“The world only exists in your eyes. You can make it as big or as small as you want.” - F. Scott Fitzgerald

I awake to the tinkly sounds of my cell phone alarm and instantly am struck with an impulse to kill myself in order to get out of going to work. I hit the snooze button instead. Eight minutes later the chimes urge me awake once more and I give in. I stumble through the motions of my morning routine, barely aware of what I'm doing as I'm doing it. I look for things through fuzzy, lensless eyes: washcloth, underwear, shoes, uniform, keys, cell phone...all of it goes in a pile on my bed. I wear the same thing to work every day, yet even in the sleepy morning hours I inevitably spend too much time accessorizing in an effort to minimize the frumpiness of my uniform. My hair has managed to work itself into a state that is somehow both greasy and frizzy. I pin it back in a bun and spruce it up with a black sequined headband. Somehow I make it out the door, though, true to form, I'm running 15 minutes late. Somehow...

The next thing I know I'm standing in line at Ruthy's Deli in Chelsea Market, determined to get a bagel with cream cheese and an enormous cup of coffee, no matter how much later it makes me. I'll still get there before the opening manager, and that's all that matters to me right now. I clock in fifteen minutes late...the first bite proves every second was worth it. I take my time doing my opening paperwork and savoring my coffee. I'm sitting in the office with Tiffany, the morning reservationist, when our manager Sara calls to say she's running fifteen minutes late and to ask us if we'd like breakfast. My heart leaps: even though I've already had my breakfast, I'm down to five bucks in my wallet and I'm heading straight from this restaurant to the next with no time to eat in between, so I figure I could stand to stock up while the opportunity has arisen. Plus, my exhausted little immune system has been working overtime and is dying for some refreshing, nutrient-filled oj this morning. I hang up the phone and head upstairs to set up the floor. But first I pop outside and down the block for a fresh copy of this week's Village Voice to have with my coffee.


When Sara arrives, I find I'm too full for my second breakfast (she's chosen for me yet another bagel with cream cheese), so into my bag it goes, destined to be my lunch on the walk between restaurants. Somehow, be it the free food, getting away with being late, or just the caffeine starting to kick in, I've managed to find myself in a good mood by the time we open at noon.

Around 12:30, five people laden with very intense looking camera equipment enter the sliding glass doors and approach the host desk. The one woman amongst them, shorter and bonier than me though saddled with the largest pieces of equipment (my kind of lady) tells me she's here for "the shoot" and asks where they can park their gear. I point them to the north private dining room that's closed off for lunch. Shoot? I ask Sara. Apparently Chef Morimoto is having a sushi lesson with his fellow Iron Chef Bobby Flay this afternoon. We decide it must be a segment for Throwdown With Bobby Flay. Cool. As the camera crew are loading in more and more paraphernalia, I duck into the coat check for a hot second to check my cell phone, as I do obsessively about ten times an hour. Lo and behold, there's a text from Molly:

Molly: Guess what event im workin today? Yer gonna shit yer pants

Molly: Obama concert with Billy Joel, Bruce Springsteen, John Legend, India Arie and James Taylor...billy and Bruce are doing sound check right now

Me: BAD ASS. Take pictures! Bobby Flay and Morimoto are making sushi together in a couple hours and the Food Network is filming in the restaurant

Me: But you still win

Molly: Shut up! U take pics too! Or get in a shot and wave like an idiot!

Can one become successful by osmosis? I'm pondering this coincidental synchronicity of Molly's and my proximity to fame, when a PA for the Food Network walks in carrying extension cords...he looks extremely familiar. A kid about my age with a puppy dog fave and shaggy brown hair in a green t-shirt and jeans. Then it hits me: I think I slept with that kid about a year ago.

My first and only one-night stand, about a month after I arrived in the city. Quite possibly my last one-night stand: as I remember, it was kind of awful. Not embarrassing or emotionally uncomfortable--I had absolutely no emotional investment in the tryst at all--but simply downright terrible sex. Is it really the same kid? It seems too random to be true. I keep an eye on him peripherally as I go about my business making confirmation calls for tomorrow's reservations and become increasingly convinced that it is, in fact, him. I'm certain because when I met him, he was PAing for MTV when they came into Beacon while I was working to shoot for an episode of Making the Band. The irony of it is enormously hilarious: that my pathetic little excuse for a sexual history would actually come back to haunt me seems so ridiculous. But it's not the first time this has happened.

