Another city weekend

Creepy and hypnotic jellyfish at the aquarium - I could have stayed there for hours, watching the oddly meditative motion, but was saved by Dear Alex and Beautiful Wife.















Dear Alex shares her fries with Beautiful Wife. Nathan's is an original.














The picture you're supposed to take - in front of the "Wonder Wheel"













Another round on the carousel - 5 times, and she didn't want to quit.



I didn't want to stay in the city this weekend - it really seemed like one of those weekends that would be good to get away from the constant press of the city and it's demanding rhythms, but it didn't work out that way - again I was stymied by my own inertia, and Beautiful Wife's exhaustion at the week that was. To her credit, BW came up with a plan B that worked spectacularly well to change the mood and make the low energy and low grey skies bearable. We got in the car and had a mission to go to the aquarium in Coney Island. It started out to be one of those "educational" trips that you do with your kid, and ended up being a really satisfying day of fun and play and learning off-the-books, so to speak. We got to the aquarium and into the parking lot and turned the car to face the famous "cyclone" a wooden rollercoaster that is still running. Dear Alex caught that and the "wonder wheel" a huge and seriously antique ferris wheel - and definitely wanted to know more about those things than any of the mysteries of the deep involved in the aquarium. We worked out an effective compromise, and basically ran through the aquarium, stopping to see some yellow fish, a surprisingly large and docile sea-lion and her progeny, and a tank of sharks and turtles. Dear Alex was not all that impressed, though I was and could have spent a lot more time there just watching the fish swim roundy-round. It is a nicely put-together place and well worth exploring - we will go back. I did have a moment to get lost in an exhibit about jellyfish - It was oddly mesmerizing, watching these simply hateful creatures swimming peacefully and majestically in tanks with all-blue lighted backgrounds in a completely dark room. Creepy and fascinating, and Dear Alex and BW had to drag me out...
We had lunch at Nathan's Famous, and spent the rest of the afternoon walking around and looking at things and riding a carousel, around and around and around.
It ended up being a long day for us, but we had a lot of fun, and it was a delight to try to see this storied place through her eyes. Dear Alex had a great day, and she's becoming a sweet and complicated little person - but for now she lives and takes great pleasure in the "now", and that's a terriffic reminder to let go of what you think you want and enjoy where you are.