[Almost] Free Friday

It's worth the trek. Yesterday I made my first foray into the mysterious north, riding the 1 through the upper reaches of Manhattan, across the Broadway Bridge to the end of the line.

I stepped off the metro at Van Cortland Park, onto an open air platform lofted above a tree-lined street. It's just across the river, but this feels nothing like the city. Gone is the amber glow of fluorescent lighting on underground station tiles, and gone is the cloying humidity of humans commuting, breathing and thinking silently, crammed together en masse.

Just outside of the station, free shuttles run to Wave Hill at ten past the hour. This public garden is perfect for a quiet morning walk ($4 admission for students). It exudes a sense of reserved elegance, passed on in the quiet of a sparrow alighting on an elm branch, and in the fickle grace of soft summer rain.

Walking across the lawns, I poked about in all variety of hidden reading nooks (those great last bastions of introversion), tucked here and there in the shrubbery. It's a rare and wonderful feeling to discover that even for a moment, a garden like this might share its secrets with you.

If you head back across the river, The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), offers free admission on friday nights, starting at 4pm. The line is hellaciously long but moves quickly, and it's worth the wait. The exhibits are crowded, but the scene is friendly (populated mainly by starving student types). That's a $25 savings on admission, ($14 for students with ID), for which I'll gladly brave the crowds.

MoMA was great (and free!), but the highlight of this second Friday in August was a performance by Johanna Warren at The American Folk Art Museum. Admission here is always free (check out the Bill Traylor Exhibition on now), but on Fridays there is also live music and a wine bar (cash only, $5) from 5:30-7:30pm. Add one upstate songstress with a haunting voice and the weekend is effortlessly begun.