Christo and Me…in Central Park

The taxi from Newark’s Liberty International Airport pulled alongside another car, the driver motioning that this was my stop. I grabbed my carryon, exited and prayed that the door code I had been sent would work.

This was years before Airbnb codes or Ring doorbells checked people into housing units with no other security.

This was Manhattan on an early Friday morning.

This was me, bedraggled and weary from a red-eye flight from San Francisco to Newark.

Do it now? Unlikely. But maybe.

What would I do if the lock didn’t click and I had no place to sleep?

The thought never occurred to me as things always worked out. This was before the days of multiple scams and craigslist becoming a leading place for advertising housing grifters. Staying elsewhere from a New York City hotel would give me more of a feel for living there, the place I had thought I would go when I finished high school. But didn’t.

Not knowing why one is taking an action goes against most management consultant recommendations for success. Likely I would agree yet I know that often when I’ve followed my gut, my instinct, my “I wanna do this”, I’ve had few regrets.

A weekend New York City jaunt to see Bulgarian and French artists Christo and Jeanne Claude temporary installation of The Gates in Central Park matched the description for what I was doing.