It was -13 degrees and understandably I was freezing. There was snow covering the hills of upstate New York. It was time to say goodbye to my partner’s family for the Christmas season and head home in the most indirect way possible 🙂 .
Our original plan was to go to NYC, attend a New Years Eve party with people we love and then fly out of NYC and get a direct and much cheaper flight home. My partner loves trains so he suggested we take a train from Albany to NYC instead of a bus even though it was more expensive. I agreed because we were traveling either on New Years Eve or New Years Day when traffic would be even crazier than usual in Manhattan so having a train that doesn’t share the roads like a bus alleviated a lot of stress.
So we arrived in Manhattan after floating through snow dipped forests while sunlight filtered through the windows. It was a gorgeous ride, but it came to an end rather suddenly when we came out of a tunnel and I saw the projects of Harlem while a voice over the loudspeaker announced our imminent arrival to Penn Station. The next 15 minutes replaced clean and pure snow with trash, graffiti and reminders of human misery. Welcome to NYC.
When we got off the train I immediately and unintentionally slipped back into my NYC self: Unsmiling, slightly glaring, moving as quickly as possible to get out of the throng of bodies that seemed to descend upon us. We fought our way out of Penn Station and I looked up at the skyscrapers that I knew so well while feeling the wind tunnels that the avenues created stinging on my cheeks. I already felt different and wasn’t sure I liked this person.
My partner turned me with an excited face and said “Let’s stay here a month!” I was struck by how different our responses to this place were. I wasn’t completely shocked since living in NYC was originally his idea that I was completely against, but as luck would have it NYC was the only place I got a job offer or even serious responses. So we moved to NYC.
I wish I could feel my partner’s excitement about this place, but the stress of just being in NYC paired with the freezing cold (which my GA blood cannot handle at all) made me immediately think “Fuck no!” So that was my latest reminder that I’m so happy we moved. I’m so happy we live in Seattle. I’m so happy that I can be a happier, nicer and more optimistic person as a result of where we live.