It happened Tuesday. I walked up to the Marcy Avenue platform in a linen jacket like a fool, and the wind came off the river and went straight through me.
The first cold morning on the J train always catches me off guard. Every single year. You'd think after three winters here I'd learn to check the weather before I check Instagram. You'd be wrong.
I bought a chai from the bodega on Broadway — the one where the man behind the counter calls me "boss" and never charges me for the extra ginger. It wasn't masala chai. It was a paper cup of something warm and sweet, and honestly, on the first cold morning, that's all a girl needs.
The J train came in slow, elevated and screeching, that brown-line rumble over Brooklyn rooftops. I love the J in the cold. You can see the whole city waking up — water towers, laundry lines, the Williamsburg Bridge arching gray against a grayer sky.
There was an uncle across from me reading a Gujarati newspaper. I almost said something. I didn't. But for two stops I felt like I was on a bus in Ahmedabad, my Nani beside me, the smell of someone's tiffin in the air.
The first cold morning does this to me. It cracks something open. One day you're sweating on the platform in August, the next the whole city smells like wet leaves and roasted chestnuts and you're homesick for a season that hasn't even started.
I got off at Essex, teeth chattering, and bought a scarf from a street vendor for eight dollars. It's definitely not warm. It is definitely orange. I regret nothing.
Fall in New York doesn't knock. It just shows up and sits down.
Love,