A muggy May Monday evening seems as good a time as any to start this account of my six months in the Big Apple.
It's take me a couple of weeks to find my voice. There's been so much to listen to, to watch, to work out that I haven't had the headspace left over to write.
New York is a noisy place, there's no getting away from it, yet tonight all I can hear through the open window is the comforting hum of a neighbour's radio and the odd rumble of a truck making its way down 9th Avenue.
I've struck gold with my cosy little apartment on the 2nd floor of a traditional Chelsea brownstone. I'm just a block from the High Line and two from the Hudson on a pretty tree lined street where people really seem to care for their tiny front gardens. I learnt on my Big Onion tour of Chelsea on Saturday that these were part of original building regulations put in place by Clement Clark Moore, the first owner of the Chelsea estate... and rather wonderfully also the author of Twas The Night Before Christmas.
My walk home from work every evening is the favourite part of my day. I have several different routes figured out now that take me through different corners of this fascinating neighbourhood. But every day I discover something new. Today it was cheese shop tucked away on 22nd Street that I hadn't seen before.
And when I finally skip up the stairs and through the front door of the block there's the daily anticipation of unlocking my mailbox to see if there's news from folks back home.
Well, it's nearly time to crawl into my oversized bed for another good night's sleep. Perhaps I'll write more tomorrow.
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