new yorker at heart

We all have a first love, ok, in full disclosure that is not the topic of this particular post--that would take a lot of guts on my part. What I’m talking about is the first time you loved you.

My being is totally and completely wrapped up in New York City.

I love that City with everything I have.

I get a lot of flack for that because it sounds slightly clichéd and well, it’s a city. But it’s not so much that it is my first love, but it is the place that shaped me, the place that held me within its grip while I struggled with the big questions. New York is the first time where I saw my life as something I got to choose, something that doesn’t just happen but that is within my grasps. And while that scared--and continues to scare--the shit out of me it is where it all began.

I lived in New York my freshman year of college. My dorm was right off of Washington Square Park. It was the perfect spot. I was eighteen. I was a dreamer. I was a NYU student.

I couldn’t tell you exactly what made me chose to apply to NYU my senior year of high school. I narrowed my college choices by locale. I wanted to go north. I wanted snow. I judged schools on their website. And yet, for as much as I didn’t choose it, it chose me. Living in the Village, being there, having someone tell me that 13 kids got a small envelope just so that I would be wowed with the purple welcome packet, it gave me chills. I was in awe. And it had nothing to do with the fact that we played second fiddle to the big bad Ivy up the island. We were to live “in and of the city” and we all did. New York seeped into my blood like nothing I had ever experienced.

In New York, everyone can be a loner. Sometimes it’s even better to be one (I mean, who has tried to travel on the subway at rush hour with a group? Chaos ensues). That suited me. I watched. I observed. I loved the people.

Washington Square Park. From University Pl. Yes, that's a grand piano

I did what other people dream about. I got stopped on my way to class so that filming of I, Robot could continue. I went to a house party in Brooklyn and rode the subway home at 4am. I did my homework in Washington Square and read in Central Park. I spent Saturday afternoons at the Met and spent too much time in the Monet room.

And I walked. I walked miles in that city. And I lived for it.

Still, I left.

Something wasn’t working.

And in the next three years I did all the things I was meant to. I made great friends, went to a couple of frat parties, worked, studied, laughed, went boy crazy, and walked the Lawn.

New York stayed.

Like a person in love, I couldn’t shake New York. I couldn’t make it all work in my head though. How do you love something and leave? How do you let go? Can you really love something so much you can let it go? (The parallels to relationships in these questions are real…something we can talk about later.)

I stayed away.

But the love remained.

It was a little over three years when I went back the first time. And then I was back just a couple of weeks ago. Five years ago it all started.

I cannot properly explain my relationship with the Big Apple. It’s there that my world makes sense. It’s there where I feel most like myself. I love the noise, the movement, and the smell. And anyone will tell you I will run you over for a pretzel from a vendor. I love taking the subway, even during rush hour. I love the lines and that nothing takes just a minute. I love the flirtatious men behind the hole in the wall bagel, falafel, and pizza joints. I love the old New York women, the ones that have been there longer than the yuppies, who came from a time of rent controlled apartments and everyone really was from somewhere else. Those women are my favorite. They are tough old broads.

It’s difficult for me to share New York. I get touchy about it. Which is difficult seeing as it attracts the most people and houses even more. I need to work on that. Sometimes I get needy and finicky when I’m there. I get stuck in my own memories, my own thoughts. I want you to be amazed that I lived there, I want you to smile that knowingly grin when I break into long stories about walking across the Park late to class, or Oxfam, or dinner. I want you to ask questions, but not about the restaurants I didn’t eat at or the plays I never saw. I want you to offer to take my picture in from of my dorm and wave a silly wave to my room. I want you to say that there is something different about me when I’m there, that it’s this difference that makes you look at me like we’ve never met.

So much happened to me in that city, things that I still think about ever so fondly. I left and handed NYU to the next class. I took what I could from it all and made it all a part of me.

I love New York so much I don’t have one of the T-shirts. I love the way it makes me feel and the person I am when I’m there.

I may go back one day. I’ll definitely be back for a visit. My Mom and I are already planning my 25^th birthday bash next year.

For now though, New York will be there. It’s just waiting for me to be ready again. And like any good first love, it will live within me forever. 

NYU Library, Bobst (left) and Student Center (right) when you're at the top of the Student Center you can see all down 5th Ave. i am convinced it's the best view