My love affair with New York City

Chen Pesahovitz
Sep 1, 2018 · 2 min read

I love New York City at 6:30 am. Yes, of all the times of day where the beauty of this jungle made of concrete, steel, flesh and dreams is evident I think it’s the most evident at 6:30 am.

I love it at this time because to me you can truly breathe the city in deeply without having to share this breath with almost all the other millions of chess pieces gliding across the chessboard island. For now they are safely tucked in their beds in the gleaming towers rising above our heads.

I love being part of the bleary eyed but determined early risers club. The cogs in the wheels that churn the city’s engine. The union men preparing for their shifts clutching their hard hats to their sides ordering their dollar bagels from the bagel cart on 3rd avenue or the doctors making their way to their 7 to 7 shifts waiting online at Dunkin Donuts for their coffees or to some, “the only reason to get up in the morning,” shuffling forward like items on a conveyor belt waiting to be picked up by the sympathetic cashier who will take their order.

As we part ways to go to our separate destinations an ambulance whizzes up 2nd Avenue unleashing it’s auditory onslaught on us sleepy travelers jolting us awake momentarily as it rushes to deposit its unaware passenger at the fate deciding doors of the hospital ER.

I’m not alone in this rapturous love affair with this city. For I am not the only citizen who is willing to pay to put up paper thin walls to convert 1 bedroom apartments into two or three bedroom apartments. I am not the only resident who has had to explain my willingness to spend obscene amounts of money in rents for “studio” apartments. I put studio in quotes as many times studio is used loosely to describe what some would say are closets dressed up by the loquacious tongues of real estate brokers.

You see New York City is addictive. It draws you in with its siren song of pleasure, possibilities, and promise and I like so many others left my ear plugs back home.

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