Dear G-d, It’s me, the grounded one.

And just to clarify, I don’t mean grounded in the rational thinking sense. I mean it literally. While I generally avoid the country  music genre, in the  midst of my canceled-flight-to-England despair, I turned to a country-only playlist on youtube. Most country music is about accidentally getting pregnant or furtively getting rid of a pregnancy– both of which are sorry mistakes for which there can be little relief, except perhaps in a recorded and heavily edited musical number.

When I go into my dark and twisty place, I crave musicals. Though country is a far cry from Broadway, I did happen upon one song that provided a perfect synopsis of my rather pathetic flying experiences. Sung by the country-pop crossover sensation, LeAnn Rimes, who rose to fame at the tender age of 13 and has never experienced a moment of normal American existence since, it is a ballad for those who did her wrong:

“Baby shame on you, if you fool me once
Shame on me if you fool me twice
You’ve been a pretty hard case to crack
Should’ve known better but I didn’t
And I can’t go back”

Yes, this is a song that I dedicate to every British airport that ever did me wrong. A canceled flight due to unsafe flying conditions is acceptable, but when those conditions are a result of British bureaucratic incompetency, it is worthy of an embittered musical number.

After my experience with volcanoes spontaneously combusting/erupting, I thought I had seen my share of crazy weather conditions and flight cancelation causations. I mean what could be more absurd than a volcano that has been dormant for 200 years suddenly erupting the day I am to take off for my Barcelona-Lisbon excursion? And that said volcano, despite being hundreds of miles from my point of departure– England, should disrupt my travel plans?

Enter the worst four letter word of them all: snow. Apparently neither the conservatives nor the liberals included acquiring shovels and melting ice in their campaign platforms. Apparently neither party thought that snow, which just happens to fall on a yearly basis in England, would cause any disruption to any holiday travelers. Apparently, as my cynical self is discovering, they simply didn’t think.

As a result, I will be forced to spend the holiday season in the best city in the world. Yes, there is a silver lining in all of this. After two hours on the phone with representatives from Continental, I rescheduled my flight for spring break– ironically, on the anniversary of the Icelandic volcanic eruption. And in the interim, I will participate in spectacular New York holiday events.

My first stop: Bergdorf Goodman Holiday Window Display. Harrod’s has got nothing on Bergdorf, as evidenced below.

Also, as I am biologically incapable of taking a complete break from reality, I have scheduled my staycation. It will involve a tea tour of Manhattan, a stop at my new favorite store on Broome St, a Spencer Tracy-Katherine Hepburn rom-com marathon, and a bit of work on my senior thesis. Because in the words of Ms. Rimes herself,

“Oh Life goes on
And it’s only gonna make me strong
It’s a fact, once you get on board
Say good-bye cause you can’t go back
Oh it’s a fight, and I really wanna get it right
Where I’m at, is my life before me
And this feelin’ that I can go back”

I wish I believed in Santa Claus…

because then I could comfortably make a list of items I would like to be found underneath my Christmas tree. However, as a Jew, and one who will conveniently be traveling on December 25th, I imagine I will have to resort to alternative methods of capitalist perpetuation. Perhaps I can pray for a Chanukah miracle.

Since Chanukah starts obscenely early this year– December 1st to be precise, it may be a quicker means to material attainment. And yes, as a senior on the verge of a nervous breakdown, my list is rather long. I have abbreviated it for the purposes of maintaining reader interest.

1. Tickets to Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, the Broadway musical based on the 1988 Pedro Almodovar film of the same name. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, I love musicals. They infuse an otherwise mundane reality with a choreographed form of spontaneity that inevitably makes my otherwise pessimistic state a little more optimistic. Yes, basically they make me smile; kind of like a grande skinny vanilla latte, but only calorie-free.

And this particular musical also captures some important life lessons about being a woman– in this case, in Spain– but in a more generalized sense, in a society on the verge of its own sort of post-modern feminist reawakening. Over the course of a 48 period, the lives of four women unfold on stage, and the power of sisterhood is both challenged and reinforced. Or so the online description claims.

I identify with the woman in red.

2. An Anthropologie gift card. I admit that gift cards tend to result in new obsessions for me. I mean my mother gave me a Starbucks gift card for Chanukah my senior year of high school, and well, she basically created a monster of the hyper-caffeinated variety.

However, as someone in the midst of refurbishing my wardrobe for my impending introduction into the real world/work environment, in which jean skirts and turtle-covered cardigans do not scream, “lean, mean, and professional,” I believe investment in clothing to be more of a necessity than anything else. And, as Michal can attest, I am fully capable of walking into and out of Anthropologie without charging my mother’s credit card.

Of course, in addition to purchasing appropriate professional attire, I am also kind of craving a certain Christmas-esque sweater that involves the Wellesley mascot: the Fearless Squirrel

3. Pre-order of the SmittenKitchen cookbook. This, in my opinion, is the most practical gift. Since SmittenKitchen is the reason I tamed my inner Western feminist and began enjoying the experience of being a 21st century woman in the kitchen, I feel it is only appropriate to purchase her official cookbook (set to be released early next year).

