Pittsburgh is city enough for anyone within a hundred mile radius. The three rivers, hundreds of bridges, dedicated sports base, tunnel traffic, perogies, pickles, and fries on everything are just some of the things you come to know (and love) living here…
But I'm reminded of the real definition of a city when I travel to New York City.
The streets are bustling with people from every walk of life. Everywhere you look, something’s for sale. Weird sights and smells command your attention, and opportunity saturates the air. It’s infectious, stimulating, and the beckoning call for ambitious spirits around the world.
I won’t try describing the headache of traveling there in a personal vehicle and figuring out parking- here, the bus is much more appealing. Taking a bus to NYC is timeless, spontaneous, and makes me feel like the main character in an indie movie.
The only downside? It’s 8 hours long- few have the nerve to embark on this sort of adventure, but I see it as an opportunity to catch up on reading and deep personal reflection.
My single Jansport backpack is filled to the brim with clothes, 2 hardcover books (I recommend paper-back next time), extra bars of soap, and a pair of black dress shoes. I figure anything else can be borrowed or bought.
Getting There
Thursday morning, 6:00 am, my roommate drops me off at the bus station to New York- or what I thought was the bus station.
6:05 rolls around, 10 minutes before departure, and I don’t see anyone else. I get suspicious and pull up the email confirmation…
Up until a year ago, the company that ran the bus system was Megabus. And it really was a Megabus- a fully equipped double decker passenger bus with huge window views from every seat. But within the last year, the Megabus became no more- they got bought out by Greyhound. I learned this the hard way.
With the change in buses came a change in bus stations. Luckily for me, the new Greyhound bus stop is just three blocks away from the old Megabus stop. I quickly make my way over, breathing a sigh of relief as I meet the bus driver and confirm my ticket.
I climb aboard, and put nicely, it’s a little bit different than the Megabus. The bus is mostly empty, and it’s a snooze fest for the first 3 hours to our first stop, State College.
We park at Penn State’s main campus, and I begin reminiscing about how I used to skateboard past this bus stop on my way to class. But I’m quickly snapped out of it as a fellow passenger says there’s a different bus that takes us to NYC. Our new bus driver, an enthusiastic young lady standing outside, makes the last call for “bus to New York City!” I quickly climb aboard the new bus, entering what feels like the next scene of the movie.
An Unexpected Stop
I grab a seat, and this bus fills up to about half capacity. Translated, this means everyone gets some breathing room as each person occupies two seats. I find outlets near my seat, which will be good for me to juice up my phone before I get off and start wandering around a huge city.
We leave campus and have about five hours left. The bus ride was going fine… until it wasn’t. We're on the road for an hour or two, but suddenly the bus driver pulls over on the side of the highway…
The bus driver gets out and starts walking the length of the bus, on the phone with someone from Greyhound- we can only guess.
About 10 minutes go by and she breaks the news: the bus is officially broken down! After stalling out on the road, the ignition now won’t turn over, and the dashboard is lit up.
The good news? A new bus will be here to pick us up in about 45 minutes.
Hearing this, I step outside to stretch my legs along with a few other passengers. As we’re waiting, I end up helping the driver set up the hazard cones behind the bus, the wind from passing traffic whipping our faces.
Finally our saving grace arrives. As we're making the switch over to the new bus, I walk by two old ladies pointing at their bags in the undercarriage of the bus. I ask them if they need any help retrieving their bags. They say “Yes please” pointing to the two bags stacked in the very back corner behind everyone else’s bags.
I reluctantly commit and plunge myself into what feels like a real life game of Tetris. I start rearranging and pulling out every suitcase I touch, completely unaware of whose bag is whose. I manage to hit my head on the undercarriage doors only a couple times.
Mission finally completed, I shoulder my own bag and head onto the new bus.
I claim two seats, and everything seems fine- but only for a minute. As I look around, I don't see any outlets. My phone sits at 45%, and we’re still two and a half hours away from New York City…
The Adjustment Period
The lurching of the bus back and forth becomes more frequent- a sign we’re getting close. I peer out the window, and the green fields and brown forests have turned to dense neighborhoods and grey skyscrapers.
