Sometimes in life, we’re faced with experiences that make us feel things so deeply, that we just can’t find the words to describe how we feel at the time.
I lived in New York City for almost seven years and just moved back to Los Angeles in March. But it wasn’t until visiting the city this month and returning as a tourist on vacation that I was able to assign words to the millions of emotions I was feeling.
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Seven years ago, I moved to New York and I met a boy. Right there in the middle of all that concrete charm, surrounded by ripe tulips, lush greenery, and the promise of the most unexpected adventure, I met a sweet, inexperienced, fresh-eyed, timid, curious, guarded boy in Washington Square Park. Standing there as a Freshman, at the steps of Hayden Hall and on the edge of adulthood, he had no idea that NYU, his end-goal, was merely the beginning. And so our story begins.
College is a very odd, perplexing place. A space where we’re told to grow into the people we’re destined to become in just four short years – all through courses and professors and exams that assign a number to our worth. It didn’t take long for me to realize that those scores and numbers didn’t mean as much to me as the number of nights my friends and I spent stumbling down MacDougal Street, singing and dancing our way through the dark, seeking the next stop in our Friday night escapade on a (sometimes too) warm summer’s night. The number of walks down Fifth Avenue between classes when I’d stop for a coffee and interpret the foam-art in my cup like an abstract masterpiece at the Met. The number of times I’d clink glasses of pink Cosmopolitan punch with my cousins over dinner as we’d toast to merely celebrate that we all found the time to reunite. The number of Polaroids I’d stick to the bulletin board above my bed, vibrant with construction paper and nostalgia. The short number of steps I’d tread down the hall to knock on Jordan’s door just to say hi. The number of phone calls Alex and I would have just to fill each other in on the most magical, mundane parts of our day. And most of all, the number of times I’d look out a window, gaze out to the skyline, and feel so delightfully small in such a big city. Sometimes feeling small is the most liberating feeling you can feel in such a vast world.
The exams and written statements may have gotten me my diploma, but the moments in between made me feel more human. And I think that’s the greatest accomplishment of all.
Soon enough, pink punch-cocktails turned into violet caps and gowns. In the wet blink of an eye, my friends that had turned into family and I were graduating at Yankee Stadium. The snapshot will always remain embedded in the crevices of my memory: There wasn’t a cloud in the sky that day – only tassels swaying above us to the music, painting a purple mosaic in the air that represented so much more than graduation, but confirmation that we accomplished a feat that felt unattainable at times. I guess that’s one of the most significant lessons I learned during my undergraduate career: that which might seem daunting and impossible is really just a party waiting to happen, if you hold on tight enough during the ride and learn to let go at the same time. Keep your faith so alive and allow the universe to take care of the rest. We can work tirelessly and strive so hard to achieve a self-imposed dream, but sometimes what’s to come is inked in the stars already.
And the stars – those mysterious little specks of hope in the dark mural that’s the night sky – are what gave me the courage to continue living in New York, even after I graduated. The city can be a tough place. I have never experienced a land filled with so many people that live so closely to one another, where everyone can still feel so lonely. I can’t count the number of times I’d walk up Madison Avenue each morning to the PR agency I worked at, to pass by hundreds of people who wouldn’t make eye contact with me or exchange a brief smile. But the optimist in me refused to believe that this morning behavior was right. (Come on, people – throw back your espresso and learn how to be warm and present and approachable.)
But now that I look back, I see that maybe my morning walks to work were amongst my most valuable rituals I experienced in the jungle. I learned first-hand that just because others might live their lives in isolation with their heads down, trapped within the mental confines of their nine-to-five’s – that doesn’t mean that we must do the same. We can be kind and just as bold and successful as all those who don’t choose to smile.
New York opened my eyes to the reality that there are so many people in this world. Before moving to the Big (more like huge) Apple, I would have never guessed that meeting quality individuals would require me to sift through what can feel like an endless gold mine – a landscape that might sound shiny and abundant. But it turns out that to find gold in a mine, we must dig through endless mounds of dust and coal to find those specks of stone that sparkle amongst the rest.
Fortunately enough, I gradually found myself in the company of people who beautifully contradict the spirit of those closed-off pedestrians I’d encounter on the daily. Men and women who shine amongst the coal, who have filled and fueled my heart with compassion and strength and excitement and joy, and the genuine belief that people do exist in that city and in this world who want you to succeed, and who will be there to celebrate your small, daily victories on your way to your life’s big dreams.
