En route-ine

Do you know what I love about this city?

I love that no matter how long the line is at Starbucks or Dunkin Donuts, it only takes 5 minutes for me to order my drink and get it because the employees know New Yorkers are always on a time crunch. I love the fresh display of flowers keeping the bodegas smelling pretty. I love the taxi cab drivers who think I am a tourist and try to take me the long-winded way home. I love the bouncers who care more about a pretty face than an accurate ID. I love the tourists who clog up Times Square trying to figure out which restaurants are the cheapest, when all along all they need to do is head to the East Village. I love that every morning I can go to my favorite café on 52nd and 6th to get my egg whites on a wheat wrap with 4 packets of Heinz ketchup and a medium iced coffee with skim milk and two Splenda for $4.55 after tax. I love that it never takes me more than 20 minutes to get to work on the subway, even if trains are held up. I love that my doorman pretends to not know who I am because it is his job to see everyone’s ID card whenever they enter the building. And I even love the man who sits on the corner across from The Blue Water Grille and monotonously says “One penny a day” every single day in a voice that resembles the sound a calloused heel makes when it’s being scraped by a cheese grater.

What can I say though? I’m just a small-town girl - now city-slicker - that loves her routine.

I wake up to the sunrise outside of my window and the sound of my Gossip Girl ringtone/alarm clock that I promptly set the night before. I stumble my way to the bathroom, turn on the water in the shower as hot as it will go and proceed to brush my teeth in the sink, which is practically invading on shower’s space. It’s not until my teeth are minty fresh and my body is tingly clean that I can even fathom what my day will look like. I give my closet a quick minute run-down in my head and plan my look-of-the-day as I wrap my bath sheet around me. By the time I am done getting ready, I have worked up an appetite for my eggs and coffee. I play a game with myself to see how many blocks I can walk without being stopped by traffic and lights, and sometimes, I even ignore the blinking hand telling me to halt if I know I can make it across. I always know it’s going to be a good day if I can walk the “L” at the crosswalk of a four-way stop without stopping because I caught the traffic light at the perfect moment.

Oh those crosswalks. If you’re not running into someone you know, you’re bumping into someone you don’t (literally). And so it goes, and I love it - everyday like clockwork. So if anyone could tell me what I am supposed to do about heading back to Gainesville, where egg whites on whole wheat wraps and crosswalks don’t exist, be my guest.