Getting to New York

I used frequent flyer points for my flights and bought an exit row seat for the Sydney to LA leg and got upgraded to one for the LA to NY flight. I think it was worth it, but on the first flight, the overnight one, I was quite close to the galley and often got light in my eyes when a flight attendant went in or out. Another problem - while I approve of including different people as flight attendants, rather than the traditional young and skinny, I was not entirely happy at being woken several times by a bump from a passing flight attendant who was wider than the distance between the edge of my chair and the wall. On the LA to NY flight I heard, for the first time, an announcement that people were not allowed to congregate in groups, particularly near the toilets.

I went armed with directions to get public transport to my apartment. There is a new airtrain linking the different terminals and connecting at 2 different stations to several of the subway lines. On both occasions when I stopped to compare my instructions with the displayed map, someone approached me offering help. I got onto the first subway train at the end of the group of people and was initially undecided whether to take my pack off and sit, leave my pack on and perch on the edge of the seat or stay standing. I was undecided when the train moved off and was looking at the map to make sure I knew the station I had to get off at when several people shifted so that I could sit down. I was most uncomfortable and used a lot of energy staying precariously on the edge of the seat, not sliding off it, not to mention what the pilates instructor calls my ‘sit bones’. Needless to say after changing to the second subway train, I stayed standing. It was all worth it when I easily passed on the stairs out of the station several people struggling with large suitcases. The apartment is only a few blocks away from that subway station in a lovely residential street with blocks of apartments, some , like mine, old brownstones. The leaves are just beginning to come out on the trees along both sides of the street. Most of the buildings are 5 or 6 storeys high and the trees are the same height. They grow out of the pavement and many have flowers, often tulips, planted around them. Most of the buildings have a half flight of steps up to the main door and a half flight of steps down to the lower level. I am on the first floor, the one up from the main entrance level, with 2 big windows that look toward the street and the trees. The street is one way, lined with parked cars on both sides , and not busy. Last night I listened intermittently for noise and heard nothing, apart from the person above me who was moving around at 2.30am.

The owners live in the basement and Warren has his office in the first room on the entrance level. He happened to be looking out his window as I arrived and he assumed that the funny-looking woman staring at his building was his new tenant and came out to greet me. I also met his wife, Susan. They are a lovely couple and seem very happy to help answer questions. The studio is small, but furnished with nice old wooden pieces – a big desk set between the windows, a comfy bed, 2 large leather tub chairs infront of a funny-looking old, no longer functioning fireplace, a large interesting cabinet housing the TV, a large chest of drawers, books, lamps. There is a chest in front of one of the windows on which I have put some of the cushions from the bed to make a nice window seat where I comfortably watched the world go past for a while this afternoon. I walked around the block last night to buy a bit of fruit and some crackers and found many interesting looking cafes. Maybe I will be taking the crackers to Martha Vineyard. I bought the supplies from a little ‘corner shop’ (through it was not on the corner) that apparently is the last family owned and run shop now in the area. In the notes given to me by the owners , it was described as ‘old New York’. I did not know what that meant, but when I heard these 2 old guys behind the counter gently, slowly, talking to each other, politely stop and greet me when I entered, then continue their conversation, I knew what ‘old NY’ was.