Before our flight, we tripped out into NYC with Megan.  We planned to run around town before flying in hopes of tiring ourselves out.  We boated to see Lady Liberty on The Circle Line Tour and visited Top of the Rock, my favorite high perch, to view Manhattan.    

While boarding the boat, many employees asked us where we were visiting from.  After saying, “Well, she’s visiting from Virginia and we live here,” almost all expressed shock.  “Locals?  How novel!  We never get locals.”  Nobody seemed to care Megan lived in Virginia.  Once on board, the tour guide asked who lived in the city.  Only RBD and I raised our hands.  “Wow,“ he said, “We never get locals.  You know, New Yorkers, they think they know everything so we rarely see them taking an educational tour.”  The guide said he too was from New York, but I have doubts.  The first rule of being a New Yorker:  Never denigrate your fellow New Yorker around the tourists.  We must present a unified front of thinly veiled annoyance to all non-locals.  He should know that.  It helps with our mystique.

If it weren’t for guests, RBD and I would rarely do touristy activities.  We’re grateful when people visit us, because it gives us reason to visit old haunts and see the city we love from someone else’s perspective.  Still, being a tourist is hard work.

On the boat, the tour guide kept saying, “Remember there are people behind you.  Take your picture and get out of the way.  Sit down or move.”  This struck me as pretty basic advice.  However, it occurred to me for people who don’t live in densely populated areas, they don’t understand how much time we locals spend getting out of each other’s way.  A lot of people live here, and this whole thing works because we routinely give way to each other.  

I think this is what annoys locals about tourists.  They stand in the doorways of subway cars, lean again the entire pole,  or don’t move into the middle.  They stop on the sidewalk, gazing upward, obliviously blocking everyone behind them.  They don’t give up tables at restaurants during peak times.  Sienfeld gave voice to this entire phenomenon, with his usual exaggeration, in the soup nazi episode.  I never understood or found the show funny till after I moved here.  

Live and let live.  Give way.  Remember the person behind you.  We live by these edicts, and I suspect find it frustrating to deal with outsiders who don’t understand the rules.  Easier to walk a couple of blocks out of the way and avoid Times Square altogether.  I mean … if I never set foot on Liberty Island again I will still have lived a full life.   

Rockefeller Center, where Top of the Rock is located, is also home to NBC.  The Today Show started there in the 50s.  Now many shows originate there, like SNL, NBC Nightly News, Seth Meyers, Jimmy Fallon, much of MSNBC, and our local NBC affiliate.  

It was built during The Depression and took about ten years to complete.  Rockefeller wanted this place to be a city within a city — a cultural, artistic, and commercial hub.  Art adorns the entire complex, which is no accident.  The builders believed, “… art was an act of good citizenship.”  That famous picture of several men eating lunch on a steel beam high above New York without any safety equipment?  That’s Rock Center.  Most tourists know the Rockefeller Christmas Tree and skating rink, traditions started in the 1930s.  Today it’s a wonderful place to spend a day exploring and touring, particularly during the holidays. 

Exhausted, we headed to JFK and met up with mom.  As suspected our flight from NYC departed late.  We landed with 50 minutes to make our connection.  By the grace of God, passport control was deserted and we sailed through.  The second we got in line at B9 for the Catania flight, boarding began.     

I am annoyed how this unfolded, but very grateful everything worked out.  For the record, 45 minutes is not enough time no matter what Alitalia says.  

Sicily is just beautiful.  More tomorrow.