Central Park

Moe on 102nd Street.

We head for Central Park on a gorgeous Saturday and seat ourselves next to The Pool: W101 which otherwise has no name. This a remarkably pristine part of an unusually natural environment given what surrounds it: concrete, for miles and miles. Our seclusion includes drooping willows, algae green waters formed in a grotto from stacked boulders. It is also a favorite haunt of the Great Egret and bird watchers nestle here to spot the many migratory species. Kind of like the Barnes Wetland Centre which also attracts its share of eccentric nutzos. 

I remember here from autumn when the red maples, Osage Orange, Moccernut hickory and American sycamore burst into colour like nobodies business. In the winter, the water freezes and impossible not to consider the stupidity of those who ice skate or walk on the ice. 

For many, this area remembered for the brutal rape of an investment banker by five youths and New York's social breakdown - ushered in the Giuliani era. The attack shortly before I arrived and when the city's killing on a murderous, upward rate. The case also introduced us to the term "wilding" and fueled fear for the after hours. So today all that 20 years ago and our grassy knoll shared with a middle-aged couple enchanted by their new-born; a large Black man who snores while his daughter and Madeleine build a tee pee from leaves and branches; a group of young people who sit on a flat rock and flirt and feel each other. 

All this while joggers and bikers stream by in a liquid flow. As Sonnet notes, the park an extension of every New Yorker's living room.