Two Suitcases, A Lifetime

I showed up here roughly a year and a half ago with two heavy suitcases in tow and an array of other bags slung over my eager and determined shoulders.  Sidewalks were pounded, apartments were scoured, temporary homes were squatted in, subways were hesitantly navigated, and after two months or so of this frightening carousel, I settled in to a cool and spacious home in a little neighborhood called Williamsburg.  It was then, finally, that I began to think I could make a home of New York City.

And I did make it my home.  I discovered things with my own feet and eyes and ears and nose that had been discovered by so many before me but for the first time were being recorded in my own consciousness.  I wandered bookstores, traversed avenues, chose favorite benches in parks, and began to wear the paths of my own feet familiar.  I made new friends and then I made more new friends and each one had more and more in common with this new self I was creating.  I turned 30 years old, published a book, drank too much sometimes, missed my good friends far away, traveled out of the city to get perspective.  Perspective that looked like the Manhattan skyline disappearing and then reappearing days or weeks later looking exactly the same.  This is a city that changes by the minute and yet is completely timeless.

I rode a bike that didn’t go anywhere twenty-some times, sweat dripping even from my eyeballs, just to prove to myself that I could.  I jumped off a platform holding only onto a thin trapeze bar and let go at the precise moment a stranger in flame-printed tights caught me by the hands.  I fell in love with a man who lived far away from the city, in my past, and one day he showed up and said, “I live here now too.”  And the city was anew again with springtime and love and new tastes and sights and flutters of the heart.  And now I’m leaving, full and happy, like I’d just finished a luxurious meal course by course which has made me sleepy and euphoric.  I am satisfied.  This city has fed me bitter, savory, rich, and sweet but never bland.

What will I miss most?  It’s hard to say yet, for the imprints on my memory are still too close to see the whole picture.  Will I come back?  Absolutely, though I’ll be changed yet again and so will bewhat I discover when I come.  Can I be happy somewhere else?  Surely, for I am a nomad, an adventurer, and my home is within myself.

Tennessee was a wild horse that I tamed and made my own.  New York is a wild bull that bucked me off, but only after my eight seconds were up.  I’ve had my ride.  I have no regrets; nothing was missed; not a moment was wasted, even the rough ones.

I leave here today the same way I came – with two heavy suitcases in tow and an array of other bags slung over my triumphant shoulders – and yet I’m completely different.

NYC and Me, A Quarterly Review

It’s time for the dreaded quarterly review.  I’ve been in New York just over three months now, and some moments feel like it’s old hat, like I’ve been there forever and hardly know another way of life.  Other moments feel like I’ve just arrived and it’s all still so shiny and new and incredible.  So, New York, how have you fared this first quarter?

We got out to a rough start, you and I, with the dramatic apartment hunt (my saving grace was MDNY’s Danielle Hamburger), and the illness.  “Visit New York all you want!” the city tells you, but the second you try to live here it gives you a glass-shards-in-your-chest cough, fever, and no place to live.  Review: Poor, all around.

Once the illness began to subside and I narrowed down my home search to one specific neighborhood, learned many more train routes than I knew from my visits before, and began to make some new friends and prospective clients, New York started to seem like something I could handle.  And New York, I would guess, began to look at me as someone who could handle it.  I visited MOMA, saw Once on Broadway, got a library card, and began to make weekly trips to the farmer’s market and flea market.  Review: A solid “good.”

The quarter ended well.  I moved into my apartment, signed a couple of new clients, got to know my new friends a little better, hired a new employee, began running at the track down the street, and, generally, feel like I’m just living life in New York like anybody else.  Also, I saw two ballets, dressed up 20’s style for a picnic and jazz fest at governor’s island, which also involved my first ferry ride, and I think the people at my favorite coffee shop almost know my name.  Review: Great!

What’s next?  Two weeks of traveling; time away which will undoubtedly make me eager to return to the city with fresh eyes.  Seeing Heather Anderson in The Wild Party, hopefully throwing my first party in the city, and who knows what else!  It’s New York, folks. Unpredictability at it’s finest.

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Hot off the Press!

It’s officially summer!  It’s over 100 degrees in New York: ice-cream melts before you can eat it, Bed Bath & Beyond is selling nothing but fans, and all I can think about is how I’d really like to be in a pool somewhere.  To be under water would just be the best thing right now.

You’ll have to forgive me for the lack of posts lately.  As you know, Loved comes out this summer (!!!) and most of my writing energy is going into reviewing final edits.  We are thisclose to having the text finalized and sent off for print.  I promise to let you know as soon as a release date is set.

The biggest news is, I am no longer self-publishing.  I have a publisher!  WOOHOO!!!  Also very big news is that I’ve been invited to write a contribution to a major online newspaper.  It will post the week of the release, so you’ll hear more about that soon as well.

