Reminder: Pay it Forward

Matty and I went into the city today to see the NY Philharmonic! It was a day of random meetings and glorious encounters.  Upon rushing into the train station since I thought I was going to barely catch the train, I hear someone call my name.  It turned out to be Ben making his way back to school via LIRR then Amtrack.  Then, only a few minutes later I ran into my once-neighbour, Howie.  It was really quite funny.  Ben and I took the train into Penn and I thoroughly enjoyed sitting and having a conversation.  I wish I could talk to Ben one-to-one a lot more than I normally do because I always love hearing what he's up to and what his ideas are.  He is one of the most creative, reflective, and intelligent people I know.

Then I met Matty in the city and we walked around until we found a deli, then went to the Phil.  The program was as follows: Tristan Murail's Gondwana, Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 11, Messiaen's Oiseaux exotiques, and Debussy's La Mer.  The program was awesome and it gave me a slightly better appreciation for more modern, atonal pieces, especially the Murail.  For Adam's sake I won't continue.  Needless to say, it was fantastic.  Immediately following the performance, Matty and I went to get our coats and ran into acquaintances of ours.  Matty knew some girl from All-State and I knew her boyfriend, Justin, from Usdan.  Small world, huh? After the concert, Matty and I went to Canal Street and strolled around.  We then went back uptown and had dinner at Sushi-A-Go-Go and had some really fantastic sushi and sashimi and just a great dinner spent with a great friend. :) Awwww...

We then went to Penn, where I got immediately on a train.  Only after getting on the train did I realise it was a "Peak" train, not and "Off-Peak" train - I knew I'd have to pay an extra $3 but I didn't have any cash on me and all I had was a little over $1.50 in change and I didn't want to leave the train to go to an ATM for fear that I wouldn't get back in time.  Luckily, when the train attendant came to check my ticket, I had an extremely nice lady sitting next to me who saw that I clearly wasn't lying about my circumstance and paid my $3 fine.  I am so glad that I didn't have the money because the lady who covered me and another woman sitting opposite us began having a whole conversation.  The lady I was talking to turned out to be a music therapist and is a director of Therapeutic Programs at some care centre, I think it was a nursing home.  She was telling me about Alzheimer's patients who seem to remember and recall songs from their youths, even if they can't remember other, more recent things.  

This whole conversation and serendipitous meeting still makes me so happy.  I'm so used to just ignoring strangers and strangers ignoring me.  To make such contact randomly with another person was such a breath of fresh air and the random act of kindness that she did for me really renewed my faith in humanity.  The additional fact that we started to peak (pun intended) into each others' lives as a result also made me have that warm-fuzzy feeling.  Life really is beautiful, and so are all of the people in this world, somewhere deep inside.  I hope to one day "pay it forward" as they say.

"What A Wonderful World" by Louis Armstrong