The Day I Hated New York

Its 9 am on a Sunday.

Let me set the scene for you. Two friends of mine are staying at the Waldorf. I go visit them on Saturday night, and we end up drinking wine. A fair deal of wine. Its late. I don't feel like catching a cab home, much less taking the six train up four stops, so I decide I'm going to spend the night with them.

The next morning is Sunday. Yes, THE Sunday in question. Now I hate Sundays anyways, with their promise of the Monday to follow, but I knew this one was going to be a real mess from the second I woke up. I wake up with slight hangover symptoms to the Waldorf wake-up call, which happens to be across the room from me and has rang at least 67 times. There is nothing, I repeat, nothing, like waking up to a hotel wake-up call. I mean, do they purposely choose the most loud and obnoxious ring, or is it law-required?

I get up and put my clothes from the night before back on, something I positively despise, which has certainly kept any slutty instinct I may have had at bay thus far in life. My contacts are all but stuck to my eyeballs and my hair is best described as a tangle of bleach.

"Hey," Justin yells from the bedroom. "Do you want to take all those bottles of wine with you? Cause we can't take them on the plane."

So while it is confirmed that we drank copious amounts of wine the night before, apparently we did not drink enough. I grab a paper bag that's laying on the floor, throw in the four bottles of wine plus a bottle of water from the mini-bar (they're staying at the Waldorf for heaven sake), give Justin and Christy hugs and kisses and wishings of a safe flight, and head out the door.

First of all, I kind of get lost leaving the Waldorf. I'm sorry, if you've never been I'm sure you're laughing, but this hotel is like, BIG. And we're in some private elevator entrance that leads to Lord knows where. Luckily this gives me time to kill 1/3 of my hangover by downing 5/6 of my 7 3/4 dollar bottle of water.

I arrive at the subway and, of course, it takes its merry time coming to pick me and my fellow uptown commuters up. And its full. Really, really full. I stand trying to balance myself, my huge purse, my bag of four full bottles of wine and 1/6 bottle of water, between a 12-year-old who has apparently already taken up smoking and an old woman of sorts. Side note: If you are a man and you do not offer your seat to the old woman, you have serious things coming to you dude.

So the subway gets stuck. I kid you not. It sits motionless and quiet on the track for at least five full minutes. Now I am aware that five minutes does not sound like a long time, but imagine sitting stuffed in a hot subway car with nowhere to move, carrying at least 25 pounds worth of materials and inhaling fresh cigarette stench. I can't decide which is going to happen to me first, a shoulder break or death by inhalation. My contacts are dry. My feet hurt from the heels I was in last night, and subsequently, am in this morning. There's a possibility I'm coming down with some sort of rare but deadly throat disease.

I finally make it past 68th street, Hunter College, and up to 77th. I anxiously push my way out of the subway and begin walking rapidly towards daylight before I have some sort of panic attack.

And that's when it happens.

Remember that 1/6 bottle of water I had left? That I so carelessly threw in the paper bag, filled with four bottles of wine?

It leaked.

It leaked on the paper bag.

Do you know what happens when paper bags get wet?

They break.

They break, and three out of four bottles of wine break with it. Right in the middle of the subway station. All over my silver dress from the night before, and my patent heels, and the floor, and some splashes on a a child, and there are four bottles worth of sharp glass strewn about, and I'm in the middle of it, and its all red wine so its not like it camouflages, and my bag is broken and I almost drop my purse and tears well up in my eyes and I think Oh My God I'm going to start crying in the subway and I stand there stunned because I have no idea what to do.

Deep breath.

I decide there is nothing I can do about the broken bottles. I don't generally carry a broom and mop with me on my journeys, so I look to the subway counter to signal someone that I need help and of course no one is present. I chalk one up to bad timing, decide my mental health is more important than waiting around for help, pick up my unbroken bottle, stick it in my purse, and take a step forward.

"Oh my God, are you okay?"

I whip around and find a young man gazing concernedly at me. Now then. I knew not everyone in New York was selfish.

"Yeah," I say with a feeble attempt at a laugh. "I don't think there's anything else I can do."

"Hmm. Well I'm glad you're alright." He says.

"Thanks. Have a nice day."

At this point I expect the young man to wander off into city oblivion, never to be seen or heard from by me again. But apparently he has other plans.

"Do you think this may have been a blessing?" He asks, as he follows me outside and east. "Do you think that maybe you're an alcoholic and this was your wake-up call?"

"Um, NO I definitely do not think that." Dirty look. Keep walking.

"Maybe you're pregnant and this was a higher power warning you."

"Um, NO definitely not that either." Scathing look. Keep walking.

"Don't you think you should consider, even for one second, that this is all a little part in God's master plan of telling you not to drink?"

"NOPE."

"Why's that?"

I spin around and reach into my purse.

"Cause he left me with one bottle."