quiet blooms

There’s a place I go when I need the world to slow down a little.

NYBG has been that place for me for years—before the brownstone and this beginning, I’d go there after endings to be alone. To walk through the grounds after a job that looked good on paper but left no room to breathe. To float through the rock garden after a breakup that rearranged not everything, but enough things. I would go just to walk, to sit, to be reminded that not everything blooms on schedule—but it still blooms.

It’s still the place I go to - usually when I need perspective. When I want to be surrounded by something alive that asks nothing of me.

During construction, I found myself there more often. When the house felt like a tangle of decisions and sawdust, the garden gave me symmetry. Something soft to rest my eyes on. There’s a spot near the rose garden where the light always catches just right in late afternoon. I’d bring a notebook sometimes. Or sit at the counter of the grill with a glass of wine. Other times I’d just bring myself. Just sit there. Just be.

Some people carry a narrow view of the Bronx. They imagine only grit and noise. But the Bronx I know holds more than that. There’s beauty here you have to slow down to see. Not the kind that shouts for attention—but the kind that stays with you. A neighbor sweeping her stoop before the sun is up. The hum of a block waking up on Saturday. An old oak in the middle of a community park. The garden has always felt like a reflection of that kind of beauty.

It’s not separate from the Bronx—it’s of it. And for me, it’s long been a kind of quiet constant. A place to lay things down. A place to remember how to begin again.

This is a kind of home too.