Stranded in NYC
Reflections on a much-needed snow day.
I started writing this post once I got seated on board my very delayed flight home to Atlanta from New York City, where I’ve spent the last few days guesting at Penance Tattoo in Bushwick. A blizzard hit the city the night before I was originally supposed to fly out. I was between clients when I first noticed the flurries became heavy snow, and midway through my final tattoo of the day when I seriously began to wonder how I was supposed to get home. The “home” in question here refers to the cozy apartment in Queens belonging to my friends Maegan and Dylan, who I crashed with during this trip. Their place is a humble 15 minute drive from the shop, but unfortunately for me every Uber in the area had decided to turn in for the night. A commute on the metro would have been roughly an hour since there’s no lines running directly between Brooklyn and Queens, but even the trains stopped running for the night due to snow on the tracks. As a last resort I walked to the nearest bus stop after loosely planning a route home, but quickly began to spiral when I noticed that even the buses that were running weren’t stopping.
I was freezing fucking cold and on the verge of a panic attack at this point. The only thing that distracted me from the reality that I might have to spend the night in a tattoo studio that’s quite literally designed to look like a meat locker was my friend Meg, who refused to hang up the phone on me until I was home. She and another one of our friends called me a Lyft from their end of the city where there were few miraculously still available. I was seated in the passenger seat of a warm car and on the way home within ten minutes.
The ride was treacherous, but my driver seemed seasoned in harsh winters (I tipped him very generously for both his efficiency and kindness). When I was finally dropped off, I ran to hug my friends—the aforementioned Maegan and Dylan as well as another friend Christian—who were already all snowed in together. They welcomed me with a warm dinner and a spot beside them where we could sit and debrief the day.
We were all curled up together when I started thinking out loud about how I could take a few more tattoo appointments now that my flight had been pushed back a few days. I figured it would be a nice opportunity to rake in a little extra cash. This idea was met with pushback from Maegan who insisted I take a day or two to rest. She reminded me that I hit the ground running immediately upon my arrival; I landed eager to enjoy the city and get a tattoo of my own later in the evening before going out with even more friends for the night. I was already reeling from the aftermath of a sickness I caught after a weekend snowboarding in the mountains just days prior. I only took two sick days to recover in preparation for this guest spot. There, I completed multiple back-to-back tattoos for several days (I’m otherwise accustomed to only doing one per day). On top of that I tried to spend as much time with my friends as I could. I had kept myself so busy that I couldn’t even think about feeling exhausted and this went on for weeks.
I’ve had this bad habit for a while now. I often find it hard to dignify my work with the reward of rest because I feel that creating is an obligation. I worry that idle hands are wasted potential, possibly too ambitious for my own good. My mental bandwidth was fried after two weeks of frequent traveling, illness, regular work and traveling guest work. Even so, it’s ironic how I used to dream of this kind of exhaustion, the kind derived from a fruitful career and a life well-lived.
My friends and I awoke the next day to snow piled halfway up the window, the blizzard was still going strong. It was the most snow I’d seen since my last winter in Boston where I grew up. I had forgotten how much New England winters could test you. We barely left the house at all and it seemed like the rest of the city had the same idea. My friends and I spent the snow day playing We’re Not Really Strangers, cooking together and watching trashy reality TV. It was a day of rotting, but definitely not a day wasted. I caught up with some much needed rest in the loving company of my long distance friends and even got some drawing done out of sheer pleasure.
The next day, I eventually found the energy to rally my friends for a trip into the city to enjoy the aftermath of the blizzard via a walk through Central Park and some shopping around Manhattan. I could have done what any driven and money-minded creative would have done and booked some impromptu appointments to make the most of my prolonged business trip. But instead I chose to treat myself to good food and a few trinkets with my own hard-earned money, and with great company at that.
As a creative and a freelancer, I frequently feel overworked between regular tattoo appointments, personal projects and all the administrative duties in between. I forget sometimes that rest—true, non-stimulating rest—is necessary to preserve my own creative drive as well as my sanity. The fact that such a hefty amount of rest is required to restore my wellbeing is the very evidence that my labor is worthwhile. My stress metastasizes in the hours spent drawing, maintaining a hospitable studio environment and tattooing, and eventually it must be purged. It took an entire blizzard to rediscover the joy of doing nothing. And thanks to nothing, I am better prepared to resume my endless pursuit of artistic projects.
It’s inspiring to get a snippet of an artist’s life like this. As someone beginning to start freelancing, thank you for sharing 😼🤍