Oscar

The following piece was inspired by a conversation I heard while eating dinner at a restaurant in the Lower East Side last Saturday night. Enjoy.

“I just want to live somewhere beautiful. I want to wake up in the morning and be able to walk outside and down to the beach. I want to be able to wear sandals every day of the year, and I want to live somewhere that’s sunny and warm.”

We were in the middle of dinner. Oscar, my date, was telling me about his deep-seated desire to leave New York. He’d been at it for about twenty minutes.

“And I don’t want to live there in fifteen years. I don’t want to live there in ten. I want to live there tomorrow. As soon as I’m done with NYU, I’m getting out of here. The day I leave New York will be the happiest day of my life.”

My initial thought was to say “New York will be happy to see you go.” But instead I said, “What do you hate about New York so much?”

“It’s too much. It’s too dark. Everyone is so stressed out all the time. There’s no poetry. There’s no life. Everyone who lives in New York walks around like they’re dead inside.”

“I live in New York. Are you saying I’m dead inside?”

“Well what do you have here? You have a small apartment that you pay way too much for. You have a cat. You have a job you hate.”

“I don’t hate my job.”

“You work all the time.”

“So? That doesn’t mean I hate my job. Maybe that means I love my job.”

“You know what I mean.”

“Enlighten me.”

He sighed heavily and rolled his eyes as if I had said the dumbest thing he had ever heard. He was frustrated at my inability to understand him.

“Never mind.” He reached for his glass of cabernet and took a sip. “You don’t get it.”

“Please. I beg you. Enlighten me.”

He didn’t catch my sarcasm.

“You think that because you moved to New York so many people want to be you. That you’ve accomplished something. That this is it. That you’ve made it. If only everyone could be so lucky.”

“I don’t think that at all actually. I would love to live somewhere else.”

“Well then why don’t you. If you hate it here, why don’t you leave?”

“I never said I hated it here. If I hated it here, I’d leave. I love it here.”

“You just said you want to live somewhere else.”

“I said that I would like to live somewhere else, but unfortunately you can’t live two places at once, and so I have to choose, and for now I choose New York.”

“Why?”

“Excuse me?”

“Why do you choose New York?”

“Because my job is here and I love my job. And I like the city. I like the people here.”

“You came here to work in an office all day?”

“I came here to be a book editor. And that’s what I am.”

He scoffed and took another sip of wine as if that was supposed to communicate something to me.

“What?”

“You build your life around your job?” He obviously thought this was hilarious.

“No, but my job is important to me. It’s not my life, but it’s important to me. I don’t understand why that’s a bad thing.”

“You’ve made your job your identity.”

“No. Why are you chastising me for being paid to do something I love to do? If you could get paid for being pompous, wouldn’t you?” I didn’t say that last part. I should have.

“Forget it.”

“Okay.” I was still pissed but I just wanted the conversation to end. Maybe if he shut up long enough to eat his dinner, which had been sitting in front of him for a good half an hour, we could leave sooner. I started to eat my food—chicken parmesan—in silence. I was through promoting any more conversation with Oscar. I resolved to just smile and nod at anything he said. And if, after an hour, he still wasn’t through eating, I would lie and say I had to be somewhere.

“It’s so lovely being able to talk to you about things like this.” He smiled warmly at me and reached his hand across the table as if to suggest I should take it . I almost choked.

“What?”

“You’re just so easy to talk to.”

Was he kidding? I remembered my resolution.

“Thanks.”

“You’re the most honest person I've ever met.”

“Hmm.” I nodded and pretended to be examining my fork with great interest.

“I’m so glad I met you.”

“Yeah.” I continued nodding. “It’s just too bad you’ll be leaving in May.”

Shit.

“I never said I was leaving in May.”

I looked up and met his eyes. “You just said you wanted to leave New York as soon as you graduated. Aren’t you
graduating in May?”

“Yeah, but I might stick around for a bit. I mean, I’ll need to save some money obviously.” Apparently, I should’ve been able to figure that out for myself. I guess I was just being hopeful.