I suspect my grandmother may pay for this little culinary conquest, as she has countless of times reminded me, “Yaffa, dear, no man will marry a woman who can’t cook.” I know it’s wrong to play the marriage card, but if it going to be a constant matter of discussion between my grandmother and myself (the one she refers to as the “barren grandchild”), then I might as well find a means to profit from this inevitable pre-Sabbath phone conversation.

And seriously, who can resist sweet potatoes with pecans and goat cheese?

4. An apartment in the Webster Apartments– a relatively affordable means of living in New York without paying the egregious rents. Yes, I am still bitter that the Rent is Too Damn High candidate did not win the race for governor. The only catch with the Webster Apartments– no men allowed. Now I am almost certain my grandmother will not support this residential endeavor, but I believe that after four years of the ya-ya sisterhood, I can survive in a testosterone-less residence– at least temporarily.

Also, it strongly resembles a brownstone, which is what the Beloved Roommate and I aspire to own– ideally on the Upper West Side, but we are open to geographical, Manhattan-based suggestions.

5. A blackberry that is not possessed by some evil, developmentally slow spirit. My current blackberry, which I should mention is only a month old, has a tendency to act disabled. It freezes up on command– kind of like those fainting goats, who “faint” or fall over every time their muscles are about to contract.

And while I know I should probably drop by my neighborhood Verizon store, I am holding out for a Chanukah miracle. Or, at least waiting until I finish my finals period, at which point in time I can pretend to embrace the land of the living once more.

When Will the Caffeine Infidelity Cease and Desist?

I remember the first time I stole a roll of toilet paper from a sushi restaurant. I proudly waved the evidence of my crime before my mother, who though initially grinning, proceeded to lecture me on the cyclical nature of theft. As usual, my mother was right. Within weeks of the first stealth operation, I was stealing bottles of diet coke from Oxford dining halls and bottles of nail polish remover from swanky London salons.

There is a part, however, that my mother left out. Crime or sin is cyclical, but not just in the specificities sense. Those who steal, yes, will likely continue to steal, but they will also fall into a general pattern of disorderly conduct. For me, that means infidelity– in the purely caffeinated sense. I made a vow the night before my AP Biology exam: “I solemnly swear to only ever purchase daily quantities of caffeine from establishments that exhibit the Seattle mermaid in their windows.” And for five years I kept that vow.

However, something happened this summer. Perhaps it was prompted by my year of wanderlust abroad, but suddenly I was discontent settling on one coffee house. I needed change; to experience new grinds, to flirt with new baristas, to delight in new versions of reduced-fat, sugar-free morning muffins on route to work.

And then it happened. I got the text from Adria– the one regarding the discovery of Stumptown Coffee Roasters– and the caffeine-prompted affairs began. First, at Stumptown itself, which I returned to late last night just to discover I had earned my first free drink. Yes, they have loyalty cards, and unlike Starbucks one needs only to purchase 10, rather than 15 drinks, to earn her first cup of heaven.

But then I proceeded to follow a map delineated in the New York Times Dining & Wine section. It details the best and brightest coffee shops within the five boroughs, and it promised to offer more than any mermaid-logo store ever had before. My next stop, which conveniently was located directly across the street from my office of summer employment, was Birch Coffee. Birch is known for its “drip coffee,” or unique signature blend. My drink of choice– the Red Eye, because even in the midst of summer vacation, I found myself taking in less than six hours of sleep a night. And yes, the Red Eye is a combination of the drip and espresso shots. It’s like an IV of caffeine, but without the needles.

 

They had me at the awning.

 

Thoroughly enjoying my bout of infidelity, I continued on to Ninth Street Espresso, a glorious little coffee house in the midst of Alphabet City, a slightly grimey neighborhood, but with a strong and defined character. There I enjoyed the house cappuccino, which contained the perfect ratio of espresso to textured steamed milk. In that moment and in that shop, I was one with the Italian coffee gods. And it was good.

 

Definitely not as "fedorable" as the Stumptown baristas

 

Now I am back in New York for the long weekend, and instead of returning to a monogamous relationship with my coffee, I have decided to continue the string of sordid affairs. On tap, no sexual euphemism intended, are:

1.  Cafe Grumpy, a shop conveniently located in Chelsea, the home of my New York aspiring gay actor confidantes.

2. Bluebird Coffee Shop in the heart of the East Village and within walking distance of the cafe that bears my name.

3. And finally, Abraco Espresso, an Espresso Bar the size of my pinky finger, also located in the East Village. Despite its small frame (literally), it is home of the best Portuguese caffeine west of the Iberian Peninsula.

Now I know that many of you may believe my adulterous ways to be immoral, deceitful, and worthy of punishment from the One Above. But, I must, as all Hollywood-stylized adulterers do, justify or attempt to excuse my infidelity. As a senior at Wellesley, with a string of midterms, papers, and fellowship and graduate school applications looming on the immediate horizon, I need a constant flow of energy– even when I am unable to sleep the requisite eight hours a night. And ladies and gentlemen, caffeine is the only legal substance I know that can ensure I stay energized, alert, and organized.

