though they would have you believe that everything happens fast in new york city- that it’s all “in the flashiest flash”, that it’s all practically instantaneous – i would offer up driving across the george washington bridge or a spin on the cross bronx or the cross island or maybe the long island expressway – as counterpoint to that point. nothing happens fast in or on any of those places. it is slower than molasses and any pretense of traversing across the waterways to get to the other side – rapidly – would be dispelled as soon as you plant yourself in a vehicle somewhere near the gwb.

the thing about being on a bridge for a long period of time is that you are on a bridge for a long period of time. you can actually feel the sway of the bridge, the movement of the bridge, the other thousands upon thousands of vehicles on the bridge. it can be alarming if you are bridge-phobic, height-phobic, traffic-phobic, noise-phobic, phobic about going too slow, phobic about being late, phobic about big trucks surrounding you (if you are upper level), phobic about dark places that are underneath a whole ‘nother level of vehicles suspended on pavement and traveling above you (if you are lower level)…many phobias, so little time.

the problem is – this is the way there. to get to long island from new jersey – coming from the west, one must cross a bridge. you have a choice – the gwb or the verrazano. you can cross staten island or you can cross manhattan. the choice isn’t exactly favorable either way.

but – those are your driving-your-car options.

we thought about leaving – heading west – a different way…maybe driving north up along the hudson and crossing at the tappan zee, taking the ‘high road’ so-to-speak and bumping up into rockland county, taking a roundabout route to try and achieve that infamous new york minute stuff.

we chose not to, though, and went the “traditional” way, hoping we had timed it well, that – this very day, this very hour – the planets would align and conditions would be different and we would sail right through.

ahhh. no such luck.

maybe, in the end, the new york minute IS actually a thing. because anything – in comparison to the sloth-inspired-turtle’s pace on the roads to the city, through the city, across the city – would be faster. and a new york minute – that blink-of-an-eye-jiffiest-jiffy takes on different meaning.

*****

read DAVID’s thoughts this MERELY-A-THOUGHT MONDAY

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