“Oh, that’s not what you said.”

He chuckled. “You’re funny.” He rubbed his foot against my shin underneath the table. I was immediately sorry I had worn a skirt.

“I might take a trip to Paris in the summer.”

“Oh, that’s nice.” I had gone back to examining my plate.

“You should come.”

“Maybe.”

“Have you ever been to Paris?”

“No.”

“Really?!” He seemed genuinely surprised. “Never?”

“Nope.” I shook my head.

“My family used to summer there. My great aunt has this beautiful villa about an hour outside the city. It’s
fabulous.”

“Sounds like it.”

“I can’t believe you’ve never been to Paris.”

“Why? A lot of people have never been to Paris.” Not everyone has a wealthy great aunt, asshole.

“Yeah, but you pretend to be so cultured.”

“I’m sorry?” I looked at him again. Direct eye contact was the only defense I could muster that wouldn’t cause a scene in the middle of the restaurant.

“Well, I mean, you work in publishing, and you talk about literature all the time. Paris is a writers’ city.”

“So is New York.”

“Yeah, but New York is so…” he picked up his glass of wine and made a sweeping gesture with his hands before he took another sip. Once again, this was supposed to mean something to me.

“So what?”

“You know.” He smiled. I guess he actually thought I knew.

“American?”

“Exactly!”

“Ahh.”

I took the last bite of my meal. I officially had no excuse to avoid conversation or eye contact anymore. I drank some more wine.

“How’s your food?”

“It’s good.” He had still barely eaten any.

“Mind if I try some? I love salmon.” My new tactic was to just try to clear his plate as quickly as possible.

“Sure.”

I took a bite. “Wow. That’s really good.” It was okay.

“Yeah, it’s not bad. Of course, it’s not like wild Alaskan salmon. I grew up eating that.”

“Are you from Alaska?”

“Ha! No. I’m from Boston.”

“Naturally.”

“But my uncle lives in Alaska so we used to visit, and he used to take me fishing.”

I realized that my strategy of making mindless small talk had backfired.

“That’s cool.” I reached into my pocket for my phone. “Oh shit. My grandma is calling me. Do you mind if I answer it? I want to make sure nothing is wrong.”

“Sure.”

“I’ll be right back.” I grabbed my purse and headed outside. My phone had not rung. I put it in my pocket and walked down the street. This was tactic number three: stand Oscar up in the middle of our date so he would have just one more reason to hate New York and leave as soon as possible.

Writing Exercise Number 1

Tonight I attended a free fiction writing workshop at the Lincoln Center Barnes and Noble, presented by the Gotham Writers Workshop. I've been toying with the idea of taking a writing class for some time now, and I think I'm finally going to do it. I've been saving up all of this money, but I still haven't figured out what I'm saving it for, so I think I'm going to spend a little. Huzzah. It's time.

But, to get to the point of this post, I wanted to share the writing exercise I did for the workshop tonight (well, one of them) because I was actually sort of proud of it--seeing as I came up with it on the spot and had about five minutes to write it. The prompt was to write a scene in which a character we had created in an earlier exercise enters a waiting room at a therapist's office (the type of therapist was left up to us). So, here it is. It feels good to get this down.

Karen entered the room and immediately noticed how sterile it all seemed. Not sterile because it was clean, but sterile because despite the other patients in the room, it seemed lifeless.

She was out of breath by this point. She had run here from her office. She never wanted to be late--not even for an appointment with her shrink. She pulled off her scarf and wool coat, allowing her pink, hot skin to breath. She motioned toward the receptionist's desk, anxious and hesitant at the same time. She composed herself quickly and cleared her throat as she walked up to the window where a lady whose nametag read "Felicia" greeted her warmly.

"May I help you?" Felicia asked.

"Yes. I have an appointment with Dr. Schwartz for one o'clock."

"Sure. I just need you to fill out some paperwork for me," Felicia said as she handed her a clipboard. "You can sit right there."

