In Alignment

I enjoy the nights in New York where you wander from place to place. While the same experience can be duplicated in other cities, it just doesn't feel the same. Because everyone is always socially obligated in a few different directions, there's this feeling that people are comets whizzing back and forth, and you’re texting each other to see if there’s some time you could meet up, or if they’re at a better occasion than you are. I can imagine this getting old after awhile, but for now it’s bliss.

Saturday night, after my book event, we had dinner with the other authors, some book bloggers, and accompanying friends and family. Quite a few of my people showed up to the signing, much to my appreciation. I happened to be seated next to an author whose blog I read and whose work I’ve admired. He just moved here a year and a half ago, and hearing about his experiences with the young adult book community out here was uplifting. This is essentially the reason I moved out here, to meet and attend book things.

The night before, I wandered into a room of twenty strangers on the Upper West Side. People were jammed into every corner and seating area, and everyone was in the quiet of writing. I found this group online, one of two I plan on checking out. After an hour of writing time, this group takes a break before engaging in a round of readings and critiques. The guy in charge, Zach, told me he’d been running this group for over eight years and there was over three hundred people on his email list.

I later found out he writes books about baseball, and is a serious stats geek. That explained why he knew exactly how many meetings everyone had attended. I recommend that a stats obsessed guy like him would probably really appreciate the Feltron Report. The writing group meets semi-weekly in various locations, and everyone seemed to be really chill and relaxed. The readings covered non-fiction, poetry, film criticism, alcohol reviews, excerpted blog entries, and a nice variety of things. I'll be back.

The rest of our Saturday adventures was spent stopping by a bar, a house party, and then a lounge to dance. Finding a venue to dance is a serious challenge, and I do miss the SF people's constant desire to go out and find a dance floor. The bar we were at was playing some very danceable Phoenix music, but it wasn't the right sort of vibe. Given the chance, I would have taken control of the music at the house party and dimmed the lights and thrown on Girl Talk. "Like a G6" gushed on repeat as people got louder and drunker.

By the time we hit the Korean place to eat and finish out the night, most everybody was exhausted. We aren’t young bucks anymore. In the future, may I recommend a three o’clock shut down time? The city never sleeps but people tend to peter out around four.