I LoveHate you, New York...

Saturday the 18^th marks two years in New York for Jess and I; though often times the city still feels so completely alien and new. As is the case with any point on a map its life’s little, stolen moments of bliss that matter, not the few grandiose occasions that generally involve far more stress than enjoyment in the end. This is exponentially true in New York where realizing that you’re sitting in the sand at Rockaway Beach with the Ramones blaring in your ears renders all that day’s troubles to nothing more than vague background noise. Walking through winding streets in Greenwich Village; stumbling through the doors of a new found bar or restaurant that is this weeks “best food I’ve ever had in my life!”, these are moments of surreal perfection that only a handful of places in the world will ever be able to deliver.

Admittedly, however, there are also times when it seems like we’ve been here ages; too long to remember the hopes and dreams that brought us here and far past the point when the city’s sights are able to distract from the indelible struggle of life lived in subways and single room apartments with eight million other’s pushing against the same current as you. Your patience, once seemingly without limit, is spent by mid morning; the weather is perpetually too something not ideal, be it hot, cold, rainy, humid, snowy etc, etc. Your annoyance with yet another person begging for money on the A train when you’re just trying to get home from work is only compounded by your self-directed anger that you don’t care more about a fellow human’s misery when you know you should. You start questioning the kind of person you’ve become; what the grime and cynicism and intolerance of this city has turned you into. You wonder if leaving will bring you back to normal; a part of you is terrified it won’t.

I was talking with a friend and mentioned my love-hate of New York and she, a fellow transplant with a full two decades under her belt, said that feeling is the bond that unites most New Yorkers, especially those not born in the city. The discussion progressed until the realization hit us that living in New York is not un-like being in an abusive relationship. You’re initially attracted by the adventure and inherent coolness of it all; so hip, so cultured; full of parties and romance and knowledge. When you first start this relationship all you see is the excitement and adventure and you willfully ignore any incongruence. You fight for your new love; defend it against naysayers and question the mental faculties of any who would cast aspersions. When you start coming home in anger or tears; when you’re a little shorter with the people you encounter, you refuse to believe it could stem from your new surroundings. After awhile your calls to friends and family to remind them of how great it all is in New York morph into exasperated rants about being broke and the goddamned cold and the goddamned trains and how amenities used to be a pool, storage, weight room, fire place, patio and in apartment laundry and have somehow now been redefined as an elevator and an in building communal laundry, They tell you to just leave; you’re miserable. Deep down though, the thought terrifies you. You can’t leave; leaving means giving up and more than that you know, you absolutely KNOW that nowhere else could be as great as New York. Besides, it will get better, eventually.

I guess that little bit of hope is really the key to lasting in this city. I’ve known people who’ve come to New York on their parent’s dime and were back home within a couple months. Jess and I showed up two years ago homeless and jobless with four bags and two dogs; somehow we’re still here. For how much longer we’re not sure, but for now those few perfect moments are enough to nullify, or at least dampen the noise. The best example of this I can share occurred one Monday night this past summer. We had gone to a late movie at Lincoln Square on the upper west side and after the cinema spilled its crowds out into a perfect eighty degree city night we skipped the closest subway for one nearer the park. We walked through the night down the streets lined with stately, quiet mansions and museums; laughing and talking and feeling like the sleeping city was new and vibrant and at that moment belonged only to the lovers and dreamers awake enough to see its silent beauty. We got to the train and leaned against the pole as it ferried us and our fellow passengers swiftl and unnoticed beneath the streets and buildings that still echo the horns and voices of Harlem’s golden age. We’re talking, and laughing and just over Jess’ shoulder I can see the man laying down; sleeping; blissfully unaware of where the train would take him, as in truth we all were on some level. He twitched. He stirred. He shuffled in his haze. He snorted and rolled to his side and as he unzipped and began covering himself, the bench and the floor of the car in piss I gave Jess a calm and resolute look and stated “you need to follow me this way; NOW”. I pulled her toward the far end of the car, near the other passengers huddled close to the implied safety of the exit. Amidst the disgusted exultations of the passengers the man nearest me looked at Jess and I and spoke the timeless mantra which succeeds in excusing all the city’s transgressions to those willing to accept the truth of it’s simple reasoning; “Goddamn Man! Only in New York!!”