Today was great until the end of it, but I will leave you in suspense and recount the rest of it first. I woke up earlier than I have at any point on the trip, packed my bags, helped clean out the fridge/clean the kitchen/strip the beds, and said my goodbyes on the deck overlooking the pond before all of us vacated the house and headed back to NYC. It was bittersweet to say goodbye; I wasn't ready to be done with the retreat, but I am ready to get back into some semblance of a routine...but I won't get a routine for another few days since I'm still in Manhattan for work.
But I was able to prolong the writing magic for a bit - I took Grace to JFK on the way back to Manhattan, and since her flight was late evening and I didn't have to return the rental until sixish, we stopped at one of the nicest Starbucks ever (way to go, Bridgehampton!) and wrote for a couple of hours. I wrote a really critical scene, which was slow going since I agonized over every word, but I ended up really happy with it. Then I dropped Grace off (with some good industry talk in the car on the way to the airport), made my slow way into midtown Manhattan (not as scary as I had expected, just frustratingly slow), dropped off the rental car, and took a taxi to my hotel.
Once here, I was absolutely starving since I hadn't really eaten lunch, so I had supper (I can call it that if you eat at 5:30pm in NYC when everyone usually eats at 8 or 9) at the Mexican-ish restaurant in the hotel next door to mine. Then, I made the mistake of going to Anthropologie across the street - not that I have any room to pack anything else, but I hadn't been to Anthro in awhile and my addiction needed feeding. However, while I was browsing, I brushed against a shelf while reaching for something over my head, and the shelf fell off its precarious perch and smashed my toe. I told the initial person who came over that I was fine, since I was embarrassed and thought I would shake it off, but as I was trying stuff on I realized I really wasn't fine and in fact felt a little nauseated by the pain. You know it's bad when I didn't try on everything that I took into the room because I'd lost interest in shopping. At that point I asked the dressing room attendant to get a manager, but the manager did nothing other than tell me in an overly saccharine way that that sucked and that sometimes that shelf falls, which didn't really make me feel better and in fact just pissed me off.
But I wanted the fancy pajama pants that I'd tried on so I'd have something to lounge in, so I stood in line, realizing as I stood there that I had no desire to put weight on my toe. Luckily, my hotel was a block away, so I got back here, got some ice from the v. nice manager at the front desk (he said that he didn't know of any urgent cares that were open, but he suggested drinking the contents of the minibar - then retracted it when he realized I'd probably just stub my other toe), popped some Advil, and propped it up and iced it for the last two hours. I still have polish on the toenail so I can't see the extent of the damage, but the nail between my cuticle and the polish (it's grown out over the past few weeks) is nearly black. So I'm guessing I shouldn't have high hopes for keeping the toenail, which is rather grim and offputting.
So, screw you, Anthropologie (even if my pajama bottoms have been v. comfortable tonight). And now I need to sleep - I have to get up super early and get cracking on the day job if I have any hope of getting ahead of my to-do list. Goodbye, writing life :( At least the next couple of days will be fun in the off-hours. Goodnight!
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