Now I could technically rely on only one source of caffeine. Instead of drifting from one coffee shop to another, I could maintain said flow of energy while enjoying a seat in a well-heated Starbucks. But, honestly, where would be the blog story in that?

I leave you with a video that encapsulates my life of unlawful activity:

Three Gardens in Harlem, or, the Long-Awaited Second Guest Blog Post

For those of who you seeking a break from my tales of over-caffeinated joy and woe, I offer you Nestor Bailly’s treatise on farming in New York City. Not surprisingly, Nestor, today’s guest blogger and co-WPJ intern, has encountered significant difficulty in channeling his inner botanist in the heart of Harlem. Like me– the only girl in the history of Wellesley College to drop Horticulture because she knew she was physically incapable of creating a favorable environment for a plant– Nestor lacks a green thumb.

My mother was due to catch a plane to Dublin for a medical conference and she wanted to say goodbye. We met at the ‘Mediterranean style’ restaurant, formerly a bakery, formerly a liquor store, formerly a crack house, with my step-father and a few neighbors. My family had just finished eating when I arrived, allowing them the pleasure to sit and watch as I slurped down spaghetti with various shellfish. Our neighbors, recently arrived immigrants from France, chatted away as French people do about things French people usually talk about, mostly other people.

After filling up on olive oil, carbs and seabugs, I moseyed back to my house, content but anxious about whether that girl would text me back, if I had made an egregious error on Twitter for all of my 12 followers to see, and wondering if I had enough beer to sustain me for the two-hour happy hour of Its Always Sunny in Philadelphia, the highlight of my Mondays.

Then I remembered I had things to do. Real things. My neighbors (other ones, not the French ones, but also recent arrivals to Harlem), two delightful young couples with everything to look forward to, had entrusted me with caring for their plants over a week or so. I had been diligent so far, enduring punishing hangovers and bone-crushing laziness to perform my duties, and was not about to give up for no reason.

Bob and Jo live a few doors down from me, on the third floor of a brownstone townhouse. After fiddling with the unfamiliar lock I thought I had mastered, I reentered their world. I had learned a great deal about these people, more than one could by just talking to them, by being in their house for just 15 minutes a day. As it turns out, although one works as a professional pencil pusher at a university and the other is a doctor, they are definitely massive stoners. The closer one looks, the more obvious it becomes; freezer filled with ice cream sandwiches, tons of plants (hence my presence), vaguely eastern-themed drop cloths and tapestries, a picture of them small-eyed and smiling in some nondescript room, and a copy of the “Bunny Suicides” cartoon book on the coffee table. That, and the smell of strong dank emanating from a specific spot in the hallway, opened a new perspective on my now-chill neighbors. They were no longer gentrifying proto-yuppies hanging onto youth by riding fixed gear bikes and living in a once-edgy neighborhood, but a happy couple with good taste in interior minimalism and designer toys in hidden corners.

Just across the street live Joseph and Roberta. Only a few years older than me, they remind me of what I could be like if I had a girlfriend, some income, a passion, and optimism. Everything points to a great home life; well-designed apartment, a big TV, a DJ setup with turntables, a large garden (again, requiring my attention) and booze. Oh, the booze. Upon entering their cozy but poorly lit domain one is confronted with a wall of wine. Literally the entire side of the living room, there must be a hundred bottles up there. Add restraint to one of their traits I lack. But it doesn’t stop there. The fridge is devoid of shelving, maximizing space for various beverages, mostly alcoholic, all fancy (i.e. not Olde English 40oz). The freezer spits out a package of frozen peas when opened, ejected from the pressure of having to share an impossibly tight space with several bottles of liquor. Beers line the counter, their night stand is home to “Whiskey: A User’s Guide” and “New Brain Science” (as per their respective professions), and a mandolin lies ready for to noodlin’ with on a chair. All this in an immaculately clean and well-organized home.

After awkwardly hosing down everything in their backyard (you never know if it needs water or not) for about half an hour, it began to rain. This saved me the pleasure of watering my own plants, for whom I have a love-hate relationship with. My garden is generally the victim of regular droughts and haphazard pruning/maimings, so is pretty hardy and can look after itself. The soil gets fertilized by the cats that spend their time out there, two of which I am supposedly responsible for, and receive water from the rains, as nature intended.

My Harlem Garden, second only to the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens.

Looking out over my green-ish kingdom I remembered what it used to be like back here, 20 years ago; no divisions between yards, wild plants and animals everywhere, junkies and cat burglars roaming the canopy. As a child I was charged with scraping at the dirt to get bits of glass and rock out so we could try to domesticate that wilderness, a Sisyphean task that left me bitter at the Earth and contemptuous of agriculture. Although I did return to the Earth-Mother several of her animal children I had as pets, I never did trust things that required so much attention just to grow out of the ground. I suppose I should have told my neighbors that.

If you’ve enjoyed Nestor’s little agrarian rendezvous, I encourage you to follow his twitter, where tales of subway brawls and other such quintessential New York moments abound.