At long last the bus groans to a halt. Already the NYC fever has entered the bus- or maybe everyone’s just excited to touch solid ground again. People begin clamoring the aisles to get off, and I bid farewell and good luck to the friends I made on the eventful bus ride.
On this trip I’m visiting my brother Jared, but I have a few hours until he gets off work. Instinctively I start walking towards Central Park, which is close to his work and his apartment. With every step I take, I try adapting to my new environment.
Through experience of my last trip, I’ve learned there’s two ways to enter this highly competitive, cutthroat space called New York City:
One is to be totally oblivious to your surroundings and let everything happen to you. If you don’t pay close attention, you'll get charged double at the register for a sandwich, you'll lose valuable personal space on the sidewalk or subway, and you'll reek of naivety to the New Yorkers around you as they poke your soft spots.
The second way only comes through experience of the first way- and that’s living with purpose and awareness of who you are and what’s going on around you.
Put simply, you learn to hold your own space.
Thoughts on Personal Growth
Once you can integrate the shock factor of New York City, it becomes easier to manage- mentally, physically and spiritually. You learn to cut through the ever-pervading noise and stimulation constantly surrounding you, and as you step up to the pace of living, everything starts clicking into place. Early on in this trip, and contrary to my last visit, I'm able to relax my senses and hold the space around me.
Accomplishing that, I then have a realization that I'm surrounded by individuals.
Previously I had a tendency to view the people here as one big blob of human mass- one that's always busy, rushing around, chasing the next big thing. And depending on your scope and point of view, it really is like that.
Simultaneously though, the hundreds, if not thousands of people you pass every day here are all living their own lives, wrestling with their own issues they wake up with every morning, just like you and I. Millions of unique stories are here in the form of human lives, each one more varied than the last- and none of these people know each other, let alone consciously see each other! The majority opt for the easy path of minding their own business.
But among this sea of people, there’s room for growth- the vastness and anonymity in NYC lends itself in your favor. In this concrete jungle, nobody holds any preconceived notions, assumed attitudes, or thoughts of how you ought to live your life. Chances are you’ll never see any of these people ever again. But the disadvantages of loneliness, unrelatability, and an overall smaller social circle aren’t without their own challenges…
On the contrary, being part of an intimate, local community doesn’t always lend itself to personal growth. In repetitive, close environments with people you see over and over again, you develop subconscious patterns. Some of these patterns are “good” as they come with a boosted mood, acquaintances, and general feelings of happiness or intrigue
But every light casts a shadow…
Other times, familiar patterns can grip your life in unpleasant, if not destructive ways. Breaking free can sometimes take an entire lifetime- if at all.
The good (or bad!) news is that you, and only you, possess the power to change your life. It takes understanding and self-awareness to figure out that if these patterns aren’t self-imposed, they’re accepted! Acknowledgement is the first step.
The next step, to awakening to your true purpose, that is, is having the courage to take complete responsibility for your life, to break free from these unpleasant-but-familiar patterns, and step into the vast unknown (otherwise known as your shadow).
These are my thoughts at least, as I sit on a rock in Central park, looking up in awe at the skyscrapers surrounding me.
City Life
Jared finally gets off work, I greet him with a chocolate milkshake from Shake Shack, and we head over to his apartment just a few blocks away.
I finally unload the jam-packed backpack I've been carrying around all day, and we waste no time walking up to the rooftop to see the view.
But soon the strain of the day compels my body to find relaxation, and eventually we stroll over to TMPL gym. They have a steam sauna and Jared's able to “sneak” me in with his good standing as a former personal trainer there.
Once inside though, I ask about taking an Inbody test. The Inbody is a $20k machine that calculates various biological statistics, diagnostics, and recommendations for achieving your dream body. I'm eager to see what progress (if any!) has been made since my visit last year.
With this side quest over, we head straight into the sauna. It's a toasty 177°F inside, and I find a temporary safe haven of peace from the harsh outer world.
