298. Your Sign to Get the Girls' Trip Out of the Group Chat

SPEAKER_00: It is time that we live out the dreams and the desires that God has placed in our hearts, even if we don't know what that is quite yet. But I got you. We're in this together. So grab your drink, meet me on the back porch, and let's do this. SPEAKER_01: Hey, hey, my friends. Welcome back to another episode of Start Scared. Um, I am coming to you post-trip to New York City. Um, I am probably gonna keep this super short because I came back with some crud and I sound ridiculous, and I'm afraid that I'm gonna cough all over you. And um also it's kind of painful to talk at times. Um, so yeah, you can tell that I've got you know congestion and I've got a tickle in my throat and I've got a real fun cough. But anyway, I wanted to tell you all about my trip to New York City. Like my mom is from New York, so I've been to New York many, many times. But the last time I had been to New York um was before I even met my husband. So I think it was like 2010. It was a long time ago. So my friend a couple months ago, Chelsea, she texted me and she goes, How would you feel about going to see Harry Styles at Madison's Fore Garden? And I was like, I honestly, you know, don't really care about Harry Styles, but I'll go anywhere in the world with you, you know, would love to travel. I don't care where we go. Um, I don't care what we do. I would love to just, you know, travel the world with you. So she's like, okay, awesome. And so we picked a date that worked best for us. And so we were gone Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday of last week. And um we took the earliest flight out. It was so freaking early, but we wanted to make sure that we managed that we managed to get as much time as possible because we were only going to be there like 50 hours. We wanted to make sure that we had as much time as possible to get everything that we wanted to get done, done. And of course we didn't, because that's just what it is. And um, but it's fun because we had things loosely planned. Most of the things we did, some of the things we didn't do. Some of the some things that we ended up doing were not originally on our plan, but it was so much fun. And I'm glad that we just decided to do it. So Tuesday we flew in and um we were we navigated the air train to the Long Island Railroad, and we felt like big girls. It was so much fun. Um, first thing I wanted to do after we checked into the um well, let me back up. I told Chelsea there were only three things that I wanted to do while we were in New York City. Like anything else she could she wanted to do, we could do. I wanted a bagel, I wanted a slice of pizza, and I wanted to see the 9-11 memorial because the last time I was there in 2010, the memorial wasn't completed yet. So um we didn't get a chance to see it. That was it. That's all I cared about. And so anything else, do it. So we checked into the hotel. First thing we did was we got a slice of pizza, and it was so freaking good. Um, I don't remember where we went, but it was just a pizza place. So the owner, you know, said pick one thing and do it well. And so they only did pizza, like no calzones, nothing, just pizza. And um, I just had a cheese slice and Chelsea had some kind of fig slice, which looked amazing, but I just wanted plain cheese. Um, and then we walked to the Highline, we got some coffee, um, because I think I slept like 30 minutes the entire time, um, or the entire night before, because I had to leave the house at 3:30 in the morning. And then Chelsea chatted my talked my ear off the entire time. Um, so I didn't I needed some coffee. And then, gosh, I wish I had my um what we did. We um just kind of wandered around and um then we checked out um, we ended up going to the um a Broadway show. And we went and saw Chicago. We navigated the subway system for the first time, and it was awesome. We went to dinner. Dinner wasn't that great, so I'm not gonna tell you where we went. Um, but we went and saw Chicago at the ambassador theater, and it was freaking phenomenal. It was so good. It was so funny. I've never seen Chicago before, and so I didn't know what to expect, and it was so freaking good. It was so awesome. And then we checked out Times Square. Um, I could not believe the amount of people in Times Square. It was like 10 o'clock at night. There were so many people, and then we were like, okay, I'm tired, we're ready to go. And so the next morning we hit up Golden Diner. Highly recommend if you're going to New York City. Um, Golden Diner is in Chinatown. Um, try to get reservations if you can, because there are only eight tables inside. And then um, I think there are like five or six tables outside. And then I ventured to guess that as the weather gets colder, those outside tables are gonna be gone. Um, but anyway, try to get a reservation. If you can't wait, put your name on the list and wait because it is so worth it. We waited an hour and 10 minutes. We got some matcha and a coffee um while we waited, but it was so worth it. We had um honey butter pancakes and the Chinatown breakfast sandwich, which had bacon, eggs, and hash browns in it with like on a really soft roll. Oh my gosh, so good. And then we had a mimosa weach out of mimosa, and um, I had a mimosa with passion