird my loins and face the grim spectre of manhattan in smarch.
moby