On Moving to New York

Two weeks ago I was driving a Jeep stuffed with five years' worth of crap, following a Budget truck crammed with the remaining 22 years, on a road of which I have yet to learn the name. But, I was going north - I think - along the East River and to my left was that infamous skyline. And so it was that I was finally going to where I always planned to be.

The excitement crept up and I developed an urgent need to call someone, anyone, and really share how momentous this move was. But then I smiled, calmed by a singular thought that almost pulled the corners of my mouth into my hairline. The only person that could truly understand how meaningful this life point was, how emotionally significant this transition is, would be eleven-year-old Annalisa.

I was that age when, for the first time, my parents brought me to New York to see the Rockefeller tree, the Macy's windows, and everything else that made Christmas in the city special. But I didn't care that much about the tree, and I don't really remember the window displays. All I knew was that as soon as my Sam and Libbies tapped the sidewalk, something felt right. The skyscrapers were sheltering me, and I could feel their windowed gaze ushering me onto a path to make the city my home. I wanted to keep the daily pace on the concrete, breath in the frigid air to wake my morning lungs, surround myself with strangers harboring eclectic tales, none of which I would ever learn, but all of which I would dream up. But, most importantly, every so often I wanted to be able to stop and, just like a tourist, glance skyward at the endless stories. Not looking down on me, but looking over me. I felt so secure in my structural forest - and I still do. After the countless subsequent visits, I still felt the buildings yanking me back, asking me to stay.

And so, looking at those very structures across the river en route to my shiny, Long Island City apartment (I know I should be following my dreams, but even my eleven-year-old self is telling me that I can't afford Manhattan), I smiled because I was finally accomplishing the first definitive and longest-standing objective I had had for myself. Eleven-year-old Annalisa was smiling like a cheeseball too. Fifteen-year-old Annalisa was too busy being pouty about something to care. Twenty-year-old Annalisa was drunk and sentimental, gushing about how cool it was. And twenty-three-year-old Annalisa was just excited to be in a city where she could get a job that really does use her degree. At the risk of sounding creepty, we were all in agreement. And that alone made me beam.

I may not be where I want to be professionally or, for the time-being, romantically (my boyfriend is still in DC). But, at least I am finally where I want to be, literally.

Pic source: www.jaylichtman.com