Well, it's all like that

I like Trader Joe’s and IKEA. Even though prices have gone up, I like IKEA’s designs, and Trader Joe’s has friendly service and a good selection of small-portion foods.

My husband doesn’t like staying in enclosed spaces, so when we go to IKEA, he rushes through things and keeps signaling for me to hurry up and leave. Because of that, I prefer going alone, so I can take my time looking at new designs and enjoy a leisurely cup of tea On weekends, I take the first free ferry from Pier 11 at the southern tip of Manhattan at 11 a.m., and return on the 2:20 p.m. ferry.

The last time I went, though, I took the 3:50 p.m. ferry home for the first time. I had been buying a jar and trying to make the 2:20 ferry, but in the rush, the jar broke, and I missed the boat right in front of me. It always goes wrong when I’m rushing. I watched the departing boat with regret, but as my gaze moved to the flowing river, I watched the water slowly passing by, rubbing together like close friends telling each other stories. Missing the boat didn’t feel so bad; my mind felt at ease. It reminded me of something that happened a few days ago.

On the subway, a heavyset Black woman was rushing to catch a departing train and missed a step on the stairs, falling hard. She couldn’t get up, so I, coming down the stairs right behind her, comforted her and stayed with her. She tried two or three times to get up, holding my hand, but she couldn’t move at all. The police came, checked her condition, and called an ambulance. I thought of a poster I remembered from childhood, outside my school’s crosswalk, saying, “If you try to be five minutes early, you might end up 50 years.” I hope she wasn’t seriously hurt.

Sometimes I just want to escape the rush of life in Manhattan, from the crowded subway with that smell of old cheese. Yet even after I wander here and there, I keep coming back, thinking, “NYC really is the best!” For a while, I feel fine, but when the urge comes up again, I’ll go away and come back again, and the cycle repeats.

Can we really draw firm boundaries between good and bad, right and wrong? I’m only judging it all from my own perspective. Someone once said, “Nothing is ever purely white or black. Saying something is white means there’s black hidden in it, and saying something is black means there’s something very white revealed within it.” I don’t know why I keep wandering around, trying to clarify the whites and blacks.