Dear Boathouse Volunteer.

Unfortunately we have to cancel the safety session we had planned for 9/30 due to poor water quality. The heavy rains have made the river unsuitable for wet exits.

Well.... that's just gross. :

I was talking to people about the Hudson River yesterday--we did a Hoboken kayaking program with Sandy. Someone said that the river flushes itself out twice a day with the tides. I wish my life would do that sometime. When you work at the same job for a while, things start to build up--little things that you just can't seem to get off your plate. You have little scraps of paper scattered around your office to remind you of all the things you were going to do, but have yet to get to. It just doesn't stop, you know--especially in private equity, because everything is so long tailed. GPs raise money for months and months... unless you give them a quick no, they hang around the hoop forever. I think that's what I liked about school... the fact that things come to an end at regular intervals. Semesters end, years end. Every three or four months, your life came to a close and then you had a little bit of a new beginning. You'd get new people in your classes, and the new classes would take you new paths around campus, at different times. Your work from last semester was done--there was nothing more you could do. It had a natural end.

There's so much on my plate right now. I wish the semester would end so I could have a fresh start. Perhaps our move to CT will do the trick.

ifoundsomeofyourlife.blogspot.com

The concept: Guy finds a memory card full of pics... doesn't know who it belongs to. So he gets a window into a year of someone else's life, well, sort of. He doesn' t know anything about who these people are, so instead, he invents the stories, and posts the pics one day at a time on a blog.

Moral? Maybe not... theft? Perhaps. Hysterical? Absolutely.

If you even have the slightest notion that someone might be down at Boathouse, you'll probably be right. So the Fordham Young Alumni whitewater trip got washed away (after we drove halfway to Jim Thorpe, PA), and I wound up in my apartment as the sun started to poke out. It was around 12:30 and I thought, "I wonder if anyone is opening up now that the sun is out." So, I hop in the car and decide to take a look. No surprise at all... Taino, XL, and Zia are preparing for a trip on their own, and Victor is hanging around as well. I asked Taino if he had another spot and he looks at me, points to the river and goes, "We have the whole river.. there are thousands of spots, but if your boat isn't ready in about 3 minutes, we're leaving you here." So I rush to grab a kayak, life jacket, skirt, pump and paddle float... and a paddle of course, and in no time, we're on the water paddling north. The sun didn't stay out too long though, and there was a pretty brisk wind coming off the shore. The water was incredibly choppy, and I had one of the longer kayaks, which would ride up a wave and then flop back down the other side with a big splash as it came down off the peak. It was a blast, and we paddled up to 66A, right by Chelsea Piers. We got out and sat around on the pier for a big, but when the skies got even darker, I suggested we get back on the water--plus I was getting cold, because my swim shorts were wet. It was a lot warmer in the water, actually. It took us no time at all to go back, and in fact, the toughest thing about going back was trying to keep the waves from pushing you sideways. Every now and then, you'd fishtail b/c the wave was pushing you faster than you could paddle. So, while we didn't get to go whitewater rafting this morning, I got to go splashing around in the Hudson in a kayak.

There are few places in the world left uncharted, but there are many lives yet to be discovered. You can't really go to a place that hasn't yet been walked upon by many, but you can be lucky enough to have someone open up to you in a way they have not done with others. These are the times in my life I feel I have discovered real beauty in this world. There are no souveniers to be bought to remind you of these moments, and no digital pictures to be taken. I can only hope to visit these places within the hearts and minds of others again, to bask in the warm glow of their inner light. There are 8 million people in this city, and if you can get to know a handful of them really well--well enough to know their hopes, dreams, and fears, you should consider yourself very lucky. We too often fail to make other people secure enough to confide in us, and other times, we fail to confide in others enough to let them into our world.

Get out there and visit someone's life today, or you'll just wind up "sitting around in Terra Nova."