Pain for pain, life for life, we are all connected.

I miss my Mom. Every time I come into Manhattan I miss my Mom. The energy of the city is my Mom. Direct, sarcastic, brutally honest yet warm. No fucks given. Her old stomping grounds. Mom died here but every time I come back to Manhattan she’s alive again. I find her in everything.

I go on the bus and I see a man who looks like Mom when she was sick with cancer. He shares her eyes, he carries her wisdom, he looks like her. He knows things just like she did. I feel safe around him.

We make eye contact at least three times. He knows and I know. There’s this unspoken knowing. We both have been through something and we can feel each other’s pain. Immediately, I want to hug him and tell him everything’s going to be okay. I start crying. I see Mom in him. I see her cancer in him. I can smell the hospital latex gloves again.

He is from a different race, culture and generation but we understand each other in these five minutes to a degree I can’t explain and it makes my heart feel full. The man takes his cane and pulls the bus trigger to get off at 145th street. He looks at me one last time before leaving, confirming what I had felt, almost to say goodbye but despite this goodbye the connection remains and follows me all the way to my destination.

We are all connected whether we like it or not. I think we forget that. Especially now. And we need to remember that, especially now. We all feel the same pain, the same grief, the same joy. When we deny that connection, we have nothing.

This is why I love New York City. Dirty, aggressive, wonderful, intense New York City. It carries that energy. It gives us that same reminder. The same one Mom did. We are connected. We don’t know each other, we may even yell at each other but I will still give you directions on the subway. My pain is your pain. I may want to kill you but I am here for you.