A New York Moment
or: How I Met Your Stepmother
Dani: I’d been living in New York for a month. I was doing medical research and teaching.
Jeremy: I grew up here, moved away a few times. Came back.
Dani: My family’s people are in Brazil, Portugal, France, all over.
Jeremy: My kid is 5th generation New Yorker. My ancestors are from Brooklyn.
--
Dani: I was exhausted but happy after a long day in the anatomy lab. I missed my subway stop at 66th Street and that was fine.
Jeremy: I was living on Roosevelt Island with my Russian roommate, Olga--the woman formerly known as My Fiancée.
Dani: I decided to walk home from Columbus Circle.
Jeremy: Olga and I had broken up months earlier, but she asked me to stay until her lease was up.
Dani: It’s raining! Oh well, I thought.
Jeremy: Cleaning up the apartment, I found a pair of ballet tickets under my keyboard for that night. I’d bought them for Olga and me during happier times.
Dani: This was September 27, 2013.
Jeremy: This was September 27, 2013.
Dani: I walked in the drizzle toward Lincoln Center and decided to grab a bite at the Starbucks across the street.
Jeremy: I dressed up, made some trail mix, and headed to city, to Central Park.
Dani: “A tall mocha, please.” The handsome young barista making my coffee had a great smile. I smiled back.
Jeremy: Some of my childhood buddies still hung out at the park after all these years—maybe I’d run into someone and invite them,
Dani: Waiting for my coffee, I talked to a friend on the phone back home in Brazil.
Jeremy: but it was drizzling, so few people were out.
Dani: Afterwards, the barista asked me, “Were you speaking Portuguese?”
Jeremy: Just sweaty, shirtless, rain-soaked Frisbee friends.
Dani: I said, “Yes! How did you know?” He said, “I’m learning.”
Jeremy: So I headed to the fountain at Lincoln Center and invited a well-dressed lady to join me for the ballet.
Dani: I had no plans and no one was waiting for me, so the barista and I chatted a while.
Jeremy: The lady had plans. I soon discovered everyone had plans.
Dani: I was starting to feel light and free, forgetting about work and everything else.
Jeremy: I asked another woman. Then another… I asked a dude who gave me a dirty look. Giving away the ticket was harder than expected. So was sustaining the rejection of this guerrilla/pop-up-dating/not-dating approach.
Dani: You know those rare, rare moments when you feel great about who you are, where you are, and what you’re doing?
Jeremy: I’d been with my ex-wife before Olga for 10 years. Then my Russian ex-fiancé another 3. Then lots of dating. But in that moment, I was feeling like a stranger to myself, an awkwardly single dad in my late 40s--discouraged and asking out unavailable strangers.
Dani: Like you’re just fine and everything is just right? I was having one of those moments, big time.
Jeremy: Then—no idea why--I recalled this lesson a shop owner taught me when I was maybe 20 and still sometimes shy about asking women out. She had a Persian store near my job in Los Angeles, and had this stunning daughter. One day I worked up the nerve to ask the lady if her daughter had a boyfriend.
Dani: I’ll never forget this night. I was just sipping my coffee, taking it all in. Energy returning from the emotionally exhausting lab work. Taking in life.
Jeremy: And the shop owner lady says, “Does my daughter have a boyfriend? Nonsense. Doesn’t matter. You’re a very sweet boy. My daughter is lovely and has many suitors, but you must talk to her. To all girls. All people. No matter what, and let me tell you why: There is an old saying in my country…
Dani: The barista said, “I want to live in Brazil.”
Jeremy: “It translates roughly to: ‘You snooze, you LOSE!’”
Dani: We talked more, I ate, we said our goodbyes, and I headed out into the sparkly Manhattan evening.
Jeremy: The odds, it seems, are in the numbers. The more people you to talk, ask out, the better the chances of--something happening--anything.
Dani: Look at that fountain and the lights of the MET! The Chagalls!
Jeremy: I felt reenergized! Hopeful! Briefly! My motivation bled out as I was shot down repeatedly with “Thanks, but no thankses.”
Dani: I’ve always wanted to be there at night and now I’m going. In the rain! My heart and feet led the way. I was present, I was one with the city.
Jeremy: Who’s alone by the fountain without plans? In the drizzling rain? Nobody. Odds: zero. I admit defeat and just want these tickets gone. Then home, I thought to myself.
Dani: I walked toward the corner,
Jeremy: I crossed the street,
Dani: toward Lincoln Center.
Jeremy: away from Lincoln Center.
Dani: My life felt brilliant.
Jeremy: Central Park was dark and gloomy in the distance. Good. It matched my mood. Instead of one ticket, I went to give away the pair and still nobody wanted them.
Dani: I was enthralled with the city.
Jeremy: There’s a trash can for the tickets. Wait--cute couple leaving hotel! “Hey--take my tickets to the ballet--about to start, best seats in the house, totally free!”
Dani: I was lost in the romantic fantasy of being there and felt light-years from everywhere else.
Jeremy: “Gee thanks--we’re in from Iowa for a wedding and headed to the rehearsal, but could we please have 11 tickets for Monday instead?” Seriously?! I crumpled up the tickets and stormed off.
Dani: I was halfway to the corner.
Jeremy: I was halfway up the block…
Dani: Hmm… I probably reek of medical lab. Maybe a quick shower first? Home’s only a block away…
Jeremy: and I froze. Completely blown away by some incredible smell. Some…thing, like from a past life. Some…one.
Dani: I looked up and saw this huge banner, two stories tall on the NYC Ballet: “New York Welcomes You.” Goosebumps.
Jeremy: I looked around and was drawn to this petite lady at the red light. “Excuse me, miss…”
Dani: “Excuse me, miss,” someone said. I turned around and I saw this man wearing a warm smile. He had piercing blue eyes behind some black nerdy glasses.
