A Good Wednesday

I met up with my new and beautiful friend Jeanne tonight for a mid-week reading and cocktail. I quickly excused the pretenses put on by Happy Endings at 302 Broome St. (their super swank interior is disguised by a Chinese pharmacy store front) when Joshua Henkin got to the mic and sang the Time Warp in Hebrew. Kate Christensen read a letter she wrote to the Queen of England when she was nine and the ethereal and swoony tunes from Clare and the Reasons made me jealous of all the daisy field moments I've missed out on. We got two easy to drink cocktails at bar in the Village where a short and frumpy man in boxy Prada glasses made an off-handed remark about his brother who was in a band..."you might know them...The Scissor Sisters?". Noticing the $1,400 bar tab while signing my $20 one was enough to make my hippie sub-unconsciousnesses speak up...Jeanne's must have too because we got to our feet and bolted toward the door faster than you can say Christian Louboutin. Of course, our anti-materialism self-righteousness slipped through the gutter the second we saw an incredible window lit up to show super high suede boots in all colors and mini designer coin purses painted with baby deer and robots.

New York has got me in a crisis. It makes me incredibly sad and self-conscious when I notice that not having enough pairs of $690 shoes makes me sad and self-conscious. In May I was wearing jean cut-offs and the same $12 men's plaid button-up every day and feeling like I had more style than I knew what to do with. I've been investing a lot of my thought time into what's coming next...I think about drinking fresh goat's milk at 5 am in the Pyrenees or sleeping on trains and being forced into fluency again in Venezuela. Walking through the East Village my thoughts were in the mountains in France, a mango farm in India, a small, sustainable restaurant in Portland, in Montana...every work day, before noon even rolls around, I re-bandage my blistered heels and wonder what the hell I'm doing in East Midtown. I'm idealistic! I want to save the world through sustainable agriculture! Why the hell am I in New York instead of the millions of other places I can be in? I'm constantly worried that my life is going to roll by before I find a place that I'm absolutely happy in.

But seriously, having that thought is almost more of a luxury than being able to buy $690 Chanel pumps. I'm not even 22 years old. I can do whatever the hell I want. I can have cocktails in the East Village tonight and still save the world, right? My internal bitching subsided pretty quickly this time, because the thing is, I just saw a great live show with a fun new friend...and my cucumber martini was damn good.