yours, tiramisu

⭐ from boston with love

My long weekend trip to Boston was, by all measures, lovely. I called it a 'solo trip' but in the end I only spent one of the four days in the city alone; in the others three local friends kept me company.

yours, tiramisú

While the day I spent alone was the least memorable of the four I was in Boston, it was liberating to explore alone at my own pace. I meandered through the streets of Boston, crossing streets without rhyme or reason, doubling back, perusing stores on whims, and walking in circles. It's been a while since I've been able to wander around without a plan on vacation, since when you're traveling with others they understandably want to know where they're going. When I'm not responsible for the plans of others, I don't need to feel bad when an anticipated destination disappoints, or my poor decision making wastes precious time. I only have myself to answer for, and since I didn't make many plans, I had low expectations.

yours, tiramisú

When I'm out by myself I try not to listen to music, because safety reasons aside I cherish the time I spend alone with my own thoughts. It's hard to get lost in your own thoughts when you have company, since you're frequently interrupted by their remarks. It can be a blessing to distract yourself from your internal monologue at times, but when I go too long without listening to it I get out of touch with how I feel inside.

Boston was smaller than I expected. It's hard to get a sense for the scale of a city until you walk through it. I was surprised that I could walk to pretty much all the places I wanted to see in roughly a day, including Chinatown, North End, Harvard, MIT, Beacon Hill, Newbury Street, and Boston Common. Granted, it would be a long and tiring day (and I had many of those!), but attempting to do the same in NYC seems impossible. Could you imagine trying to see Central Park, Chinatown, Brooklyn, and Queens on foot, all in one day?

Perhaps it's fortunate that Boston is so compact, because the subway system there (called the "T") proved underwhelming. The trains move mind-numbingly slowly, and I rarely found Google Maps' public transit estimates much faster than walking. I only took it once, to go to South Station from Cambridge, and I found myself sorely missing the ruthless efficiency of the MTA as we crawled through stops. After walking more than thirty miles in three days, I spent the last day shopping online for more comfortable walking shoes.

My friends in the city were lovely hosts. They proved to be kind, considerate, and perhaps most importantly, incredibly generous with their time. They took me to do things I would surely have missed on my own, like race office chairs down steep basement declines, play spontaneous pickleball on a rooftop garden, and watch the sunset from the top floor of a classroom building. Some of them (whom I met in summer camp way back in high school) I hadn't seen in four, five years, but our conversations picked up right where they left off. It's a wonderful thing, to feel like you haven't missed a beat with someone even after half a decade apart.

Racing office chairs at dangerously high speeds was certainly exhilarating, but my favorite memory from the trip has to be when we stumbled across a public piano on MIT campus. My two companions with me for that day are talented musicians, and we took turns playing the piano and singing pop songs. Before long, a small crowd gathered, and our singing voices echoed through the empty tiled halls. As I finished a song a boy who had been listening and singing along by the piano got my attention and said, "You're killing it!" with a beaming smile. I could have burst into tears on the spot, big bittersweet tears of heartbreak, longing, nostalgia, and gratitude. I don't know if he knew how much that compliment meant to me, but I know I won't ever forget it.

Pleasant melodies and harmonies might have been what originally got me into music, but it's dawned on me that what keeps me coming back to the keyboard is the space it creates for me to share lovely memories with strangers and friends alike. I keep thinking of what Visa claims is the best guiding question in life: Who do you want to share this life with? It's a question I've always struggled with, between my pickiness and the vicissitudes of fate, but I do know I want to spend more time with friends like these.

Thank you for reading all this! Now if you'll excuse me, I have some demons to run from.

yours, tiramisú

Highlights

yours, tiramisú

yours, tiramisú

yours, tiramisú

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