On The Steps of the Palace

Okay, it wasn't exactly the palace, and I didn't leave a glass slipper. I just couldn't resist the Sondheim reference.
 
It was actually the New York Public Library, the big, fancy branch with the steps and the lions--where the Between The Lions lions lived.
 
On this bright sunny day, I planted myself for an hour, hoping that the sun above me and the giant literary trove behind me would provide the necessary inspiration (or at least captivity) to finish (or at least start) revisions on my children's book chapter.
 
I was far from alone. People flanked me on all sides, with busy Fifth Avenue in front of me. Yet, in a little chair, at a little table, with my little manuscript before me, I might as well have been in a dark, isolated room. For close to an hour, my companions on the library steps disappeared, as I became completely immersed in the world of my chapter. I can't say whether it was some mystical power of the library or the lions, or just the power of having taken myself out of my daily routine, but in that hour, I made progress on things that have eluded me for weeks.
 
Will sitting on those steps work every time? I don't know. All I know is that for this one moment in time, they provided a form of solitude that I needed. A place new enough for me (though I see it many times each week) that I could put aside the rest of my life and just focus.
 
It's not easy to put aside the rest of life. There are many things daily that demand our attention and care. Yet, taking ourselves away from those things--physically and emotionally--even for an hour, can open us up to all sorts of new experiences. For me today, it was a little clarity in my writing. Who knows what it will be next time?
 
All I know is that I'll be heading back to those steps, and to other places that "take me away." It may not be tomorrow, but count on it being some time very soon.