Karen thanked Felicia and walked to the chair she had indicated. She sat down and began to write her name on the top of the first page, but instead she wrote her mother's.

"Fuck," she thought. "I'm turning into her."

Why I Am Still Awake Right Now

It's almost midnight. I wanted to go to bed early tonight. Of course, I say that to myself every night and I still end up going to bed at the same time. So why? Why am I still awake right now? I am tired. I went to bed at one this morning after staying out all night to watch the Oscars, which I don't regret. But, when the alarm went off at 6:30 this morning and the guy on NPR said the high was going to be in the lower 30s today and there would be winds up to 40 mph, I wanted to cry. Seriously I wanted to cry.

So, why am I still up right now. For several reasons.

I'm blogging. I feel compelled to write as much as possible. I can't stand myself when I make excuses for why I don't write more. "One day I'll write that book." No. Shut up. You won't. You'll just keep saying that until the day you die. "One day I'll go back to Italy." When? WHEN? So I'm up right now because I'm tired of making excuses for myself. Maybe I'll buy a ticket to Florence before the night is out.

I've been online shopping. This sounds lame, but I've been shopping for things for our apartment. I'm tired of living like a refugee or like I'm still in college. I am an adult and I want my apartment to be my home. I'm desperate for home. This little apartment in Queens is the only home I have. I want it to feel like the home I knew growing up. I want to put pictures of Italy (in frames!) on my walls. I want to have proper storage for things. I want to have a salad spinner and a flour sifter. I want to have a DESK! Though I won't. Not here. My room is too small.

I had to edit tonight. I asked my boss to shadow edit a manuscript, so he gave me one. It's just what I asked for. He gave me three chapters. I read the first one. It was good. The writing was a little clunky, but overall it was good. I work at home a lot. This is what I asked for. Sometimes people look at me with pity when I tell them that. They look at me like I'm overworked or like I'm making poor work-life balance choices. But I tell them that, in life you only have time to do certain things. You can't do everything, and you can only do a few things well. You have to figure out what your priorities are. Work just happens to be one of my priorities. Don't pity me for it, damn you. Don't act like I didn't make this choice.

I'm terrified about bed bugs. One of the things we need to acquire for our apartment is a step stool so we can utilize all of the above-the-cabinet storage space we have. I was walking down my block last night and found a small, splintered wooden step stool that someone had left on the side of the street as garbage. I grabbed it and brought it upstairs to my apartment. But I left in in the hallway for two reasons: 1) it was wet and 2) I'm terrified of bed bugs and bed bugs can live in wood. So, I decided to leave it outside of the apartment so I had some time to think it over. I went online today and learned that bed bugs can live in wood. In fact, they love to live in wood. And bed bugs are impossible to kill. Well, pretty much impossible. Plus, they're disgusting. Do you know how they procreate? It's revolting. So after reading that, I immediately started to feel itchy, and I had to keep telling myself that I was only itchy because my skin was dry and I was wearing a wool sweater. Needless to say, I put that stool right back on the curb as soon as I got home.

I feel unattractive. This happens a lot. I got my hair cut on Saturday. It's shorter than I intended it to be, but it's my own damn fault because I was so eager to chop off the stringy mess that had become my hair, that I didn't give a second thought to just how short I was asking her to go. People keep saying they like it. But I feel like I look either five years older than I am or like a pre-pubescent boy. Plus, I'm wearing my glasses again. I don't feel feminine. I feel completely undesirable. And I can't help but wonder whether or not he would have liked it. And I hate myself for that. I hate that his opinion would still matter to me if he ever decided to give it. I hate the fact that I need anyone's opinion to validate me, especially his.

So I'm still up, but I'm going to bed now. Hopefully not to dream about him. Not again, not tonight. I need to rest.

So, good night. Sleep tight. And for heaven's sake, don't let the bed bugs bite.

Me vs Green Chile Peppers

First, I will spare you the agony of wondering: the green chiles won this battle.

