554. LIFE FEELS LIKE A JERKY MOTION SOMETIMES

I get home from work and feel bad that Mom has been cooped up in the apartment for two days. I unlock the door and toss my purse aside. She sits up from the bed that doubles as the couch and dining table. I basically live “in bed” when I am home. I mean the apartment is only 312 square feet. Other than the bedroom furniture all I have is a desk and bookshelves. I can see the entire apartment from bed.

“Hey Mom,” I say. It feels hot in here so I immediately wonder if the windows are closed. But I cannot see them because the curtains are closed. “Why is it so hot in here?” I ask and move to the window in eight steps. “Oh I closed the window when the kids came outside.” “Are you hot?” I ask. “I’m okay,” she says. “What shall we do for dinner?” “Let’s order Chinese,” she suggests. “Don’t you want to go out?” I ask. Now I feel really bad that she has come all this way to sit in this little cell like apartment, with the heat blaring and the screaming children.

I wish I could afford a nicer place for to visit me in. Or that I could afford to take her to shows and ferry her about the City in a taxi.

“No, I don’t want to go out. I want to spend time with only you.” “Okay, great,” I say and go into the bathroom before the tears start. I already miss Mom and she doesn’t leave for a few more days. So I don’t know what is going on with me sometimes. I don’t have any regrets in moving out here. I am glad I did. I am glad I mortgaged my future on a chance at love and a chance at something more. But it is hard sometimes, because it can be so lonely. Which is strange right, that I can feel alone in a City this size, in a City so restless and also pulsing, always moving.

But sometimes I don’t know how to feel normal in New York. I go back to Minnesota and I can pick up where I leave off. But in New York, life feels like a jerky motion sometimes.