Subway Observations #5

5:46pm, Flushing-bound
Asian male, mid-teens, looking like a page out of my sophomore yearbook. American Eagle polo, khaki cargo shorts, white tennies, gelled spikes with fade. Slip of printer paper neatly sized to fit in the spine of his binder reading SAT in Arial bold. Also, his name is Peter Park.

10:09pm
Always someone reading.

3:44pm
Two feeble women lug in two folding wire carts and prove they've got plenty of strength in them.

8:51pm
White male, mid 30's. Aaliyah tattoo on forearm.

3:56pm
Father, 30's, and son, somewhere in the single digits. Son anxiously giggles with excitement. Father swats at his hands feigning to be too slow, sneaking in brushes to his cheek.

9:50pm
Three women: two French, one American, all early 30's. American woman attempting to be conversation in French. Pretty much just a lot of hand motions and abuse of the word "avec."

9:04am
That clang clang clang is so much louder in the morning.

9:55pm
Two women, early 40's; one sitting, one standing. Seat opens up next to the one sitting, she insists the other sit down, the other woman defiant. The first woman huffs and turns away. Moments later they resume conversation as normal. I assume they're siblings.

11:16am
Girl, 6, on the phone, staring out the window. She shouts "mom I'm looking at the WORLD!"

2:10pm
Man, late 40's, with Meatloaf tour shirt ftw.

12:49am
Seeing how the people sleeping hold their backpacks feels like seeing how they hold their pillows at night. It can get very endearing.

11:45pm
I'm sitting down, cross-legged, one arm clasping the opposite elbow. I look to my left and see a skinny Chinese man, late 50's, with hair parted to the side, sitting exactly like me.

Year Won.

They say it takes a year to settle in the city. By the time I moved into my first apartment in November, I could tell you all the different subway lines in Manhattan, distinguishing between express and local; I could tell you bobbing and weaving methods for effective tourist swimming, and I could tell you that the chicken and rice cart on 53rd & 6th was owned by the same people who ran the one across the street, the one without the half-hour wait. Albeit still a few years away from gaining "local" status, I figured I was ahead of schedule.

Professionally speaking too. Thanks to Jee's help I came to New York with something most actors I know are still scrounging to get--representation. Within half a year, I had gotten callbacks for a national commercial, an off-Broadway play, and a major motion picture. Overall, I had enough solid auditions to blot out a couple disasters.

In the last few months, however, things started to slip. I wasn't getting the same response. I was starting to get more timid. I wasn't working as hard. Except reverse the order. I recently took part in an acting seminar that sobered me to how much more I need to be doing for my career. It's said that 97% of the people who start acting careers leave them within 3 years--and that's just counting union actors. One of my least favorite responses to my vocation of choice is "you're an actor? oh that sounds like so much fun, I wish I could just do that." You don't become an actor out of curiosity or because you love performing, you might audition for the school play for those reasons but you don't become a professional actor for those reasons. It has to be more than pursuing a passion, it's learning how to be your own business and coming to terms with the fact that the product you're selling is you. Nobody just does that.

It's September now, and last Wednesday marked my 1-year anniversary with the city. She's a high-maintenance gal. I'm realizing that whomever "they" are, they're right, I feel like I've finally settled in. I suppose sometimes it isn't until you've gone through a couple highs and lows that you get levelheadedness. That isn't to say this past year hasn't been an exceptionally fruitful and wise decision. There are many sins and weights that still cling closely to me, but I gladly confess that this the most disciplined I've ever been. Some habits true of today that were not true a year ago:

- I set time aside in the morning to stretch, spend time in His word and prayer, sometimes even eat breakfast. œ
- I've a voracious appetite for literature, plays, theology and learning in general.
- I keep up with correspondence (if you shoot me an update, I'll happily reciprocate).
- I check messages and delete old mail.
- I plan out my days.

And a lot more things that I'm a lot more of or do a lot more often. Of course there are always the New York merit badges, like surviving winter, expanded pallet, and the aforementioned city skills, but I don't mean to go on (notice the lack of boast regarding that vow to blog weekly). I've come a good long way, but there are still miles to go before I sleep. This year is starting with a renewed vigor, a restructuring, and a touching up. The endeavor continues as I push toward the things that inspire this journey most: a desire to support a family, and a calling to be a man of God. Now let's git it.