My favorite park of New York City isn’t the bagels, the attitude, or any of the sky scrapers; it’s the benches.

The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows defines sonder as the realization that everybody around you, even strangers, are living a life just as complex as yours. I like to think of it as ‘people watching 2.0.’ Park benches are great places to practice when I’m not busy reading the poignant and witty dedications nailed on to honor New Yorkers past and present.

I love sharing my bench finds with friends and family from other places so much that I made an Instagram to do so. This has inspired an influx of loved ones to stop and smell the benches in their own cities and share bench-related news from publications like the New York Times and Defector.

Check out the breadth of this just-for-fun project on Instagram at @stopandsmellthebenches.