Jeremy: This adorable, sweet, kind, familiar face looked up at me.
Dani: “You don’t happen to be going to the ballet, are you? I have an extra ticket,” he said.
Jeremy: “I... I couldn’t go, I’m... not dressed...” she stuttered. And I felt instantly protective of her and comfortable with her, like she was an old friend.
Dani: In a nanosecond, my first thoughts: He’s not scary so that’s good. Also… ballet! INSIDE that beautiful theater! Unlikely he’ll kill me in there…
Jeremy: I saw gears turning. But she just stared at me. Blinking. Like a cartoon chipmonk.
Dani: …my hair is a complete mess! I thought.
Jeremy: She had this black mane of gorgeous hair.
Dani: Like a witch.
Jeremy: Like an angel.
Dani: I’m wearing, like, simple linen clothes for under my lab coat.
Jeremy: She had this super-cool sorta’ trendy Amish style.
Dani: I felt like I knew him.
Jeremy: I felt like I knew her.
Dani: I liked his face.
Jeremy: She looked like if Marisa Tomei, Julianne Moore, and Gal Gadot’s big sister gave birth to an adult baby.
Dani: I felt unsure, but excited, like a nervous kid.
Jeremy: I thought, finally, a grown-up, confident woman.
Dani: He seemed like a hopeful, sweet man--with these wet crumpled up tickets in his hand.
Jeremy: I showed her my sad pair of tickets and felt a little embarrassed.
Dani: I heard myself say I was sorry, “but I’ve had a long day at my hospital and…”
Jeremy: “Which hospital?”
Dani: I told him. He said, “I was born in your hospital.”
Jeremy: “I think it’s a sign.”
Dani: A sign. New York Welcomes Me.
Jeremy: “I think you’re having a New York Moment and you should just go with it. See those doors?”
Dani: “It’s 7.27. We have 3 minutes to get to them”, he said.
Jeremy: “Or they won’t let us in.”
Dani: He put his arm around me and I felt safe.
Jeremy: We walked in and they led us to the Penalty Box.
Dani: We had to wait in this crowded back area where the bad people stand who arrive late. I was in awe being inside a Lincoln Center theater.
Jeremy: There were so many of us--we were all standing, squished like sardines together.
Dani: I was lost in the beauty. Onstage, a pianist and a cellist were painted in light, playing Gershwin.
Jeremy: My back was pressed to the wall. Her back was pressed against me.
Dani: Then couples danced Balanchine’s choreography to Chopin’s Nocturnes and Waltzes.
Jeremy: Her hair was in my face.
Dani: It was breathtaking.
Jeremy: My knees were weak from inhaling her--some magical combination of her body, her perfume, and… formaldehyde?
Dani: They seated us after a bit. I was mesmerized.
Jeremy: The lights came on at intermission. She was beaming.
Dani: It was a lot to take in.
Jeremy: “See the ushers studying everyone?”
Dani: “Yes.”
Jeremy: “They’re looking for eaters. We’ll be in trouble if they see us eat.”
Dani: “Wha’?” He pulled his suit jacket open and showed me a bag of homemade trail mix and how to eat it, “Like a ninja.” I didn’t know what trail mix was.
Jeremy: She looked dubious. Her squint screamed, “Why is this ape offering me dried banana chips?”
Dani: “Fake yawn to place trail mix in mouth,” he said.
Jeremy: “…then contemplative beard strokes as subterfuge.” I ate some first to put her at ease.
Dani: “Who ARE you?!” I asked as I just stared at him, doing what he told me, chewing and stroking my imaginary girl beard. He was almost impossible. He was just--in my life all the sudden.
Jeremy: She was so beautiful. She was…is…so beautiful I felt overwhelmed by her.
Dani: And it felt just right.
Jeremy: Afterwards we were caught in a murmuration of people leaving the theaters and I led her through the crowds to her corner a block away. I asked, “Would you like to do this again?”
Dani: “I would.”
Jeremy: I didn’t kiss her.
Dani: He didn’t kiss me. He opened his arms and embraced me.
Jeremy: I didn’t want to risk it being the wrong time.
Dani: I’m glad he didn’t. It was perfect, his hand in my hair.
Jeremy: We held each other for a long time. My hand felt home in her hair.
Dani: Perfect.
Jeremy: It was a moment that needed to just be. So after a long time, ages it seemed, we let each other go. I smiled, said I’d call, and quickly walked away, against the current, through the sea of bodies, from Lincoln Center.
Dani: What? I kept calling out his name.
Jeremy: There were hundreds of conversation and voices all around me, but I was sure I heard my name being called over and over. Something made me go back.
Dani: He came back! I smiled, bewildered.
Jeremy: She was still there and looked confused.
Dani: “How are you going to call me? You don’t have my number!”
Jeremy: Oh. Yeh.
Dani: But he wasn’t fazed at all! “What would you have DONE without my number?”
Jeremy: “I would have waited here every night ‘til I found you again.”
--
Dani: He has a young son full of magical laughter. He’s now also mine.
Jeremy: Dani and my boy fell in love, too--they’re always curled up like kittens. He said he can feel her angel wings when he hugs her. I told him me too.
Dani: We made his first origami tsuru together.
Jeremy: One day I told my boy that if we ask her really, really nicely, maybe Dani would want to marry us and be ours forever. He said “YES! For real? Forever? YES! Let’s ask her!”
Dani: One day they asked if I would marry them and be theirs forever. The beautiful little boy made me an origami ring.
Jeremy: She said yes, she would be ours and we would be hers.
Dani: And we got married.
Jeremy: And we got married.
Dani: You snooze, you lose.
Jeremy: You snooze, you lose.
<End>
Welcome to Substack, Jeremy.