i met him: the king of New York

I met him through a friend.

Through a bunch of friends, really. He was everyone’s friend before he was my friend. 

It’s not worth telling you what his real job is, because if you’re not from here then you just won’t get it - but all you really need to know is that he’s basically The Man You Go To When You Need Something.

And there’s a tall stool behind his work bench, but it’s not for him, ‘cause men in his position do much better standing.

Standing and walking, 
standing and selling, 
standing and buying. 

Standing, always.

No, that stool is for whoever the “lucky girl” is, and that wasn’t me. It wasn’t that I was unlucky - he and fortune favored my friends and I pretty well, pouring us tequila shots into little medicine cups every time we stopped by. But I had never been lucky enough to be the girl sitting on the high stool, 
watching over the counter, 
watching over Brooklyn, 
watching over the world.

And that was fine, I convinced myself, ‘cause I’m not much of a sitter or a watcher anyways.

Until one day, I was invited on to the stool.

To sit, and watch.

And I realized that New York City feels a little different when you’ve been offered a seat at the table. Feels a little different when you get a break from the running and the hustling, and someone asks you to sit. Feels a little different to be a little higher than the rest of the room, and to just be still. 

It was the first time I had really felt “invited” in New York City and I felt immovable, impassable - ineradicable.

It felt like I finally had a seat at the city’s table, and it felt like now that I had this seat, nothing could move me.

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