It's the end of a three-day weekend. Last week, I was looking forward to this weekend as one that would be both productive and relaxing; I was going to budget my time just-so in order to get my work done and take a little time for myself after a long week.

Up until today, I had managed to achieve that to a certain degree. I'd managed to edit 5 chapters of the book I'm working on (which is not fun, believe me) and I also managed to go to a party, go on a date, and kick my friend's ass in pool (again). Though, admitedly, the only reason I "kicked his ass" was because he kept scratching on the eight ball, but I digress.

This morning I set my alarm for 9 am, which, if you know me at all, you know is early for me to wake up when I don't absolutely have to. But I wanted to get a jumpstart on my work for the day so I could enjoy my President's Day evening with, perhaps, a nice glass of wine and a chick flick. I managed to edit three chapters in a few hours (really only pausing to eat, go to the bathroom, and, of course, Twitter) I wanted to edit a fourth chapter before I called it a day, but I figured I should go to the grocery store and prepare some dinner before I got to be too hungry. So my roommate and I headed out to Trade Fair, which, in the two weeks we've lived in Astoria, has proven to be a pretty awesome super market.

I was planning to make a very simple recipe: chicken chili, which, according to the website from which I obtained the recipe, is one of the healthiest meals you can make because it's chock full of nutrients. Consider the ingredients:

10 oz chicken, diced
1 1/2 tsp cumin
1 1/2 tsp chili powder
2 14.5 oz cans diced tomatoes
1 15 oz can yellow, whole kernel corn
1 15 oz can black or red beans
1 small can diced green chiles

The greatest thing about this recipe to me, besides of course its nutrional value, is the fact that most of the ingredients are canned which means that the prep time is reduced by like 30 minutes. Fabulous.

I gathered all of the ingredients until the only thing missing was the can of chiles. I had never had a problem finidng these at a New York grocer in the past, and I figured, since I was at a superior New York grocery store, it would be doubly easy. Boy, oh boy, was I wrong.

I looked up and down the Mexican food aisle, figuring it was a safe bet. No go. I went into the other, regular canned veggie aisle but still couldn't locate them. I asked a stock boy where I might find a can of chiles. "Next aisle," he said, nodding his head toward the aisle I'd just left. Okay, fine. I guess I just hadn't looked hard enough.

I went back to the Mexican food aisle and found another stock boy. "Excuse me," I said. "Where can I find a can of green chiles."

He led me over to a shelf full of canned peppers that I'd already looked at. He pointed to a can of pickled jalepenos.

"These are jalepenos," I said, annoyed. "I need chiles." I wanted to say to him "You're Mexican, you should know the difference!" but I refrained because my mom taught me better manners than that.

He shrugged his shoulders and walked away. Then I got pissed. I used to work in customer service and whenever someone needed something that I couldn't find, I asked a manager or another person who had worked there longer than I had. Not this guy. He went back to shelving. Fuck.

I found my roommate who had since retrieved several other items on my list. "I can't find chiles," I said, trying to hide my annoyance since we've only lived together two weeks and I didn't want her to see that side of me yet.

She told me there was another aisle she'd just been down where there were a bunch of jarred peppers. Maybe we'd find them there.

We walked down it. Nope. There were lots of other things in that aisle - several types of canned grape leaves, a variety of pickled beets imported from Poland - but not one single, effing can of chiles.

My roommate offered to look for them while I got deli meat, but she didn't have any luck either. I looked again, especially carefully this time, but, meanwhile, I was becoming increasingly annoyed with everything around me. Ugh. People. IT SHOULDN'T BE THIS HARD!

Fnally, I gave up and went to the produce section to find some fresh chiles. I had no idea how many to get as I'd never made this recipe with fresh chiles before. Hell, I don't know if I'd ever used a fresh chile for anything. I grabbed a handful and got in line behind two women who kept leaving the line to get more stuff. I was still pissed. The chiles cost me 20 cents. I figured I'd saved about 50 cents than if I'd bought a can and I felt a little better. I felt 50 cents better.