You can't sweat your butt off and not fill your stomach after, so we grab some fettuccine alfredo. But not just any type of fettuccine alfredo…
This is Yummy Cheese Pasta, where the noodles are made fresh on the spot. Once sliced, the noodles are boiled al-dente and thrown into a big wheel of parmesan cheese just sitting on the counter. As the cheese gets hot from the cooked noodles, it sticks to the noodles and becomes perfectly cheesy. I get mushrooms on top and call it a day.
Some Old Adventures, Some New
With Jared at work Friday morning, I have some alone time, and I take full advantage. I typically spend my mornings off work writing or video editing at a café, and a quick Google search in my area floods me with options.
When I go to a café, I don’t go because the coffee is so amazing and they make a little leaf pattern in your drink- I go strictly for the vibes.
Looking for something relatively close, I throw myself together and walk a few minutes to the New York Coffee Project.
I walk into the unusually(?) quiet café to find all the seats taken. The atmosphere was pretty chill, with help from a winding ceiling feature, and it’s clearly a café in high demand. My intentions for the morning are shattered, but I'm flexible. I order a café au lait, my usual, to go.
I begin walking around, shooting GND content as I meander around, drawn from one piece of architecture to another, from a metal gate on one side to flowers on the other. Eventually I find a random outside table this cool Friday morning, and I begin writing about my journey thus far.
But I don’t spend all my morning writing. I walk a few avenues over to Argosy Book Store. They have a few titles I recognize, and many more I don't. It’s a nice bookstore, but not quite the thrift-store vibe I was looking for. I mainly picked this bookstore because only a few blocks away is a café called Devocion. This café has the best atmosphere in the south Central Park area (that I’ve found), so I head over there for my second coffee of the day.
NYC Nightlife
Late that night Jared takes me to a nightclub called The Stranger. It’s known as the go-to nightclub at the end of the night, and I’m told it usually doesn’t fill up until after midnight. When we walk up to the club around 11pm, we’re surprised to find the line stretching down the sidewalk.
It’s no issue for us though, as Jared fist bumps the bouncers, introduces me, and gets our hands stamped. We walk right on in, sidestepping the increasingly long line behind us.
The Stranger feels like an interactive art exhibit, and reminds me of the Meow Wolf exhibit we visited on our Colorado trip last fall. And in a way, it is interactive. We see signs pointing to swirls painted on the wall, prompting us to “find all three portals.”
Out of nowhere, Jared and I are led into a room where a gentleman tells us about a secret scavenger hunt going on. He goes on talking, about what I’m not really sure, but just when my curiosity is piqued, he escorts us out of the small room for “duty calls.” Intrigued, but still somewhat confused, I turn my attention to the club music (my favorite) playing downstairs.
We aren't out super late though- come morning, we’re going thrift shopping in the Chelsea area.
Thrifting in Chelsea
Saturday morning is slow but steady for us. We hop on a bus due south, and about 15 minutes later we arrive at our first thrift store.
Our first stop is a newly opened store by one of Jared’s acquaintances, called Thrift NYC. It’s their second location, and to our advantage, right in the middle of many more thrift stores.
As we’re browsing the various thrift stores, some cheaper priced, some asking designer prices, we find a woman carrying around a sword. Jared’s immediately intrigued, and asks where the sword came from. She points us to the Chelsea Flea Market, and at once we make our way over.
It takes a few minutes to find the sword dealer, but eventually Jared finds the guy with “the perfect sword,” the last one he has. Mission success, we start walking down the street and into surrounding thrift stores, receiving curious looks from passers-by the whole way.
Wrap Up
We take it easy Saturday night, hanging out at the apartment watching TV. The bus back to Pittsburgh leaves at 1 pm tomorrow, and we’re able to sneak one more sauna session in before I head back home.
As expected, my trip to New York City poked me in some soft spots- but I learned a few new things, and I appreciate the opportunity for accelerated personal growth that occurs when exposed to different environments.
The Greyhound bus back, although an hour and a half late picking us up, manages to make the long ride back to Pittsburgh without breaking down- and for that, I’m thankful!