DAY 2 - LIKE I'VE LIVED IN BROOKLYN ALL MY LIFE

Day 2 - I wake up. I'm excited and emotionally raw because I have so usual sensory overloads of, "You have to do this now. You have to do that." This day is all on my own and I know FIRST, I want to walk around the neighborhood and find the TraderJoe's supposedly close by!

I make sure I have me keys and remind myself (metally) that everyone's going to be moving at breakneck speed with no time for a tepid, shy little smile! So off I march to claim my sandwich makings that will keep me fed for a week! It's survival for god's sake!

Well, I really do, firstly, leisurely walk through the neighborhood. Kids are running to school with their mittens on. Christmas decorations are everywhere. Teachers and/or parents laughingly give chase as they're yelling at them not to run. All the brownstones and the small streets give such a neighborhoody feel. I find Trader Joe's and go right in. BUT.... it's different... (1) It's bigger than any Trader Joes I've been into (Wasn't Trader Joes only in Oregon?) and (2) there was a line of people waiting to get checked out, snaking all the way through the store. I quickly got my things. Went to get in line myself and go "handeled" by an employee that was there to "handle" the line. Whoa! There were two more such "handlers' along the way to the bank of checkers. And when I finally saw it -- THERE WERE 40 CHECKERS!! At a Trader Joe's? Crazy. When I get up to the guy that's checking me out, I mention I'm from Portland and that all the Portland checkers at Trader Joe's have to ring this little bell. He looks at me like I'm crazy. He says he'd quit, he wouldn't handle it. HA.

It's still early morning and I get back to the apartment and make some tea ad go sit to watch the people coming and going along Bergen Street. I feel lucky to have a fine place to sit and be calm and let my adrenaline come down. It's a lovely big window in front of the bed, in fact. And I set myself with a blanket in this little antique chair and sip and watch people and plan the rest of my day...
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I realize it's a GORGEOUS sunny (cold) day out and I want to walk over to Prospect Park and see it--take some photos. It's supposed to be great, but I've never been there. So this is my plan. I wash up my tea things, pack a sandwich, my camera and film and head off. I walk a zig-zaggy way to the park to get a view of as many different neighborhood streets as possible. It'ls all straight out of a movie. Big brownstones. American Flags hang everywhere. Kids are of hollering, grandmas are out walking their dogs. It's lovely.
I get to the park and the first thing I'm struck by this huge, vast, open green field. It is glorious.I had to walk right out into the middle of it to get the delicious feel of green grass and spaciousness on all sides! I later learned this area is called The Long Meadow and that this 90-acre space is considered to be the largest meadow in any national park!!!  I wanted to walk all the way to the lake too, but I was too tired. I ate my sandwich, snapped a few photos and lovingly walked the long walk home.