NYC and Babies

This past Wednesday I had an opportunity to head to our NYC office and spend the day. This would be the first time I have been to the NYC branch office and was prepared to take full advantage.

Having been to NYC many times, I know how to get around, and whats where at least the major sites, and a few others I have discovered over the years. Like last year wandering around Chelsea pier looking for the Food network studios, only to discover that the Studio is not on the actual pier! My bad. but I did find the studios and the market Emeril is always talking about on his show. Story for another day.

Anyway, I leave town on the earliest train I can manage as the ride is about 2.5 hours to get to NYC. The day was going to be very nice weather wise, and I was planning to get in as much city time as possible.

Hurried out of Pen Station and hit 7th ave running almost, and headed east. It took me a good 20 minuets to walk the total of 12 blocks or more to the office. I had an idea where the office was but not exactly. However having used Google Map I was pretty sure where it was and what it looked like. I arrived and did my thing for the morning hours and then came lunch time.

I had a specific idea in mind for lunch but it changed slightly. I wanted to find a specific food vendor that was recently given a nice write up on a very popular food blog. Well, I did try to make to that one, but didn't, so I ended up in the raw oyster bar in Grand central. I had always wanted to go there and try the oysters as well as the stew.

It was nice being there, I was there once before long ago, and did not indulge in the raw oysters. Not knowing one oyster from another, I asked my server, and he brought me a tray of six, two each from a different selection. I really liked to one set, so I ordered a few more. well by the time I was done with a Belgium draft, the oysters and the stew, I was shocked at the total cost. It was a nice lunch but that nice!

Back at the office and being that it was very quiet there I did what I set out do, I left to go see a friend who lives on the lower West side of Manhattan. I don't feel right caller her friend though. When people ask how I know her and what the relationship is I simply say "my daughter". She is not in the biological sense, but I feel as though she is. She was a kid whom my wife and I took under our wind back when she was very young and have tried to watch out for ever since.

We watcher her go through her teens, I taught her to drive, we supported her while she was deployed to Iraq, she did care for my boy when he was born. I remember meeting her for the first time and knew she was special and that she would achieve great things. She recently finished her degree in Criminology at John Jay, but right now she is doing the most important work she can do.

She is a stay home mom. She and her husband have a beautiful baby girl, about 4.5 months old. well, my aim was to go take her to dinner, so I took a subway across town and met her at her apartment. Her husband wasn't sure he could get out of work and join us, so we decided to hangout in the apartment and enjoy the baby, and wait to see if he could join us.

As soon as as I arrive she handed off the baby to me, and what a little bundle of joy. She was happy laughing smiling and bouncing. I bouncer her on my knee and she would giggle. when I stopped she would move best she could to mimic the bounce, so I had to keep bouncing her. However after her bottle, bouncing stopped, I learned that lesson long ago with my son! you don't bounce a baby after they have had a bottle, you just don't.

I was not remotely hungry, so we didn't go out to eat, we talked about drinks but I was not in the mood. I was content to be with my daughter and her baby, I felt like a grandpa with the baby on my knee. it was the best moment I have had in a long time. It made all the trouble dealing with the city worth it. For those few hours I was content. It was like the feeling you get after a really really good meal, a full belly and a contentment. it was like that but so much better. To see her so happy with her baby and husband, and see that little bundle of joy, it was a moment forever etched in my mind now. One of those moments you know when it is happening that it is special.

Well, my time was up, I needed to get back to the train station and catch the last train back home. Well there was one more later but much too late for me. As it was I would not be home much before midnight, and had a long trek back to Pen Station and then the train ride back home as well. We bade farewell but not without making a firm commitment to see each other more often. In that, she committed to coming up and spending an afternoon for a cookout Labor day weekend in two weeks.

We are letting life get ahead of us and not spending the time seeing each other we would like to. her baby is 41/2 months old and that was the first time I saw her. We both agreed that is unacceptable, and will not allow that to happen again.

That's how it is sometimes, we let the ones we love go along in life and try to stay connected but it becomes lost somewhere. Granted there are many miles between us, but we should not let that be an issue unless we let it. The good news is we see this potentially happening, so we are going to ensure that we don't lose each other in living life to it's fullest.

It was good day in NYC.