I write this lounging on a wooden chaise on the High Line as I watch the sunset. The evening is cool, breezy, some people are wearing sweaters – autumn is on the way. Helicopters circle above. The Hudson River ripples, reflecting the waning light. Apartment and office windows are lighting up. And I exhale. It is so nice to be up here on this peaceful, late-summer evening.
And I realize that, whatever people say about singlehood being the time to indulge yourself and enjoy being on your own schedule, these moments are not worthy compensation for being single and pre-parenthood (a term I’m using in lieu of both childless and child-free, which don’t resonate). And these moments are not inevitable, they don’t automatically come with the territory. They take a bit of planning (at least enough to be able to spontaneously come here after work, knowing that such a place exists and how to get here). And they take the determination to grasp life and enjoy it.
I realize that this feeling of gratitude I have is not that I am grateful I get to do these things — I don’t see having family obligations as an unfair burden. Rather, I’m grateful that I do these things. That I have the resources, the imagination, and a child-like sense of wonder that miraculously has pulled me along all these years, even when I think it will surely fail me. I’m grateful for the energy and the inclination, for the mental freedom to invest in experiences that make life more beautiful.
And these are my thoughts, as the sky darkens above.
