*March

April 03, 2025

*March

Again, how Spring's cold hands run its fingers through my hair, smooths its way down my spine, and holds my hand and guides it to my heart.

*･ﾟﾟ･*:.｡..｡.:*ﾟ:*:✼✿ ✿✼:*ﾟ:.｡..｡.:*･ﾟﾟ･*

At the end of last year, I told myself I needed to go to New York for my birthday and would do anything to not be home. I would rather feel moody and difficult elsewhere. I listen to the stars and often shape my decisions around what's going on in the sky.

On Saturday, we arrived around 8 am. Check-in wasn't until 4 pm. We went to Matto instead. My friend is a doctor and my other friend is someone who has a lot of questions for a doctor, so we sat there with some of the yummiest matcha lattes I've ever had for a while. As they conversed, I had to finish my assignment on xylazine and another girl finishing up from a yoga session had stepped into the conversation about fibroids instead. I like the barista and could tell she was listening by the slight nods from the mirror reflection. Mahima was fresh off of a 24-hour, so we shooed her to rest and walked down Broadway towards SoHo. We were dead inside and looked it. Rich teenage girls are the same everywhere, which was comforting but still, they were rude and misguided (what were they doing in Princess Polly..?). We lugged our bodies to something familiar (Trader Joe's) and melted into the hotel room's bed once it was check-in time. We stayed in the rest of the day and ordered ramen. I did homework until I fell asleep at the table across the soup dumplings.

On Sunday, we walked around SoHo again. We started at Bibliotheque and drifted around. My two friends and I bought matching underwear at Brandy that were navy blue and had "Paris" embroidered onto the front in red thread. Time passed us by far too quickly and I don't have much recollection beyond just being cold. We went to Kisa, which we loved. We're already thinking about the next time we should go back. I loved the grandmother florals.. and too small tables.. and cocooning warmth. Our server wore a Lamp shirt. There was an apres meal instant coffee machine (there was mitsugaru too) that the host told us to help ourselves to. There were no instructions and I could hear them giggle behind us as we tried to figure it out. Whatever. It was too cold for our wimpy bodies to do anything else so we booked it from LES and back to our place. The windy walk home was fun because no one was out at the time.

On Monday, I got my ass beat. I did golki therapy for two hours and was knocked out the entire time. The longer I live, the more I find myself seeking comfort in pain and release and detachment. I woke up glowing and as if I was just put on a tumble dry cycle. We had soondubu and let the rain end our day early. We walked all the way home and scampered into a bodega later in the evening. I'm already thinking about the next time I can get it done.

On Tuesday, I tried to take advantage of the sun and wore a skirt. The sun ended up taking advantage of me. And so did the wind. Whatever curls I tried to make into my hair ended up a whirlwind atop my head. Guggenheim's spiral was closed for installations, so we set off to a cafe to spiral off instead. I love the way ceremonial matcha soothes my throat like a planty salve; however, my friend does not. After squeezing past the miniscule desserts at Sorate and stumbling over a hump on the sidewalk that resulted in a matcha drip down my right forearm, we went to Blank Street to get a drink that didn't soothe differently but stung familiarly. It was warm and there was a cute pitbull holding a stick and a tennis ball in his mouth. A Spaniard couple sat next to us and was rude and tried to take up all of the space. To keep our wits about us, we stepped out. We went to March and it was hot inside the gallery and one of the showings was done by a Spaniard. We stepped out. We headed to Pace and were met with a door shut for installations. We gave up and went to Two Boots. We molded ourselves onto the red leather seating and listened in on the little kids next to us who had just got out of school and wanted something to eat before dinner. They were funny like all New York kids are. The guy working the counter felt bad that our order wasn't made after waiting over an hour, so he gave us some garlic knots and extra pizza. Some lady looking for drug money started getting mad at us when we tried to offer her some pizza. The guy working the counter knew she spun the block often and kicked her out. She flipped all of us off from the window. We hurried ourselves the opposite direction after finishing our pie and towards Angels on A. Another cool guy working a counter. He had his call on speaker and was talking to his friend about loyalty. At some other shop, I bought a gray silk shirt. We walked all the way to Chinatown for desserts at The Little One. It was 30 minutes before closing so we took our half-eaten baby cakes and finished them on the walk home. We went to the bodega later in the evening. It was a very New York day.

