An Uneventful Day

“Today was a normal day.”

Let me explain: I woke up, pulled on my running shorts, and stumbled out the door, just like any other day. I waved to every security guard along my running route, returning the occasional “good morning’s” one by one as I clipped along the riverside. I finished the run and stretched, no surprises, no mishaps. I went to work, and I took the subway. I always take the subway. But this time, just like lots of other times, it was completely and conventionally uneventful. As predicted, the third stop on the route – the only one that opens from the right side, instead of the left like all the others – made the foreigners and newcomers stick out like sore thumbs as they stumbled around, nearly missing their stop. I was one of them a couple months ago, but now the other regulars smirk with me, not at me, as we judge the newcomers. A few minutes later, I nodded and smiled at the guards at MoCA as I strolled into work, barely remembering the first two weeks they spent trying to keep me out (thinking I was a tourist). I went to work, came home, and finished out the un-calamitous day.

Maybe this isn’t what I’m supposed to be blogging about. But these things are what makes the city feel a little more like “home”. It creeps up on you when you spend some time fully acclimated to a city. And now that I’ve gotten here, I’m ready to go back. The days are dwindling down in Shanghaiville; it’s reached that point in the summer where the days finally start flickering by, and the U.S. and Yale and Trumbull and my room all finally re-work their way to the top of “places I want to be”.

Peregrine, one of my favorite people, came to visit last weekend. She took last year off to study and work in China and London and so we caught up on our past years and shared our ridiculous stories. She, Della, and I visited Shanghai two years ago before our first China summer program, so we spent some time re-enacting that trip and being floored by (for once, not how much China has changed, but rather) how much we’d changed. Our language alone made Shanghai a different place, and our newly-gained comfort with the culture made wandering through the city a more comfortable experience than NYC could offer, and a much more introspective one. I guess that’s what you get for a college education.

At MoCA, we’re switching to the last exhibition I’ll see: the Contemporary Art of Indonesia. I was dumbfounded yesterday when the artists put me in charge of installing a couple of their art installations, and found myself atop a ladder putting my basic carpentry skills to work. Most of all, I was surprised how much control the artists were willing to give up in the installation of their art. I had creative power in deciding how exactly to space banners, pin cloth up, etc., and it made me think that art is slightly more collaborative than even the artists themselves realize. And also during work last week, my coworkers took me to buy books that I have since busied myself with. I bought Chinese classics translated from ancient Chinese into modern Chinese (so I can read it). Maybe I’ll read these instead of taking Chinese classes this year.


I hit 121 last week. I’m no longer afraid of mileage.