Tourist for Life

This morning I had the distinct privilege of riding the B express train from Park Slope to Midtown. Aside from being an express train (the only way to fly), the B travels up and over the Manhattan Bridge, rising out of its tunnel like the sun rising over the East River. To the left is a close up view of the Brooklyn Bridge, its cables suspended over the water, dangerously assembled in a day before cars, let alone trains, were imagined to cross bridges.

While I craned my neck, shifting it into abstract arrangements in order to see this bridge out the window, I couldn't help but look at my other passengers, so calm and self-contained. There were readers, sleepers and daydreamers. They were so wrapped up in their own lives, schedules and thoughts (or working hard to escape them through novels), they didn't even SEE the Brooklyn Bridge, the sunlight dancing on the river or the captivating contrast of sprawling Chinatown graffiti pushed up against the perfectly polished financial district. I've been in NYC for almost two years and these scenes still grip me, still fill me with the kind of awe only an outsider can experience.

If it means I'll never be a New Yorker, so be it.
I don't want to miss this.


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To Be or Not to NYC

One truth I've discovered over the last year and a half: living in NY is a constant battle. The struggle, however, is no longer over resources, space, housing. It's over a dilemma. The dilemma. To be or not to NYC?

On any given day or night you can have anything you want: art, music, theater or socializing, dancing, sex. This city is the bona fide buffet which dictates guilt and remorse the times you opt out of the 'all you can eat'. At least this is what it looks like to an outsider. Yes NY boasts more options than you can shake a fork at, but for those of us who actually live here, the city is more than a free-for-all playground.

Sometimes it's 50 hour weeks in midtown, 20 degree walks to the laundromat on a Sunday morning and hour long subway rides because a cab just costs too damn much. Other times it's pure exhaustion, emotional damage or regret from poor decisions. Grocery shopping, lunch making, snow shoveling, bill paying. Just like anyone else, anywhere else, real life runs right along side all we have and do here.

Because of this, I've recently struggled with my decision on the nights I choose to stay home. Do I deserve my peace and quiet? Yes. Is it good to have some down time? Of course! But, even after rationalizing it here before god and all my (3) readers, I'm going to defy myself and start hitting the town. This bastion of culture and commerce is worth a little fatigue.

We may be running ourselves into the ground, but at least we're running the world.


Andy Sachs:
"But what if this isn't what I want? I mean what if I don't wanna live the way you live?"
Miranda Priestly:
"Oh, don't be ridiculous. Andrea. Everybody wants this. Everybody wants to be us. "

--The Devil Wears Prada (2006)



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