A Day Well Spent

When we emerged from our apartment today, after most of the long weekend spent inside, we had two things planned--seeing kids from Broadway's Annie singing at Dylan's Candy Bar and spending my daughter's Claire's gift card at South Street Seaport.  Simple goals, but plenty for my first outing after days on the couch trying to kick a cold.

Little did we know when we started how different these two things would be.  At Dylan's, we were surrounded by colorful candy of all kinds, bright displays, and 6 little girls singing "You're Never Fully Dressed Without a Smile" as if they'd been on Broadway for every minute of their young lives.  It was like being in "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory."  If you had enough money, you could practically live there, feasting on all manner of sweets (including my daughter's favorite--bacon-flavored chocolate), and sleeping on pillow facsimiles of different candies in pajamas with pictures of cupcakes, made happy every day by the vibrant colors surrounding you.

A long, winding bus ride later, we found ourselves at South Street Seaport for errand number two.  Those New Yorkers among you might already be laughing at my miscalculation, because, alas, when we got off the bus there, we were hit with the reality that South Street Seaport is still long from "back in business" after the hurricane we thought was behind us.  Dark stores, boarded up windows, emergency management trucks, and signs everywhere saying "Closed--Do Not Enter."  From the colorful, carefree feeling of Dylan's Candy Bar and Annie the Musical, to the gray reality of stores and restaurants that may never fully recover.

As we returned home from part two of our outing, I thought about how lucky we were, both to live in a place where we have largely been able to move on, and to have had not just part one of today's expedition, but part two as well.  We can all use reminders that there is a world outside our own, that the view from our own window is not necessarily the full view.  It's just the view we happen to be in a place to see.

I know that I won't soon forget my first reaction when we walked from the bus to the Seaport today, the realization that whatever darkness I might be choosing to feel in my life was actually pretty bright compared to the dark windows we saw and the challenges that would be ahead for the people there and in lots of other places affected not just by the storm, but by challenges a whole lot harder than a bad cold.

A day well spent.