the catcher in the rye

Crop top: Asos; Skirt: LN Family; Shoes: Steve Madden; Necklaces: Jennifer Zeuner; Bracelets: Vita Fede; Sunglasses: YSL

This past weekend, and pretty much every other weekend when I'm not traveling, I hop on the C train to Central Park to find a quiet spot to read. Granted, this has been my MO for most of my life. Simply put: I love to read outside. Just ask my parents. I would pace around our backyard with a book, making laps around the lawn, occasionally popping my head up if our dog, Bobo, happened to be following too closely next to me. 

There's something about the fresh air, the buzzing of people passing by waltzing in and out of your book's narrative and the off chance that someone sitting on the bench nearby has read that book as well and wants to know what you think about chapter 21 -- for me, it makes the story that much more tangible, almost to the point, when I think about certain books I've read, I also recall where I was when I was reading it. What the temperature was like? What was going on around me at the time? Was I lying on cool grass or lounging on a back porch swing?

This gets doubly interesting, (at least for me anyway), when I get to reread old favorites of mine that are set in New York, actually here in New York. Most recently, I've started thumbing through The Catcher in the Rye again, the last time being in high school, like most other folks. And in a way, it's a weird déjà vu feeling to be reading it in Central Park. On one hand, I feel that much more connected to the book's events given that I'm actually sitting next to the very pond that Holden refers to when he wonders about the ducks in the winter and where they go when the water freezes over. And on the other hand, I can still picture Ms. Sweeney's freshman English classroom at Galena High School, where I first read the book. 

I'm not sure if any of this makes sense (and it's fine if it doesn't), but it just struck me as both odd and kind of amazing that two parts of my life could come full circle like that. So I just wanted to share -- perhaps you associate time and place to certain books you've read as well?

Photos by Lydia Hudgens