Blog Post #1-Daniel Iqbal

Hi all, this is a short story I have come up with after walking through the park during class this week. I could not attach any pictures due to space allocation problems with the length of text.

Late For Class

Letting out a sigh upon gazing at the digits on the device that failed to wake me up at the appropriate time, I realized today would be a “running day”. This was the third time I was late this semester and my professor had already scolded me for a moment after class last week. I could not afford to twist a squeaky door handle to a room filled with students who were on time, responsibly listening to the lecture.

I rolled myself out of bed, quickly putting together an outfit, while brushing my teeth, making breakfast, and sighing again when I realize I didn’t even charge my laptop the night before. Regardless, being late was not an option. In exactly 23 minutes since I had woken up, I had already hugged my grandmother before leaving and somehow made it on the Grand Central train on the LIRR.

A quick moment of rest on the express train ended abruptly upon entering the Penn Station Tunnel, cutting my music off, alerting me that it was time to make a peaceful 20-minute walk, into a 10-minute run. I run to Broadway, speeding past the people on the street, prematurely crossing each street before the stoplight can get a chance to turn red.

Reaching W 26^th Street, passing the chain-smoking finance employees of UBS Bank, the secondhand smoke and the entrance of Madison Square Park alert me that I’m halfway there. Already sweating profusely, I run past the corner of the East 23^rd Street subway entrance, crowded with people coming out the last train. As I rush past the individuals clearly not in a rush, I become more frustrated within this crunch of time.

It is 2:17 and whether I make this next stop light will dictate whether I’m shut out of this classroom. I sprint to the corner of the street before the entrance of Madison square park, and I’m met with a blaring red hand that stops me in my tracks. Out of breath I look around me for comfort, and to my surprise, I see my professor, of my 2:30 lecture, dying of uncontrollable laughter after recognizing my situation. As the light turns red, and we walk across, I mirror her casual stroll through Madison Square Park staying silent and quite embarrassed. My professor finally says to me, “Look at us, right on time as usual. You see, timing is a construct, and the world often encourages us to rush.  But sometimes through coincidences like this, it reminds us that there is a reason and a rhythm for everything.” I stare at her in complete disbelief as she walks through the park completely unfazed about being late. We take time to admire the woven art appearing as decoration along the lights, and the historical figures that I usually walk right past on my usual schedule. As we walked together through the park, the conceptual lines of Professor and student seemed to become blurred. We had become characters in a story written by the city around us, outside of the grip of the construct of time. Our moments through our walk were not measured by the ticking hands of a clock, but instead the congenial nature of our words.

As I end my tour with my professor, she had explained the historical context of the eternal light flagstaff, and the statue of Admiral Glasgow. Much of which I would have never learned if I was doing my usual sprint through this park. But as we walked side by side towards the doors of Baruch, her last but most impactful words to me were, “You may not remember what I will be saying for the next hour in lecture, but the real lesson today is to remember the art of being present.”