Written a few months back, while waiting for the train.
Not quite the fringes of modern society, but the feeling is different. While at Penn Station, you can feel New York. It permeates everything. And that of course means there is more traffic, more people, more…..something. I cannot quite put a word to the feeling. To say ‘society’ or ‘life’ would take away from other places or even go so far as belittle them.
But the other places I have been do not compare to the magnitude of that which you see in New York City. So I sit here, in this ‘mid-water’ station. Seeing the folks that probably exists at Penn, but because there are so many people there, you never notice them. Here though, they are thrown into sharp relief in my worldview.
So is that where the problem lies? Is it my worldview that puts the emphasis on the ‘better-ness’? (for lack of a more appropriate or grammatically correct word) Is it me?
I try not to be judgmental, but that is lip service to the built in Puritan guilt that all Americans seem to have. And those that come here from somewhere else seem to learn. Of course I am being judgemental, that’s just another…something…that permeates the landscape of this country.
Moving on….
I wonder why it is that I seem to be 10 years behind the curve on most things. I’m starting the life of the traveling consultant when I should have been doing this when I was 23. I am making life choices and future commitments almost a full decade behind those in my same age group and sometimes younger.
I need to figure out how to make the best of it. I need to figure out how to break some REALLY bad habits that I have. I need to learn how to learn again. For my benefit, and for the benefit of others.