A Year In New York

As I walked through Central Park past the Conservatory Water, I passed a pair of girls who looked about twelve smoking cigarettes on a rock. One of them gave me a defiant glare that was just a bit wobbly and unpracticed. It seemed to say, “This is my life, and I will smoke this cigarette and there’s nothing you can do about it, unless you happen to know my parents.”

Directly across the path facing the girls was a threesome of very old nuns. They sat close together on a park bench in their brown habits, leaning toward each other conspiratorially.

Now that’s some gumption, I thought, being in eighth grade and lighting up a death stick right in front of some nuns.

The nuns, however, seemed untroubled by the moral lapses of two pubescent girls in Lucky tank tops. The eighty-year-olds whispered to each other and giggled. Maybe they were ignoring the girls. Or maybe they were laughing at them.

I’ve always admired rebellious teenagers, but for the moment I wondered if it might be more fun to be an old nun.