January 1, 2019

blind spot

Last week, there was an article in the paper about the 3,000 pounds of confetti 
a team of 50 volunteers would disperse from 20 floors up before the New Year's ball dropped.
I imagined it descending each story during that final countdown, passing by
the residents who'd stayed in because of the forecast, or simply because the view
was so much better from where they lived. I thought of strangers standing by
their living room windows as a cascade of cut paper drifted streetward, then pictured
the movement of a single square, the way it might wobble in the air as an updraft
from a subway grate caught it mid-flight. This morning, walking miles of city blocks,
I went looking for it, one tiny quadrant of color left in the concrete, a souvenir of festivity
to take home. Above me, miles of uninterrupted blue kept trying to flag me down.