fruit, which was really, really good. And then after that, we um walked to the 9-11 memorial, which was absolutely incredible. And one thing that I really loved about it is that there was some out not outdoor space, but there was um some space within the museum that was outside of rooms. And then there were a couple rooms that you would go into, and inside those rooms, you weren't allowed to take photographs, which I loved because you know, what a great way to honor um and and really sit in reverence of you know what had happened um rather than taking pictures. And so yes, I did take some pictures, but I took them um in the perimeter of the rooms um where there were, you know, uh phone calls and um, you know, lots of videos and um, you know, lots of memorabilia. And it was just it was so there were thousands of people in this museum and it was so quiet. It was it it was unreal. And it was just um you know, it I could viscerally feel and remember where I was that day. Um and I know like for the generation prior to us, like it's the same thing. Where were you in JFK shop was shot? Like our generation is where were you um during 9-11? Like I viscerally could remember sitting at my kitchen table with my mom, eating breakfast, and looking to my mom and saying, Why is Good Morning America live? Because we live on central time zone. And so we didn't 9-11 uh 9-11. Uh Good Morning America was never live for us. Um, it was always, you know, an hour behind. And um I remember looking at my mom, I'm like, why is Good Morning America live? And then all of a sudden we saw that second plane hit the second tower, and uh it was just we had no idea what was going on. And then I had a good school, and at school they wanted to pretend uh, you know, like it was business as usual, because of course we're live we live in Texas and we couldn't possibly be affected by it, right? But I think there was a lot of people affected by by it that they didn't realize, and that is a day that is going to um haunt us and live in our memories forever. And so just to be able to experience that memorial was just um it was it was beautiful, it was absolutely a beautiful um representation of humanity and the lives lost, but also the beauty that came after it. And um my favorite part of the memorial was well, there were a couple of parts, but if you remember, a lot of people talk about the beauty of the sky that day because it was a cloudless September day, beautiful blue sky. And so um they had 2,700 and however many people died that day, or 2900. I can't remember the exact number, but however many people died that day, they got that that number of people um who were there um who experienced you know who were in the city that day to watercolor paint what they remember, the color of the sky, and then they just created a whole mural um mosaic of um these watercolor paintings, and it was just absolutely stunning. SPEAKER_00: Hey friend, quick pause for just one second. If you've been listening today and you're thinking, yep, this is me, I am kind of lost. I love my kids, but I don't know who I am anymore. I want you to know you are not broken and you are not behind. That exact feeling is why I created rediscover you. It's a 30 day circle for moments to left the very go go go go go. Remember that you matter to. If you grab your own copy of Rediscover U on Amazon, it is in paperback or Kindle, just search Rediscover U journal. And if this podcast has encouraged you at all, this journal is the next perfect step. So here's your gentle med. Don't wait for life to slow down, start scared, start small, and start now. All right, girl, let's get back to the episode. SPEAKER_01: Um and then the outside with the water feature has every single person's name who perished, whether they were um in the field in Pennsylvania, whether they were in the Twin Towers, whether they were in the Pentagon. And every single day, I have goosebumps just thinking about it, every single day they put a white rose on the name of the person whose birthday is that day. So um the day that we were there was um Johnny Doctor Jr.'s birthday. And so I took a picture of his name. He died in the Pentagon. Um, took a picture of his name with his white rose, and it was just such a beautiful way to honor um these people who lost their lives um in such a horrific way. Um, but yeah, every single day is a white rose. Um, and I remember seeing um on September 11th, there were so many people's birthdays. Um, you know, because it was the 25th anniversary not too long ago, and there were so many white roses on this, you know, fountain display. And it was just such a uh such a uh uh beautiful and sad um place to be. Highly recommend going. Um and then we just kind of walked around. We um ended up taking a cab to um because we were going to see Harry Styles. Harry Styles um had a Together Together pop-up shop with merchandise and whatever. So we took a cab uh an Uber there and um yeah, the line was like three blocks long, and we're like, we'll take a picture of it and we'll move on. But what ended up being great is that we just walked around. So we walked around Greenwich Village and saw all of the amazing townhomes and all of the amazing townhomes that decorated for Halloween, and it was so cool. And we actually stumbled upon um the