Spring Break

Ever since I have personally been done with school, I have lost all sense of measuring the progression of the year according to academic milestones. (It wasn't "fall", it was "back to school".) Now, the months just sort of all melt together -- this was especially the case for me in SoCal where most days were "70 and sunny", so I didn't even have the weather to cue me about the season.

Now that spring is unfolding in New York, I'm noticing that it is apparently a very popular destination for the spring break crowd. Not just lots of families with kids, but HUGE tour groups of young people from all over the world. Since my office is on Broadway, not far from Times Square and right in the middle of the Theater District, I am starting to see more and more swarms of people.... they'll descend on one of my regular lunch places and take over the entire restaurant. They'll be congregated at the corner, posing for a group shot with the Letterman Show sign in the background. Or they'll be around the corner in a long queue to get into the famous Stage Deli. (Which, by the way, was the very first place I ever ate in New York in my first trip here almost 15 years ago now!)

It's so easy to slip into the "I live here now" persona and be so focused on just getting to work, getting to the next meeting, getting to the restaurant to meet friends and getting home again. What I love about the tourists and tour groups is that they remind me to pay attention to the marvelous city around me and to always look at it as if I'm looking for the first time.