On Wednesday, we went to Brooklyn. Before that, we got some bagels near our apartment somewhere down Wall Street. I don't often see men in neat suits, but I enjoyed. The bagels too. I love smoked salmon. In fact, I love raw fish so much and wish I could eat it every day like a baby bear... There was a train collision that delayed all the trains. Everyone felt like shit. We ate at Acre in silence. Mahima scolded me for acting like a bad puppy, but I could only temporarily calm down as I bought two Francis Lai vinyls. It rained out of nowhere. It was as if all of New York was in a mood. I felt so so so empty. Kids were getting picked up by their parents after school and they were all so free as they played around and goofed off with their friends and family. I was kind of jealous. We walked and my hands ached. Even the biting cold in Bryant Park did little to shake me of the tears that kept kissing my eyes. The ducks kept pushing along. I had my headphones on all day but all I could hear was ringing and something else drowning, but I couldn't quite figure it out. I liked how dim it was on the MTA on the way home. We had horrible pho. We sat next to a guy who was on the phone with his friend and said. "Last night was a movie". I couldn't stop thinking about it for the rest of the night. We felt foolish and went to get some Goofy Goober-looking sundaes to end the night.

On Thursday, it was my birthday. I woke up and got ready in silence. I felt like nursing myself in a hateful way so I took half a Zoloft alongside my medication. I got a shit matcha. I walked that shit matcha around Chinatown. We passed by Alexa Chung taking photos for Instagram against a graffiti-ed shop. We took awkward photobooth photos. We had Cocoron for lunch, which was amazing. My mom called. I had been ignoring her calls for a couple of days because I felt abandoned, so I answered. We talked for a couple of minutes. I told her birthdays make me feel weird because I can't help but wonder why I'm alive. She was concerned, but she brushed passed it. I appreciated her usual demeanor because it didn't make me feel alienated like I usually do. I ignored everyone else. My body is getting better and plateauing whenever I choose to put it through hell, so the feeling only lasted a couple of hours. We went back home to rest before our 8 pm reservations at Sakagura. Mahima and I left walked through a bookstore. My grandparents called and sang Happy Birthday as I stood in front of the staff book recommendations. It reminded me of how shitty my Spanish was getting and how I needed to practice more. We walked back to the hotel and I hate laying about the home in outside clothes, but my legs were tired so I leaned against the edge of the bed to rest. Something something about my friends complimenting how good I am at layering clothes. We set off to Sakagura. It was alright but I enjoyed the hunt to find the entrance because it reminded me of all the times I got lost in Japan. We went to Sake Bar Decibel, which is my favorite bar. Our server looked pretty to me. He was from Queens and looked about 6'3. My friends had came up with nicknames for one another after a couple of drinks (Mahima's was Maneesha and Saray's was Sakagura lol), but mines was still missing because they wanted to ask him what he thought mines was. He said Veronica because of my black hair, and that it reminded him of a movie he couldn't remember the name of. My friends thought that he was interested in me and I went mute whenever he came by our table. I played into my friends' wishes and left our server my phone number on our table (he never reached out). The number was written on a gum wrapper. Maybe he threw it away? Whatever. A group of guys passed as I waited outside alone because I felt awkward waiting in the restaurant knowing that I had been a sliver of vulnerable just then. One of them flirted with me so I told him that he reminded me of my cousin. He laughed and said that he might just be from Alabama then. I shooed him and he listened. Whatever. The evening was fun and the yuzu sodas and lychee martinis (and the pineapple liquor I had snuck in) had soothed my senses. We walked off the drinks and watched a young college girl vomit outside a shop. Some weird man was doing the same, so we stayed there until he fucked off. I smoked outside the bodega that Sara wanted to go into because there were handsome men in there. She came out with berry-flavored Nerds clusters. I couldn't sleep again. Whatever. I feel empty anyways.

On Friday, we didn't go to the Hamptons because the weather was dull and our time was limited. We decided we would walk everywhere. We had acai because the weather was nice. We redeemed our shoddy photobooth pictures at an 인생네컷.

On Saturday, the weather is beautiful and we're going home. The music playing on the speakers at JFK T5 is funny. These songs played one after the other:

Unwritten -- Natasha Bedingfield

La Vie en rose -- Édith Piaf

Move Ya Body -- Nina Sky

It's so hot here and as I type all of this out, I'm already thinking about the next time I can come back.