Whether it’s a New York airport, hotel, restaurant, subway car or taxi ride, the first time one visits the city, everything will seem so amazing.  For me it was all so new but incredibly familiar.  As we flew into La Guardia, the skyline brought tears to my eyes.  Throughout the world and in the United States, the New York Skyline is sometimes more familiar than the aspects of one’s own city.  It is the subject of photographs, posters, and tee shirt design.  It is featured in the opening scenes of many movies and television shows, and serves as a backdrop for many more.  Seeing it in real life for the first time was pretty overwhelming.

When I stepped out of the airport I had to locate the bus that would take me to Grand Central Station.  I did, and as we drove across the bridge and I got closer and closer to city, my heart began to beat just a little bit quicker.  I don’t know if it was that I was nervous, or if it was just the energy the city seems to project…perhaps it was both of those things happening at the same time.  So, the bus drops us off on the corner across from the Station.

I wheeled my suitcase through the snow and the ice of the cross walk and entered the building.  Again, how many times have we seen the inside of Grand Central Station.  It has appeared in movies for decades, and so too on TV.  Be it a gangster shoot out, or a romantic meeting, or a sad departure. I have seen characters waltz though that building my entire life.  That night, just a week before Christmas, the place was packed.  I was to meet my friend Robert at the Kiosk.

Now I stated that I was familiar with the building, however, there were so many people and it was before the days of cell phones and began to get nervous.  And then, just as it happens in those movies, and just as it is said about the city of New York, a seemingly magical thing happened.  I kid you not, the sea of people opened up a bit, and standing a in the middle of the mass, at the Kiosk I saw a man in a black wool trench coat.  He turned around slowly and I saw the bright blue eyes of my dear friend.  I ran dragging my wheely suitcase with the frozen wheels, through the crowd.  That was the beginning of one of the best weekends in my life, spent with my old friend in that great town of Manhattan.