columbus / 9th ave

5.57 miles

It took me many years to realize that it’s hard to live in this world. I don’t mean the mechanics of living, because for most of us, our hearts will beat, lungs will take in oxygen, without us doing anything at all to tell them to. For most of us, mechanically, physically, it’s harder to die than it is to live. But still we try to die. We drive too fast down winding roads, we have sex with strangers without wearing protection, we drink, we use drugs. We try to squeeze a little more life out of our lives. It’s natural to want to do that. But to be alive in the world, every day, as we are given more and more and more, as the nature of “what we can handle” changes and our methods for how we handle it change, too, that’s something of a miracle.
transcendent kingdom by yaa gyasi, 244

it has been a strange 24 hours since i took this walk. i was able to see a dear friend and enjoy the pleasant is-it-already-autumn weather, taking in downtown new york. after coming home and lazily lounging and finishing the truly transcendent transcendent kingdom by yaa gyasi, i naively began to spray paint the dining table in our apartment. it did not go well, and i broke down for the first time in a week or so (breakdowns are more frequent these days).

this morning, i begin anew. i went to church and soaked in the worship and rediscovered gratitude, a common thread holding this first week of my last year of college together. i listened to the encouraging words of my friends via the best app marco polo, i stared at the wind rustling the trees out my window, at the ivy climbing up a white wall, i meditated on norah jones’s newest album— and i remembered that this life, this very breath, is a miracle.

sometimes i ask God for a miracle, forgetting that he has already given me so many.

anyways, this was a very good walk. if you have already walked the length of broadway, you ought to walk columbus. it definitely is not the most scenic, but to me, it is a perfect representation of this city. i remember a columbia student once referred to the segment of columbus near campus as a “not-so-nice area”. there is quite a long stretch of public housing that goes from 104th to 100th, and then in a striking shift, you are hit by michaels, whole foods, loft, sephora, a luxury apartment building. there is a gentle shift in demographics as well. is there a neighborhood in new york that has not been gentrified? how does one combat gentrification? i admit i have walked this stretch of columbus often to go to whole foods or church, and i admit to feeling out of place walking through the frederick douglass public housing complex with my whole foods bags.

do you avoid eye contact when you walk or do your eyes meet those you pass?
eye contact is sharper when it is the only visible feature of your face (masks covering the rest).

at 91st, you are welcomed by a little park that surrounds the american museum of natural history (i confess i have not yet made my visit). on the sidewalks following, there is a mix of hipster plant and coffee store and rundown mom and pop grocery and boarded up stores, victims of covid. i hear spanish music and pass by outdoor dining setups varying in size and shape and social distancing. juilliard is at 66th, then lincoln center and the met opera. columbus avenue turns into 9th avenue at 59th (note: columbus circle does not cross columbus avenue). one passes into hell’s kitchen around 54th, greeted by rainbow flags and trendy restaurants, and a group of gay men on rollerblades. 41st brings you to the port authority bus terminal, chelsea at 25th, the meatpacking district at 14th, and 9th avenue comes to its end at 12th street, where it melts into greenwich street.

i was most struck by the diversity of restaurants i saw on this walk. thai, peruvian, irish, pakistani (shoutout doaba deli), french, szechuan, vietnamese, caribbean… there are many reasons to live in a city, but the heterogeneity of the people is perhaps the utmost one.

other sights: two bagel shops with very long lines (h&h and zucker’s for reference); church of st. paul the apostle (churches in the city, like parks, simply hit differently); a multitude of multiracial couples; biker shorts (i don’t mind this trend but it is a little strange); three lenwiches; one homeless man passing another who had set up a fruit stand (?) and music, saying “good vibes, man, good vibes”; a child in pigtails; more men in yarmulkes than i usually see (which made sense to me because it was a saturday, but this might be poor logic); and a short filipino lady crouching to sit on construction bars, scratching off a fat stack of lottery tickets while smoking a cigarette.