My roommate and I lugged the groceries home, and I proceded to prepare the chili. I cut the peppers last, and then when it was ready, my roommate and I each served ourselves a bowl. "Mm. It's good," my roommate said. "It's spicy though."

I started to eat. It was spicy. Really spicy. I started to tear up, my nose started to run, and I could feel my face getting flushed. I went to get myself some crackers to help take the sting out, and in the process rubbed my eye to wipe away a tear.

Shit.

My eye instantly began to burn. The chili residue was still on my fingers, and now it was in my eye. I started yelling. "Ouch! I rubbed my eye!" My roommate, always sympathetic, suggested I flush it out with water. In order to do that, I needed to take my contact out. I washed my hands quickly and pulled out the lense.

I started screaming more. That had just made the pain worse. I began flushing out my eye with water. After a minute or two it started to feel better, but I didn't want to put the contact back in because my hands were still covered in chile residue. I now had one contact in, but I didn't want to take it out because I didn't want to burn the other eye too. Plus, my glasses were with the optometrist because I was having the lenses replaced in them and they hadn't come back from the lab yet.

I wanted to go out and get some sour cream to cut the spiciness of the chili. Plus, I needed floss. So, I decided to walk with my roommate, who was on her way to the subway, and retrieve the necessary items while my eye healed. I figured I'd do that, come back, put my contact back in, and finish the last few pages of editing I needed to do before bed.

I went to Rite Aid. They didn't have sour cream. Whatever. I wasn't going back to Trade Fair. I was still pissed at that place and needed a few days to cool off. But I got floss. What the hell.

I went home and washed my hands again before attempting to re-insert my contact. The second I attempted this, my eye began to burn again and I threw the contact in the garbage. Since that one was tainted, I figured I'd throw the other one out too, so I pulled it out quickly (though my eye still started burning) and tossed it. Now I was completely blind and I had no spare glasses, and I still had 15 pages of editing to do.

That fucking chicken chili blinded me goddammit.

So I got my editing done (though it sucked even more than usual) and now I'm sitting here typing on a blog that I can barely read (My apologies for any spelling errors). Why did I feel the need to share this with you? Well, for one thing, I had nothing better to do and for another, I wanted to share this message wth you all: nothing in life--not even a simple chicken chili recipe--is ever as easy as advertised.

God bless.

The Only Child

I'm the oldest and the youngest of my parent's children. I'm the favorite and the most disappointing. I'm the best and the worst. I'm the only one.

I never really started considering my life as an only child (i.e. my life) until fairly recently. Obviously, I've always been aware of it. When I was little I used to be very conscious of the fact that I had no siblings (and, after my parent's divorced, no prospects of siblings). I used to watch my cousins and my friends play (and often fight) with their sisters and brothers. They used to look so tortured. Part of me was glad that I never had to deal with a younger sister who was always trying to steal my clothes or an older brother who called me ugly. But that never stopped me from answering "a baby sister or a baby brother" everytime my parents asked me what I wanted for Christmas or my birthday. Only children are generally thought to be spoiled rotten, but I never got a younger sibling, no matter how much I begged for one.

I've resigned myself now to being an only child. My mom has gone through menopause, and my dad doesn't seem interested in taking care of any more babies (plus, after me, I'm sure he'd consider any other child a letdown :) Even if one of my parents married someone who had his or her own children, I live away from home now, so I still wouldn't have to share anything with them.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not complaining. My life is fine. And the thing is, I don't know if I would be any happier with a sibling. How can I know that? People ask me "What's it like to be an only child?" I always respond the same way: by not responding. How can I answer that question? I met a girl a few weeks ago who is also an only child, and she quoted an author who said that asking an only child what it's like to be an only child is like asking a fish what it's like to breathe in water. The answer is--there is no answer. It's normal. I cannot tell you what it's like to be an only child because I cannot tell you what it's like to not be one.

