Fire It Up

There is a serious energy here in Manhattan. I touched a piece of it last year but a part of me was worried that it might be fleeting, or more of a product of the right people at the right time, or just my post-crazy still fired up mindset. Well, it's only been a week into my three or four week trip and it feels exactly the same. Like too many things are happening, in a good way, and there's just no time to catch my breath. That's such a contrast to the last two years I've spent in the Bay (Fremont), Los Angeles (West Covina), or San Diego.

To be honest, I'm just unmotivated to be out and about when I'm elsewhere. I'm sure a large part of the reason everything's like hyper "let's go because hell no I don't want no FOMO" is because it's basically vacation time being out here. And people are willing to stay out and hang for however long because it's rare to see everyone together.

But with one week down and two and a half to go, I already feel all packed in with stuff I have to do, people I've yet to see, and my original idea of having long expanses of time to just chill out, explore the city, and look for something to do is probably going to be shelved. There just isn't enough time.

I think you can do Manhattan on low energy output and have it seem like anywhere else. But see, I've been hanging out with Amit all week and even though he's gleefully unemployed, his social life is pretty much two full time jobs. Last year too, he was everywhere, even if he had a job in the morning. Or wait, did we catch him both summers in-between work? Regardless, doing New York at Amit's pace shows me how much energy people must have to take everything in out here.

The adage is that New Yorkers work hard and play hard. It's certainly true. I doubt people can get much out of the "New York experience" by sleeping twelve hours a day -- like I'm fully capable of. You gotta tap those energy reserves often in order to get everything into your non-negotiable twenty four hour days and sleeping is wasting some of that. The craziest thing is that it's not like people here just work and play. They join groups, they work out, they have cultural activities, they cram everything in in order to justify that $1500 rent.

Manhattan is alive. Or more importantly, it makes me feel alive. I'm not sure how to duplicate that feeling elsewhere, or what it is about myself that doesn't seem to be able to just stay self-hyped without external factors. It's something to work on I guess. Dann's been here this week too, because he's working out of the New York office. Every night when we're hanging out (making him invariably late for work the next morning), we turn to each other at least twice and say/scream "I love New York!"

And I have the feeling that this week might just be the warm up act. Sam and Pam, two late night stalwarts, are returning from vacations. I haven't even ventured anywhere near the Village yet, which was where we spent all of our time last year. Right now I'm camped out at my god-sister's in Columbus Circle but that'll change soon as James and Victor drop in next week. It could all just be starting. I'm gonna seriously need some sleep.