04/16 — New York City
As a reminder, I’ve been spending each month in a new city. Month one was Seattle and Month two was Oakland. My third month was spent in NYC.
I’m a child of the eighties. The geographical home of that decade has to be NYC. I grew up in my Canadian hometown watching Ninja Turtles explore its subterranean wonderland. I saw the girls in my class ogle over the trench-coated business types in their RomComs. My parents’ cop dramas (and the nightly news) showed a fast paced city with a gritty scene in every alley. And Hackers, arguably one of the most influential movies in my youth, showed a semi-futuristic mecca of cultural diversity I couldn’t imagine.
Pop culture has made NYC has a mythic city for me.
And yet, it wasn’t the city for me for much of my life. By the time I first visited after finishing school, I had become an ardent westcoaster. The the blue of the pacific and the green of the coastal rainforest were the colors of my flag. I struggled to find that beauty in the concrete and the brick of NYC on my visits.
Fast forward a decade.
This trip to NYC showed me what a different person I am now. I fell in love. But it was that bittersweet international vacation love. That kind that gives you a little taste of what another life path would have been, in some alternate reality.
Let me tell you why I fell in love.
The people
A lot of the myth I had about NYC was the people. I pictured them hard driving, competitive, and cold. The I’M WALKIN’ HERE stereotype. That couldn’t be further from what I found.
The people were warm, friendly. They actively sparked conversation. Sitting at the bar, in the elevator, waiting at the light. People helped each other. They smiled. They made eye contact. They asked where I’m from and why I was here, and jokingly gave me shit for poor menu choices.
I somehow missed this on past trips, likely because this was my first solo, non-work trip to NYC. But the city opened up to me right out of the gate and forced me to do the same. It felt like coming back to a hometown.
The infrastructure
My uneducated initial reaction to the New York subway system is “what a shithole!”. It’s rusty, dirty, and smells. But that passes and is replaced with a growing appreciation of the cheap, fast, and reliable personal freedom it provides.
Here in North America, we’re now largely incapable of building high budget public works projects for the greater good of future generations. But when I came back to SF and had to get a car again, I was pissed.
It’s a city designed for pedestrians and it’s amazing to be one. Comprehensive subway, extra wide sidewalks, physically separated bike lanes and 30min bike rentals, even free open wifi and USB charging ports on the streets (Link NYC).
The diversity
Nothing is uniform in NYC. The architecture spans centuries. The people sharing the subway work in all industries, from finance to fashion. There’s a choice of restaurants for every type of food and you could spend your life trying them all without getting to each one.
Here’s where I contrast NYC’s diversity against SF as you’re expecting but that’s an unfair comparison. Though SF has issues with diversity, the root of that problem was the choices I made over eight years in the city that kept me isolated in the tech bubble. It’s something I’ll need to improve if I go back to SF.
The pizza
Let me simply recount a message I sent to a friend on a late night walk home while in the city.
In the city that perfected pizza, literally the best pizza you can get on the planet (sorry Italy), you can also, on nearly every block, get a giant slice of pizza for $1. While that specific slice itself is not the best on the planet, it’s still satisfying and delicious.
And in that same city that defines fashion trends for the world (again, sorry Italy), you can walk down the street stuffing your face with a slice of $1 pizza and no one will bat a fucking eye because they’re all doing it too.
Pizza is the great equalizer in NYC. All of that diversity unites around a slice.
This all begs the question that I’ll answer bluntly: I’m not moving to NYC (though I seriously considered it). On the surface of it, NYC seemed like the answer to the question that started this adventure. But at the end of the month, I was still frustrated. Not with NYC and not with travel, I love both. I was frustrated that, for the most part, the work side of life remains unsettled and the travel hasn’t made that easier.
It’s with a very conflicted heart that I’ll be putting the new month new city adventure on pause for the next little while. I’ve got a lease in SF and a move in date of June 1.
For the short term, I’ll be in the area. It is a short term plan though. While I get that sorted out, you and I should conspire on where next. I’ll be looking forward to it.
