New York & Brooklyn Baby!

NYC and Brooklyn Baby!

Every year when Matt makes his trek to Kenya, I like to have something fun planned so that the time passes more quickly. This year was one of the best! I reunited with some of my Edinburgh friends in NYC! Ruth came over from the UK and joined Nikki for a road trip of the south and up to Chicago. Nikki and Ruth then flew to NYC and I met up with them at Sam and Kristin's apartment in Brooklyn. We had such a blast! The first day Ruth, Nikki and I headed into Manhattan to meet a dear friend of mine and Matt's, Sabina. We had delicious NYC pizza with her and then spent a lazy day in Central Park. Nikki was also in NYC to meet with editors and agent for her book (Tempest Rising by Nicole Peeler due out in November--pre-order your copy on Amazon), so we had cocktails with a book reviewer who interviewed Nikki and put it on his blog (so cool for her!).

Sam and Kristin are great, great hosts and welcomed us with a cocktail party at their place that night. We met Kristin's Norwegian friends who happen to be Norwegian pop singers! They were super beautiful, nice and fun to be with! My friend Sabina joined us too! One shot of this evening shows how a bunch of us ladies who were somewhere between 5'2" and 5'5"--hooray for shrimpy women!

We spent most of our time in Brooklyn in Sam and Kristin's neighborhood just hanging out and catching up. While the entire trip was such a great time, one of the most memorable parts was walking in NYC's Gay Pride parade 40 years after the Stonewall riots that started it all. We walked on behalf of the Empire State Pride Agenda (because Kristin volunteers there) and the craziest part was the we carried this HUGE gay pride flag some 50 or 60 NYC blocks (almost 3 miles)! We needed around 30 people to carry because it was so big! And it was a hot and steamy day! The 5 of us had one corner of the flag and danced our way down the streets while being sure to stop and make the flag flutter, wave, shimmy all the way. Our right hands will never forgive us, they were so tired! We held signs that said 'Another Straight New Yorker for Marriage Equality' and we actually had loads of people thank us! And I explained to one spectator that you don't have to be gay to be in the parade, just supportive:) At the end, when we packed up the flag, it felt like we ran a marathon. We were exhausted and moved by the event. We celebrated our effort and our last night together with pints at a pub near NYU.

I simply cannot wait until the next reunion and for the crazy and wonderful memories that come with it!