I lost my virginity to a co-worker at one of my restaurants when I was 19, the summer after my sophomore year of college. After a month-long period of pseudo-dating (I hesitate to call it a relationship), I decided to break it off quickly by neglecting to call him back. I naively thought it would be easy and painless...until he started to call me every day. Luckily, I was in my last week at the restaurant so I only had one uncomfortable run-in with him at work, which ended with me leaving through the back door after my shift and him following me outside, cornering me, and badgering me about blowing him off. Which, granted, wasn't the most mature way to handle it, but I was young and there was a lot going on in my life and I just wanted to detach quickly and cleanly. He called me every day for almost two months and every day I ignored his call. Then one day, he left me a message telling me he was leaving for Europe for several months. I breathed a sigh of relief as I counted down the days until he would be out of the country and I would no longer run the risk of running into him. Then, an entire year later, I was walking out of the Ritz movie theater in Old City with Molly and Matty one Saturday afternoon, when suddenly, there he was, walking towards us. I saw him first and hoped he wouldn't recognize me, but he did, and walked right up to me. I panicked, making forced, frantic small talk and gave him my number again in a daze. Two months later, we met up for coffee one time, and I invited him to see a show I was in at school. After that, I faded him out of my life again. Until this summer, when I swore I passed by him on the street in Old City and added him as a friend on Facebook to see. We emailed about getting together, but my heart wasn't in it.

But the kid I hooked up with one time? New York is the most populated city in America. How could I possibly have run into him? Sure, this kind of thing happens on Sex and the City all the time... but I'm only 22 and I've only slept with four people, and only one in New York. Is the Universe trying to send me some sort of message? I can't possibly imagine what it must be--it certainly can't be to scale back my promiscuity. I couldn't be less promiscuous if I tried. What the hell?

I don't acknowledge that I recognize him. I'm not sure if he recognizes me, or even remembers me, as he makes no indication. I'm relieved. There is nothing to gain for either of is in acknowledging that one tiny event that links us together. It certainly doesn't seem like anything worth revisiting.

I am connected to random people in New York. Although individually they mean very little to me, something about that feels comforting.

The shoot starts around 3:00. I usually work until 5, but at 3:30 Sara lets me go. I leave quickly, relieved that I have an extra hour and a half to myself before I have to work at Tabla. I take the scenic route through Chelsea and walk all the way to Madison Square Park. It's a perfect sunny afternoon, and there's a perfect bench just waiting for me: across from the fountain by the playground, next to a water fountain. I settle onto the bench sitting cross-legged and devour my bagel from Sara as I browse through the Voice. All the parts of my day swirl through my head in a strange kind of way that makes me feel like I'm being guided.

An hour passes, and the sky has clouded over entirely. The threat of rain is in the air but I'm not scared. I'd be happy for it to rain while I'm at work. Everything feels different when it's raining...indoors people become a little stir-crazy and there's electricity in the air that somehow always serves to unite us. A gust of wind above stirs the leaves of the one yellow tree in the park. I noticed this tree earlier in the week while I worked the patio. It's the overachiever of Madison Square Park, eager to be the first to shed it's old leaves and start from scratch. Suddenly the fountain and I and all the people around me are being showered in yellow leaves. They flutter through the sky like birds and as they hit the ground the wind makes them scurry along the sidewalk in great clusters. Tiny children with their nannies squeal with delight. Two leaves land on my newspaper. I tuck them into its pages and save them for later, not for anything in particular...maybe only to remind me of this moment when I get home from work later, exhausted and bitter, and empty the contents of my bag. I'll see the leaves and smile and remember that randomness is itself a pattern worthy of believing in.

Is anything connected? Is everything? I have no idea.

"Our passionate preoccupation with the sky, the stars, and a God somewhere in outer space is a homing impulse. We are drawn back to where we came from."

- Eric Hoffer