In the interest of balance

Following yesterday's downer post, I present to you:

10 details to love

The big things are obvious, so here's a list of the small things that make my time in New York wonderful. Not organized by weight or value.

1. It is impossible to leave the house without hearing at least 2 spoken languages aside from English.

2. The dry cleaner's by my house uses an antique sewing machine to do repairs, without pretension.

3. If I happen to be lying still in my room with my ear to the mattress when the subway passes nearby, I can hear and feel a faint rhythm like a bass line.

4. There is a spirit house in the back room at the laundromat.

5. When the train is about to arrive at the platform by my house, it causes a gentle wind tunnel. It always feels dramatic and special.

6. In Prospect Park, you can bird-watch.

7. Brooklyn has enough of a city vibe to get me to put on mascara and earrings when I go out for the day, but not enough that I feel guilty if I don't feel like putting an outfit together. A happy balance.

8. Manhattan has such a different vibe that it feels like a completely different place -- and it's only half an hour away.

9. Good music in cafes. On the whole, this is true.

10. Sometimes, you just need to see the water. It's never too far away, here.

The One-Month Blues

It's been a difficult couple of days, though nothing in particular is wrong.

I didn't want to hang out with the new CouchSurfers today. I hid in my room while my roommate greeted them. I worked in my bed, propped up against pillows.

I hate working from bed.

The calendar on my wall has nothing penciled in for this week until Saturday. Saturday! Big empty square spaces of no plans. The New Yorker would come today, though; I'd look up some new things to do and the calendar would be lively and full again. Maybe I should use colored markers this time. Brighten the thing up a bit.

The New Yorker didn't come.

I decided to go for a walk after work. Get some fresh air, enjoy the park, people watch. It was raining, so instead I went to the bagel store.

Standing in line, the cheapest, dirtiest way to my heart came on the radio. You have one of these songs, too. The one that was getting airplay when your heart was being broken. Some stupid pop thing with a line that guts you, usually insulting in its simplicity. But you couldn't get away from it -- it was in the grocery store, at the bar, coming out of car windows. And years later you still can't hear the thing without being pulled right back to the hollow feeling you felt then.

Bagel store, I really don't need this right now.

I went home and made tea and stared at the dark feeling in my rib cage. Not the rain. Not the song. Not the failures of Conde Nast's subscription services. Not even the potential friend who had said she'd get in touch on Friday but didn't, or the fact that last night I couldn't think of a thing to do and ended up watching a movie that made me cry.

It's called transition, I know that all too well. Turns out it comes a little bit faster when you're on your home turf.

As a traveler I didn't backpack, I moved from place to place. As such, I became a bit obsessed with the nuances of transition, how it hits you and when. The two month mark, the six month mark, the nine month mark, and the year mark. Those were the dots on my map.

It's only been one month! I'm thinking now. It's not time for this yet!

But so it is. There's not as much to adjust to here, so the work of getting settled in a superficial way is proving to be somewhat faster going than anticipated. And it's on to the next stage: the craving for a life.

The highs don't go away now, which is a relief. I can still expect to be honeymooning off and on for a while. And I also know that the best part is a few months down the road. But the initial bliss is over (so soon!).

Making a commitment, whether to a place, a job, or a person, puts you on the sharp emotional edge of life. When something good happens, you are exhilarated, beside yourself with love. Things have never been this good before. Then, when there's even the slightest aberration from that thrilling feeling -- a dull evening, a plan that doesn't work out right -- it hits you far harder than it should. It brings on doubt. This is what it's always going to be like. Maybe this is a mistake.

I have said many times before, publicly and privately, that I was going to stick it out somewhere and really get through all of the tough times. And I failed every time. I'm committed to making it, this time. I want it more than I ever have before. The alternative has ceased to be a viable way for me to live. At the base of it, I know that I need this.

But commitment is scary, folks. It's time to stop telling myself that this is going to be a breeze, and time to face up to what's going to be a lot of adjustment.

Mint tea, make me calm. Take me to sleep.

On making things

One thing that is very difficult to do, while traveling, is to create crafts. Anything that you make is another thing that you need to carry to the next place, for one. And it's also an unreasonably expensive past time if you need to buy a completely new set of tools and materials each time in order to avoid carrying a bag of craft supplies around with you.

Of course, if I cared enough, I could have figured out a way to make it happen despite the difficulties. I've been living in locations for months at a time, after all. It's not as if I've been backpacking all this time.

Somehow, though, I've forgotten how much happier I am when I'm creating things. It's odd, because I have spent many, many hours in my life creating bad art. It sometimes happens when I run into someone whom I haven't seen since my teen years that they'll ask, "So, I assume you went to art school?" (For the record, I think there's lots of relief mixed in with the reply when I say no, because I never had anything approaching professional level talent). For most of my childhood, I was taking 2 to 3 art classes at any given time. As a teenager I spent a lot of my free time -- and nearly all of my time in class, which pleased my teachers greatly -- drawing comic strips and sketches. I have manufactured enough macrame and hemp jewelry to decorate the wrists and necks of a marching band. My father built me a darkroom in our basement. My first time traveling without my parents was motivated more by art than by travel -- a friend and I spent a month studying drawing and painting in Paris.

I don't really understand how I was able to drop such a huge portion of my identity without really noticing or caring. I'm not sure when it happened, exactly. But changing locations at ever increasing rates was the nail in the coffin for my artistic life.

Which is why I am very happy to introduce you to This Thing I Just Made.

Ahem. Kitchen Mobile. Meredith Hutcheson, 1983 - . Mexican tin ornaments, embroidery floss, balsa wood, metal beads, thread, glue. Private Collection.

Crafting, for me, is a way to be artistic without reminding myself that I'm not really an artist. I'm not sure when I last created something. My favorite thing, of mine, is a table that I painted in 2006 while I was living in San Diego.

Since then, I've made some jewelry, but mostly I've just thought mildy about projects and then forgotten them. Suddenly, since I've arrived in New York, I've been thinking about it more often. There is some psychological shift that goes along with making a commitment to a place. It's affecting me in ways I didn't expect. For instance, beyond crafting, I've actually found myself thinking of paintings I'd like to make. I haven't wanted to paint in years. I can't even remember the last time I tried.

And now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to put on a podcast and paint a flower pot.