From: [redacted]
Subject: TimesheetsTell me about this week … the more dramatic, the better…
I have a sort of love/hate relationship with autumn. Good summers make depressing autumns, and I had a great summer. I expected Monday to be a fiercely fall day, so when I stepped out of work for lunch and it was 90 degrees, I felt at least a small measure of relief at having been spared the cold for a day. Summer never dies as long as it’s hot and humid. Took a deep breath—hot, humid.
Tuesday came and went. I could look out the window at Central Park and stare at the expanse of leaves: green, so far. Just green. Felt like summer, but it’s not summer. I sat back, tapped at the keys, caught myself thinking about apples. Is this what people in California do? Dream of apples?
I took the subway to work on Wednesday and Thursday; I typically ride my bike, but I thought it might be a good idea to acclimate to the train (wasn’t raining, no latent cold weather hostility, and I wanted to watch a movie on my phone). On both days, I stopped for coffee near my house. I like an iced Americano. Nobody was drinking anything iced. Got a foul look from the “barista”. Screw that.
Outside the coffee shop on Thursday was a dachshund with one brown and one blue eye, sitting amidst a few dry, yellow leaves. He just sat and stared.
Today I rode my bike. It was windy. The very tops of the trees in Central Park are pale green, turning paler yellow. It’s humid, but it’s fall.
d
This week's New Yorker has an article about an ecologist at the Wildlife Conservation Society who's embarked on a massive project to discover and depict what early Manhattan was like--including "a coffee-table book, interactive exhibits, a series of printed street guides, and a three-dimensional virtual re-creation". Consider me publicly thrilled.
There's a slideshow on newyorker.com with images from the Mannahatta Project.
(image courtesy newyorker.com and Markley Boyer / Wildlife Conservation Society)
