Which Way is South

The birds seem confused this year. I think they’re supposed to be flying south. At least that’s what I was always told growing up. But these birds fly in a v-shape, down Avenue Y to the east, then rounding back up Avenue Y to the west as if to ask, which way is South? I walk on the sidewalk below them and stop just to watch. The birds bolt south, and I root for them — I even say go go go under my breath, the warm puffs of air visibly mingling with November’s bite. But the birds don’t end up making it south. They go north.I took the B train to Sheepshead Bay from Broadway and Lafayette to visit my father for Thanksgiving. I haven’t seen him since I left for NYU in August. The station’s only a short walk to his house on Brigham. The birds loop back around, the fluttering of a thousand feathers audible in the midday Brooklyn air. I don’t even know what kind of birds they are. All I know is that the absurdity of it makes me feel something I can’t describe. I can only compare it to other unexplainable feelings, like seeing a flyer for a manic depression research study and noticing every single one of the contact slips ripped off, or the feeling I got when my father confiscated my stash and I later found him smoking it alone in the garage.I exhale and continue walking, my gaze tilted to the sky. Not one cloud is up there, just the hypnotic blue I often get lost in on my walks through the city. I call them ‘swimming.’ All it takes is a playlist filled with Talking Heads and The Lemon Twigs, a good high, and an unmapped route through any of the boroughs. There’s just something about doing private things in public. I’m only a few streets away from my father’s house, but merely the thought of telling him I dropped out of school makes me nauseous. So when I reach the cross street, I don’t end up making it south to Brigham. I go north.