Walking Until My Legs Failed

The first week I didn't have a plan so I walked. I took the train into Chelsea and just started walking south. Sometimes I wouldn't register that hours had passed until a knee or a hip started complaining.

I walked the High Line. I walked the West Side down to Battery Park. I walked across the Brooklyn Bridge and stood in the middle and looked back at the skyline like everyone does and felt almost nothing. I had expected to feel something. Instead I felt tired.

I think the walking was a way of imprinting the city on my body before I had any real relationship with it. If I could get the blocks into my feet, some part of me would belong here even if no part of me had permission to be here yet.

I stopped at a bodega on 10th Ave and bought a coffee. The man didn't look at me. He asked "cream and sugar" and I said "black" and he said "two dollars." It was the most intimate conversation I'd had in three days.

I walked back to the sublet at nine p.m. My calves were on fire. I took off my shoes and sat on the floor and ate a slice of pizza I'd grabbed on the way. It was the best pizza I have ever eaten and I have never been able to find the place again.