There is music everywhere…

This is New York. This is the place where the best is the last, where there is too much, where the good is the bad. It is all relative. And that is why the city is magical. New York is a muse, the best place to find inspiration in every corner if you are sensible enough to see beyond the first layer. You are in a restaurant, full of people, everybody laughing, apparently having a good time. Big table with co-workers must likely from out of town, yet nobody is there – John Doe is texting, Jane Doe is so into her blackberry must likely facebooking and the others, no less than fifteen, are either taking pictures or pretending to care. What is the matter with you people? When all you want is a free meal and a souvenir. I don’t get it. It is a waste, not only of money, but of time and life. Even in your worst moments, even if you are not with your friends, you must find the small tiny piece that makes it work, only because you are there!

If you pay attention, if you really care, even in a room full of people, non-related people, there is magic, there is art, there is music inside. In this case the room has a live jazz band that almost nobody is willing to care. But if you dare, just slow down and listen: after a few moments, along with the nice rhythm and a good sax there are voices, indistinct noises that mean less then nothing if you try to understand. But along the notes, they sound like an instrument: bi di bum bam bam… bu di di bam bam… if you follow along, you can tell, that the magic of an indistinct crowd is their natural way of singing along. Who cares what they are saying or what their individual cry is about. All along, as a unity, is the nice voice of humanity, pacing with the notes as if they knew the tune, making a high note as beautifully as if they all practiced for months; creating the crescendo of the night as if they had a cue from a non-existent director marking the pace of the evening’s orchestra just in time to slow down and fade the moment to a finale framed by desserts and after dinner drinks that were part of the individual program we all followed along to have the perfect symphony, only audible to the ones willing to listen. For the rest, is just annoying restaurant noise. It is all relative, but I choose to enjoy.

To be or not to be is not the question, but what am I now and when am I going to be?

New York is a city of contrasts. Some are eating a nice serving of caviar with the nicest fixings and the best white wine while the servers are carrying one day worth of wages on their trays. But without the ones who are willing to pay for that, the others will not get the good tip that the service will deserve. It is indeed a contrast, but a necessary evil.

Who ever is capable of enjoying the good life is also capable of providing a better life to others. That is the spirit. That should be the purpose. That should be the silent meaning of a so called vanity of life.

The key is in the enjoyment – if you don’t enjoy what you are doing, whether is serving, eating, drinking or doing, you are not getting the point. Poor is the one who pretend. Pretending to be inferior because you can’t afford does not make you good. Pretending you like it because is expensive does not make you better. You must be real. You must find the beauty and the meaning in the moment you are living; once you served, regardless of your field or duty, therefore you’ll be served. It is the balance in life. Otherwise is poor and simple vanity and playing martyr and fool.

Who is rich? Who deserves? Who must wait? Rich is not the one who has… rich is the one who feels comfortable and full in whatever they do. Life is too short; it must be lived in first class. But everybody’s first class is different. If you pretend and try to live what is not within your reach, then you won’t enjoy. If you expend without thinking in your primal needs then you will fail. You must find the middle point – the point that makes you feel YOU. The point that feels natural, the point that makes you feel good. Otherwise you are faking it. Whether you are doing what you should not or if you are saving it for a better day, you both are not getting the point. Life is too short to waste it in laters. Life is too short to be doomed to “why not me”. Is time to be real, to earn what you want to be. To work for what you want to become. Once you live what you are ready to experience, the rest is natural, it falls into place, nothing to prove, nothing to explain. There is no better way to feel yourself then the moment when you realize you are what you are, always enhance able but never inferior. Make the best of your moment and learn the path. You don’t want to owe it to somebody, owe it to yourself. Be true to your own. Be loyal to your principles and always aim high – when the moment is right, there is no better time to enjoy the good times.