I did nothing on Sunday and it might be the most New York thing I've done all year.
Let me explain. In this city, rest is treated like a moral failing. Everyone is optimizing. Everyone has a side hustle. My own calendar looks like a hostage negotiation. So when I got to Sunday with an empty afternoon, my first instinct was panic.
Instead, I took the 1 train up to 96th and walked into Riverside Park.
Riverside Park is underrated and I will die on this bench. Everyone talks about Central Park, but Riverside is quieter, longer, greener in a scrappier way, and it hugs the Hudson so the breeze actually finds you. On a July afternoon that breeze is a gift from the gods.
I brought a samosa from a place on Broadway, a bottle of water, and a book I did not open. I found a patch of grass near the 91st Street garden, the one that looks like a secret, and I lay down.
And then — this is the radical part — I did nothing. No phone. No content. No little voice saying you could be doing more.
A dad taught his kid to ride a bike, wobbling and cheering. A group of aunties in salwar kameez had a full picnic setup that made me ache for home in the best way. Somebody played old Kishore Kumar from a speaker and for a second the whole park felt like a Sunday in India.
I thought about how doing nothing in Riverside Park is not actually nothing. It is watching. It is remembering you are a person and not a to-do list. It is letting the city hold you instead of chasing it.
I stayed until the light went orange over New Jersey. Then I walked home the long way because I could.
My mother always says even the dal needs to rest before it tastes right. Turns out so do I.
Go lie in the grass. That's it. That's the assignment.
Love,