Sometimes...

Friday morning, we got a call from my mom.  These kind of phone calls have become somewhat of a routine joke in our family.  However, Friday's call made me uncomfortable.  My mom knows more about what is happening around us then we realize.  We have joked about the calls about cannibals in Rio, the jumper in the apt right below us, the terrorist car bomb a block away, rats at the Taco Bell we secretly frequented and several other incidents but Friday made me wonder.

10 minutes after the shooting, mom calls to say that a designer named Jeffrey just shot a man at the Empire State Building.  Her first question was "Do you know him?"  Tim and I had to laugh but when I googled it - there it was on my laptop - a designer shoots a co-worker at 10 West 33rd St across from the Empire State Building.  I tend to be a little superstitious about coincidence.  When we bought the property upstate, the owner coincidently worked for the realtor who sold me my apartment in Manhattan who also lived on the floor beneath me.  I considered it Kismet. Or, is the world just getting smaller?

I am a creature of habit.  I have worked in the same neighborhood for 14 years.  I get off the subway at 32nd and 6th.  I walk down 33rd St. to the art supply store at 14 West 33rd St. before I go into the office.  I get coffee at the Starbucks on the corner of 33rd and 5th, cross the street to my bank on 34th and 5th, grab an egg McMuffin at 33rd and 5th, pick up my prescriptions at CVS Pharmacy at 32nd and 5th, passing my old office on 32nd and 5th on my way to my new office at 29th and 5th. I frequent Mandoo dumplings for lunch at 32nd and 5th,  eat too much yoghurt at 32nd and 5th and catch the subway back to the apt... I pass that corner way too many times in a day for this not to feel slightly uncomfortable.  However, I hate people who attempt to personalize events that didn't affect them. It just creeps me out that that guy possibly might have stalked his old office waiting for the right moment?  We happened to take Friday off and both Tim and I were glad that we were upstate - far away from the chaos.

There are days when sometimes... I think we would be better off moving permanently to Bovina sooner then later.  I have other memories just as uncomfortable - standing at the corner of 33rd and 5th watching the first tower fall on 9/11.  When we have weekends like this one upstate - that are so perfect - I have to wonder why would we continue to go back and forth to Manhattan?  It turns out that the guy who was murdered Friday went to school in Oneonta - 40 minutes away from us upstate - that headline was on the newspapers as I walked into our little post office to get our mail on Saturday.  I spent the three days working in the garden, perfectly quiet, watching the leaves start to turn red,  picking blackberries, digging up potatoes, picking cucumbers, making jam, having cocktails in the backyard. watching the sunset, having a quiet dinner with a friend,  drinking coffee while watching the frogs in the pond.  Sometimes....I just wonder.