I can tell you that the prevalent conceptions about only children in our society are often false--though not always. I know several only children who are bright, motivated, even-tempered, well-balanced, fair, compromising, open-minded individuals. (I like to consider myself one of those people). I also know only children who are spoiled, selfish, mean, lazy, uninspired, domineering, controlling, and impossible to work with. I maintain that this has little to do with the fact that they are only children and everything to do with the way in which they were raised.

But, by the same token, I'm also kind of glad that these misconceptions exist because when I was growing up, I was highly aware of them and, therefore, incredibly conscious of my behavior. I did not want to be a spoiled brat, and I assumed that since I was an only child, and people expected only children to be spoiled, I had a greater chance of ending up rotten if I didn't take the precautions to avoid it. So I did. I remember actually asking my mother once, "Am I spoiled?" She looked at me lovingly and, perhaps, a little worryingly and said, "No, honey. Of course not. Why would you ask that." "Because I don't want to be," I answered.

I don't deny that being an only child helped shape the person I am today. My parents were able to give me more support, attention, and opportunities because they didn't need to split their time and resources between several kids. I was also allowed a certain amount of solitude since both of my parents worked full-time, and I was often left to entertain myself. I developed a love of reading, and now I work in book publishing. This isn't to say I would've been illiterate otherwise, but I probably would've read a few less books if I'd had a younger brother or sister to pester instead.

The other thing I've only begun to consider recently is how my parents' divorce affected me. I only bring this up because I believe that the impact of my parents divorce has been exacerbated by the fact that, seeing that I have no siblings, I am the only child who had to go through my parents divorce.

I don't remember this bothering me when I was younger. But, since I've become an adult, both of my parents have become more open with me about their relationship with one another. I find myself (quite unsurprisingly) hearing two sides of each story. This is, obviously, typical, but it's especially frustrating for me because I feel I have no one to commiserate with. If I talk to other family members about it, they'll take the side of whoever they're related to. If I talk to my friends, they can't really understand the dynamic because they don't know my parents the way I do. At these times, I really wish there was someone in the world who had shared that experience with me. Someone who had the same perspective and could help me deal with things when they got rough. But it's fine. I've managed. I'm the only child of Bill and Deb Carey, and that's just one thing that makes me more unique.

blog topics

Teaser blog post for the one person who follows this. (Thanks Jana!) I haven't written in forever. I'm a bad little blogger. And, actually, I can't blog now because I have to finish editing something and I want to go to bed before midnight, which is in 62 minutes. But here are possible future blog posts TK:

* why all the smart, gorgeous, young, single women I know are suddenly desperate to find men (this includes me too, I guess)
* goals (yes, goals)
* a really awesome topic that I thought of about three minutes ago and then promptly forgot as soon as I started typing this. Damn it!
* just remembered it--being an only child. this will be my next one. My friends keep asking me "What's it like to be an only child?" I will try to craft an appropriate response

More thoughts later. Right now, back to editing.

I <3 New York

When I was a Freshman in college, I realized what I wanted to do with my life. Up until that moment, I really had no idea where my life was headed. I'd enrolled in one of the top journalism schools in the country where most of the students harbored ambitions of being the next Tom Brokaw or editor-in-chief of the New York Times. I, on the other hand, chose to pursue journalism through process of elimination. Seriously. That was my methodology. When deciding which colleges I would apply to, I asked myself "Do I want to be a Doctor? No. Do I want to be a lawyer? No. Do I want to be an architect? No..." This continued until I got to journalism. "Do I want to be a journalist? Hmm. I've never thought about it."

SOLD! I applied to journalism schools because I figured I'd hate journalism less than I would all of the other disciplines.

So, I got to school and quickly realized that, as ambitious as I thought I was, my aspirations paled in comparison to those of my peers. "Crap." I thought. "Now what?"

So, after a few months of going through your typical Freshman fears, I had an epiphany. I was sitting in bed reading a book for class one night, and just as my eyes began to glaze over, I turned the book on its side and noticed the logo on the spine.

"Wait a second," I thought. "Someone had to make this book! Sure, there's an author, but someone else had to publish it!"