That’s another thing New York taught me: to dream – without fear or hesitation. The city itself was built upon the promise and fortitude of dreamers after all. A rhythmic island of individuals who gathered from all around the world to build a better life – and to live it. I once heard that when New York was being built upon its conception, contractors didn’t have much room to build wide; space was limited horizontally. So, they built upwards. It turns out that even the city’s architecture, its makeup, its blueprint, has inspired me to dream. Look at the Empire State Building, the Freedom Tower, the Chrysler Building… Even some of the tallest, most majestic and iconic buildings in the world have their heads in the clouds.
Seven years ago, I met a boy. (The same boy I mentioned earlier – shy, timid, free of experience). He would have never dared pop his head up into the clouds, see the view from above, leave the world below behind, and dream. Well, as it turns out, that boy is gone, and now a man stands in his presence. I never expected that a move to a new city would provide me with the scraps of wisdom, confidence, heartbreak, spontaneity, strength, brains, and soul, to say goodbye to that boy and to gracefully leave him in the past.
I came to New York with a shell. Over time, that shell turned into an armor – and for a while, it didn’t quite sparkle as brightly as I would have liked it to. But as time went on, as I lived more and learned from those experiences, I continued to discover the man behind the armor, and I allowed him to reveal himself authentically with pride.
I started writing this reflection about my experience over these past seven years. But as I continued to let my fingers dance across this keyboard, I realized that this afterthought is less about me and more so about New York City – and all that it taught me:
- Living alone in a new city, (no matter how glamorous and sparkly it may seem from afar), can be as painful and difficult at times as it is rewarding and wonderful. Sometimes life in a place like this makes you question why you ever moved there in the first place. But staying there answers all of those questions.
- The subway is a warm, sticky, horrible place. If hell manifested itself into a place on Earth, that would be it.
- Heartbreak comes with being human – (and a New Yorker, more specifically). Being vulnerable and open and bearing your soul is beautiful and brave. Just because someone doesn’t like you back doesn’t mean you are unlovable. It means they might just be incapable of loving.
- Most of the time, dollar pizza is better and more satisfying than any gourmet Italian meal you’ll find in the city. (The quality spots are also open all day and night.)
- Sometimes we have to endure the physical burn that a walk-up will induce. Carrying your groceries up five flights of stairs is as tough as it sounds. But dinner will taste better once you make it to the top and you will have the best hamstrings of your life after a few climbs.
- Distance does in fact make the heart grow fonder. Call your parents often. They appreciate it more than you know and serve as a constant reminder that there is a place for you out there whenever you don’t feel at home.
- In a city where you don’t have much family, hold on to your friends for dear life. In a place like New York, friends become family, and that’s more meaningful than I could have ever imagined.
- Glitter-confetti is extremely difficult to completely wash out of your hair and rub off your skin. The celebration is also worth the scrub that follows.
- There is no place like the top of The Plaza Hotel to hide away from Hurricane Sandy and watch the snowflakes do their dance.
- New York doesn’t have much nature, (in the classic sense of the term), and that’s fine. The city makes up for that lack with parks and rose gardens that are carved into little squares of concrete, and leaves in the autumn that gather in the trees and collectively look like auburn chandeliers, and rooftops that can evoke more height and magic than California’s tallest mountaintops.
- And lastly, New York will always be there.
The beauty of traveling as a tourist to a place that once was home is that you see it in a different light every time you return. The surprise, however, lies in the reality that each visit feels completely unique.
Each time I visited New York since I left, each trip has felt different. And each time, I’d ask myself why. It turns out that the city hasn’t changed at all – but I have. People, places, and sights that I used to feel accustomed to suddenly feel new. But no matter where in the world we live or travel, we change – we grow – we flourish – (like a beautiful tulip in Washington Square Park at the end of a summer season and at the beginning of a freshman year at NYU). And that’s what New York has made me realize. I will continue to evolve – as will we all. But she will always be there waiting for me, to remind me of where my journey began, and where I spent the most wonderful, memorable, crazy, difficult, painful, rewarding, joyous, eye-opening, meaningful years of my life. The place where I will continue to retreat, to remind myself of the progress that I’ve made – and to celebrate that growth.
Sometimes in life, we’re faced with experiences that make us feel things so deeply, that we just can’t find the words to describe how we feel at the time. And then the time finally comes when the words rush in and fill the gaps of emptiness we feel when we close one chapter and begin another.
New York, you crazy whirlwind of a place, you – you took my breath away. But now that I look back, I see you gave me wings instead. Thank you for it all.
Love Always,
