[Say what you want…this comes with the apartment]

Okay, It’s maybe three or four weeks now since we’ve left the cold and hostile fields of the North Country for the Cold and hostile streets of the Big Apple.

So, you might ask, How are we doing?

[Across the street from out building. A line waiting for cookies.]

I’d say just fine.  It isn’t last year like Florida…that’s for sure but it beats the forty or fifty times I’ve already shoveled the path to the garage and the way to the road back home at Rainbow Lake.

Am I sorry we’re spending the winter in slushy New York?  Am I sorry we’re sub-letting a great apartment near Lincoln Center?  No.

[The famous Ansonia Building…just steps away.]

Do I miss the beautiful snow falls and the freezing lakes?  Not really.  I just had an injection in my lower back which would have prevented me from skating on anything other than my front deck.

[The view across the street.]

Do I miss the shoveling? No. I’ve mastered that skill years ago.  I don’t miss the two feet of snow…It’s my back remember?

I’m remembering all the great nights and days that Mariam and I had in the 20+ years of living on the Upper West Side.  Yes, I miss the quiet snow falls of the North Country…but it’s not forever.  We’ll be back when the Black Flies begin to surface and the Canadian geese have returned to Ontario.

There’s so much to do there.

There’s so much to do here.

I’m a conflicted guy.