Wednesday, 28 January 2004 | Delay

Sometimes, while I'm telling someone who doesn't live in New York about some of the inconveniences of living here, it occurs to me that s/he might wonder why anyone would, in fact, want to live in New York. It is easier for me to list specific examples of sacrifices than examples of benefits, but I love this city for some reason anyway, and have no plans to leave it in the foreseeable future (which, admittedly, isn't especially distant).

On Monday evening, after walking around in the cold for several hours (unsuccessfully helping Martin find a winter jacket), I had the brilliant idea to do grocery shopping in Manhattan. Grocery shopping, especially when far from home, is an exercise in realism. For each item you put in your basket, you must determine if you both need and can afford the item, as well as whether you're able to carry it.

Using a basket rather than using a cart helps determine if you can carry your groceries, even if it drains you of the energy you're going to need for the trip home. It doesn't seem to help me anyway; I always get more than my arms can handle, just like I pack too much when I go on vacation. When I finally left the store at 10 p.m., I was saddled with the two bags I'd brought with me (one of which contained a computer) and three overstuffed bags of produce, cans of soup, and I have no idea what else.

As I walked down the stairs to the subway platform, I heard someone yell, "No trains!" for the benefit of the newcomers, like me. A minute later, a different guy asked, to no one in particular, "Who's been here more than an hour?" A few people quietly raised their hands. Everyone seemed calm and accepting, as if in tacit agreement that broken subways are an understood part of life here.

How much longer can the train take, if it's already been an hour? I reasoned. Forty-five minutes later, and I was stepping onto a crowded subway car, after forty-five minutes of staring down a dark hole, of listening to a street performer produce (and repeat, I think) Chinese twangs that echoed against the tiles, of observing the people immediately around me (including the obnoxious businessman with the loud voice and slicked-back hair), and of chaperoning my plump plastic bags of food, which surrounded me like a small fort.

The train moved slowly; the typical 7-minute ride took 30, and I could watch the walls and tubes of the mysterious underground tunnels creep by recognizably, not the fast blur of gray and black that I'm accustomed to. The obnoxious man was telling jokes to people he'd befriended on the platform. "This one is a little dirty," he warned his audience.

We stopped prematurely, one station before mine. The platform filled up with bodies as soon as the doors opened, pouring out like liquid. We stood there, stuck, draining out of the holes that led above-ground, a few drops at a time. Another 10 minutes of baby-stepping forward; me, carrying my bags on stiff, sore fingers. It occurred to me that I was a fire or gunshot away from getting trampled, but it was more of a contemplation than a worry.

Finally, I sifted through to the brisk, open air, where I was pelted with giant snowflakes until the bus arrived. I walked from the bus stop to my cold apartment on sidewalks partially covered with thick, shiny ice.

Which means, of course, that New York has a million virtues.

...

Two things I feel pretty sure of at the moment: I am going to have a cold for the rest of my life, and winter is never going to end.

Also: today the office was closed due to weather, which hardly ever happens. (In North Carolina, in contrast, life comes to a standstill at the mention of the word snow, and, somehow, bread and milk automatically vaporize from grocery store shelves.) Mollie came over, which meant Oreos, hot chocolate, temporary tattoos (which she got in a laundromat gumball machine), and me discovering that I can use my wireless card in my apartment. More snow days, please.