facade of the Friends uh building. It wasn't where they uh wasn't where that where they filmed Friends, but it was the outward facade of the actual building, and we were walking around and we saw these people on this corner and they were like taking pictures and um videos, and we're like, what is happening? And so Chelsea took a picture of the building that they were facing and um excuse me, um took a picture of what they were taking uh what they were taking pictures of and uploaded it into Chat GPT and they and chat told us that it was the friends building, which was really cool. And then that night we saw Harry Styles, and like I told you, I didn't really care so much about Harry Styles, but man, does he put on a good concert? And I actually knew more songs than I thought I did. It was so good. I felt like I was in a rave with the lights and the boom, boom, boom music, and it was fabulous, absolutely amazing. Um, and we saw him on the 28th, which was his 28th day of his 30th, 30-day residency. Um, and then Thursday was our last day there, and we went to the summit. The summit was the most amazing experience. If you go to New York, I 1000% go to the 9-11 Memorial, go to the summit um at one Vanderbilt, but go during sunset. That was the only thing that would have made going to the summit better was seeing it at sunset. Um it was phenomenal. So it's this big tall building. You get to access the 91st, 92nd, 93rd floor, which was is all glass windows. And so you get to see the entire city of New York. You get to see the Hudson River, you get to the Brooklyn Bridge, you get to see the George Washington Bridge, you get to see all the buildings, you get to see um uh Roosevelt Island. Like it was absolutely phenomenal. And then they also have like um interactive rooms with they have like these big um helium uh silver blow-up balloons that you got to like toss around and um this really cool like art installation that was just a mirror that then, you know, um reflected some of the buildings um that you could see through the windows. And I mean, it was just absolutely amazing. And then the 93rd floor was completely open, so glass, so that you, you know, obviously couldn't fall, but the roof was open, and um, they had some food and they had some cocktails up there, and so I had an espresso martini in the clouds, and it was just absolutely phenomenal. Like, highly recommend doing that. Um, and then we walked around um towards Central Park. We went to Bryant Park, they had just opened the winter markets. Um, we walked around the periphery of Central Park. Of course, I had to take a picture of the big huge Louis Vuitton luggage installation across the street from the Louis Vuitton store. We walked down um Fifth Avenue, and it was just the most incredible experience. Um, we already have a running list of New York 2.0 and what where we want to go and what we want to do that we didn't get a chance to do. Um, but if you have a chance to go with a girlfriend or a girlfriend or two, um, book the trip. You don't need a week, a long weekend is just fine. We did Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, our flight left um at 8 p.m. on Thursday. So we got almost all of um the day on Thursday to get to Sightsee and do whatever we wanted to do. And um just book the trip, get it out of the group chat because the time that you get to spend with your girlfriends and just having a good time and laughing and getting lost and just having a great time and getting ex to experience something new together. There's nothing like it. Um, you may come back with stuffy nose, but that's okay. It's totally worth it. You may come back sleep deprived, and that's okay. It's totally worth it. But book the trip, get it out of the group chat, just start stop saying, let's make a trip. Um, luckily for me, Chelsea is a planner, and I am the Venmo friend, and she told me where to be and when and how much I owed her, and it was fabulous. We worked really well together. We were great travel partners together. I did get us lost. Um, one day we took the wrong subway, and it's okay because we still had a good time. Um make sure you wear comfortable shoes, um, make sure you wear layers, but no matter what, go book the trip, go to New York City, go to Summit Vanderbilt, and go to the 9-11 Museum, and of course get a bagel at Leon's Bagels and definitely get a slice of pizza. Um, other than that, yeah, there are other things to do, but get lost in Greenwich Village and just look at all of the amazing architecture and townhomes. And I think I walked by one townhome the entire time we were there that had a garage. Like it just is a oh, and we walked by so many kids who were coming home from school walking downtown streets of New York City or on the subway system. I'm like, city kids are built different. Like, holy cow, I couldn't imagine my middle schooler just walking around downtown. But that's just what they do because that's what they're used to. Um but anyway, I just wanted to tell you all about my trip because it was absolutely fabulous, and encourage you to get the trip out of the group chat because it's worth it for sure. All right, girl, um, I will talk to you next week. Same time, same place, hopefully with a better voice. I love you, I'm reading for you, and remember you matter.