NYC Life: Escape

… And on the oth­er end of the spec­trum, it is also SO GOOD to get the hell out of the city and head back home to the quiet of Mas­sachu­setts.

The in­cess­ant horns, jack­ham­mers, car alarms, and traffic still get to me after a while. It is nev­er quiet in New York City. That’s mostly ok, but when I get back in­to the woods, breath deep, and hear ab­so­lutely noth­ing for a few minutes, I re­lax in ways that I just can’t in NYC.

Get­ting out­side and away has al­ways been im­port­ant to me, and that’s nev­er been more clear than when I have the con­trast of the city to com­pare it to. So­ci­ety has learned in re­cent years that get­ting in­to the woods and closer to nature is healthy in many ways, and not every­one is for­tu­nate enough to have this op­tion… and if you grow up in the city, how do you even know where to start? Michele and I have al­ways donated to or­gan­iz­a­tions that help with the ma­jor dis­par­ity gaps in edu­ca­tion and op­por­tun­ity, and also to en­vir­on­ment­al causes. This year, I think I’m go­ing to help sup­port some of those pro­grams that help urb­an kids who want to get ac­cess to out­door ex­per­i­ences and ad­ven­tures. I’m lov­ing Man­hat­tan, but quiet mat­ters too. Every­one should have this op­tion.