Eureka! I'd figured it out. I can't believe I hadn't thought of it before. It was like Newton's apple falling on my head from the sky. I'd read books all of my life, and although I'd toyed with the idea of becoming a writer, I never thought about all of the other efforts that went into making a book a book. From that moment forward, I decided I wanted to work in publishing.

And so I spent the next four years doing everything I could to make that happen. And I did a pretty good job. The one thing I realized early on, however, was that, in order to get my start in publishing, I would have to move to New York City after graduation. Sure there were houses all over the country, but the Big Apple was where the action was.

So, I graduated, and immediately began my quest to move. I had no idea what I was doing. I didn't know Brooklyn from the back of my hand. The subway system baffled me. I couldn't tell you how to get to the Empire State Building even if I was standing at the bottom of it. But I did it. I moved to New York five months after I graduated. Some people thought I was brave. I did it because I had to do it in order to be happy.

A month later I got a job in publishing - a really awesome job in publishing, though I didn't really know that at the time. And, as great as my life was going, I still couldn't get rid of this one nagging feeling that kept haunting me - did I really like New York or what I here because I felt I had to be?

I never visited New York until I was 18. I loved it, but the thought of living here was still so foreign to me. To me, New York was that mythical place that only existed in the movies and cultural myths. It wasn't a place where people lived. It wasn't a place where people raised their families. It was a place to visit. It wasn't a place to settle down.

And when I first got here, I figured I'd start my career here and then move on to somewhere else later - maybe San Francisco, maybe Boston, maybe London. Who knows? I couldn't imagine wanted to end my life in the same place where I'd started my adult one. I couldn't imagine growing old here. I couldn't imagine getting married, buying a home, and starting a family here. Only really wealthy people did that. I was never going to be really wealthy.

My first year in New York was also incredibly hard for me. My close friends lived out of town, and I found myself becoming less social than I used to be. For the first time in my life, I was surrounded by people all of the time, and yet, I felt lonelier than I ever have before. I lived with strangers (in two different places) in neighborhoods no one had ever heard of. I found myself taking the subway home late at night by myself every night. I got depressed--not severely depressed--just a little depressed.

My one year anniversary in New York was October 13, 2008. My one year anniversary at my job was November 15, 2008. Both of these dates have marked turning points in my life. I've noticed that now that I've been here more than a year, I feel like this is my home. I've made friends, started building a reputation (my name appeared in The New York Observer last week!), and, as of last week, I've found an apartment that I can call my own with a person I actually have known for a while.

It's funny how having a place to call home makes you feel so much happier. Immediately after putting a deposit down on our apartment last week, I was walking around the city with a bit of a spring in my step. I used to feel like an outsider here. Now I feel like I belong.

I met a 30-year-old lawyer in a coffee shop in the East Village tonight. He's originally from Texas and before moving (back) to New York a few months ago, he'd lived in Boston and San Francisco among other places.

"Ooh! San Francisco. I love San Francisco!"

"Yeah. I like New York better. I didn't like San Francisco that much," he said.

"Really? Isn't it like every New Yorkers dream to live in San Francisco?"

"Yeah, I think so, but I couldn't imagine living anywhere else but here."

He gave me his phone number and told me that if I was ever in the area, I should give him a call because he lived nearby.

Maybe I will call him at some point. Maybe we can troll around the Lower East Side together and find little places to call our own. We can join the millions of people from all over the world who have lived here and stalked these streets, carving out neighborhoods and niches and hangouts for themselves. We can yell at tourists for walking too slow and forget that we used to look up in awe at the sheer size of the city before we called it home. We can write about how awesome this city is and pretend no one has ever said that before. We can discover it for ourselves the way countless others have. We can recreate it over and over and find new things to love about it every day. We can curse the rudeness of some of the residents, the inefficiency of the subways, the price of alcohol, food, rent, and basically everything else but then go to any other city and think to ourselves "this is a fine place to visit, but I think I'll stick in New York."

And then one day I'll pass away, and maybe I'll be famous or maybe I'll be forgotten. The important thing is that I'll be here.