What else have I been doing?  I’ve been running three miles almost every day, training for The Color Run NYC in August.  I have never been much of a runner before, but my goal is to do the 5K in 27 minutes.  Last weekend, I dressed up 1920’s style for a jazz era festival at Governor’s Island, New York (see picture), and I have two trips coming up in July: home to Tennessee and then to Florida to visit family.

How is summer treating all of you?

I’ll be keeping you up to date on Loved news, and I’ll try to get some more posts up here soon.

XO,
Kimberly

 

Life in NYC: Week One

Adapting to life in New York is like nothing else.  Apartment hunting here is pretty much a nightmare, especially for someone as particular (ahempicky) as me.  Props to my broker, Danielle, for her patience and her ability to “get me.”  Here are some of my discoveries from life here so far:

1. New York is the most dimensional city on the planet.  There is so much happening above you in the way of architecture especially.  You miss so much if you only look at the street level of buildings.  There is so much happening below you in the 5 million people layered through the subways each day.  It’s unbelievable how much there is to look at and how many conversations, footsteps, lives are happening at once.

2. Everyone has a TV show that they reference in relation to their lives in the city.  I’ve heard Seinfeld mentioned several times, How I Met Your Mother is a very relevant one, plus of course Friends and my favorite Sex and the City.  And at any given moment a scene from any of these or other shows can flash through your head.  I wonder if you cross a line where this stops happening but it seems like it doesn’t, as even well established friends here keep making these references.

3. The weather can be completely different in other parts of the city.  It can be sunny and warm in midtown, and when you come up from the subway ten minutes later in SoHo it’s drizzling and chilly.  Perhaps I should always, always carry an umbrella.  Also, Hunter Boots will be my first big purchase here.

4. Speaking of the subway, when a train car is so full that you’re hugging three people just to hold on to the bar and you think no one else could possibly get on, seven more people will somehow crush into the car before the doors close.  If you’re even remotely claustrophobic, New York is not the place for you.  (That is, unless you can afford a chauffeured car.)

5. Pretty much the only cause for interaction between large groups of strangers are crazy people.  Nothing will cause you to make eye contact with others faster than the need to reassure yourself that you’re fine and everyone else is fine and they see the crazy guy too.

6. I want to read more.  Lots more.  This isn’t new, it’s just intensified here.  I could read like we eat meals: Something light and invigorating in the morning, sustaining in the afternoon, hearty and delicious in the evening.  With a glass of wine.  I want to read my way through the city.

It’s a pretty solid start to my new life here.  Hopefully this week will bring warmer weather and a final decision on an apartment.

The Pulse of New York

Of all my travels this fall, my two weeks in New York were by far my favorite.  Though I loved the peace and quiet in Portland, and I believe peace and quiet is vital for our emotional restoration, I felt more at home amidst the hustle and bustle of life in Manhattan.  After I adjusted to the nighttime street sounds, I actually found the din to be kind of a lullaby at night.  The world doesn’t stop when we do, does it?  I found a home in a little coffee shop a block from where I was staying.  It was tiny and had the best iced coffee and brownies and a super nice staff.  Furthermore, the seats along the window were the perfect place to sit and work while watching people stroll by.

Other memorable moments?  My mom came in for a few days and we went to the top of the Empire State Building.  The older I become the more afraid I am of heights, but the view was more than worth a little discomfort.  I could even point and say “there’s about where I’m staying, there’s the park, there’s where the Steeler’s bar is, there’s Soho over there…”  So proud of savvy navigational skills was I!  Mom and I also went to see Wicked.  Have you seen it?  I know I am late to the boat on this one, but it’s phenomenal!  The set!  The costumes!  The voices!  The music!

Food: A local-food restaurant in alphabet city called Westville was one of the best meals I’ve ever had… a meal that made me want to laugh outload in awe after every bite of dinner and cry joyous tears after every bite of dessert.  I also enjoyed the Rose Bar at Gramercy Park Hotel (black cherries in my jack and coke!), Lure in Soho, Macaron Cafe at Madison and 59th and pretty much everything in the West Village.

New York is just what I’ve been looking for: the solitude of a walk through the park watching yellow leaves falling into the pond; reading a book on a bench while violin music floats from just around the corner; running to catch the train and missing it but knowing there will be another in 4 minutes, emerging from the subway not knowing where you’ll end up and finding yourself in Columbus Circle where the blue sky reflects off the buildings; high fives and new friends in the Steelers bar on the upper west side; looking in the windows at Bergdorf’s and thinking they must belong to an art museum; coming out your front door, raising your arm, and having a cab abruptly sweep you up, the possibility of who you’ll meet or what you’ll discover with every step.  The pulse of New York mirrors my own.

Here are some shots from my visit there.  I’m not confirming or denying any rumors, but New York can expect to see me again very soon.

I (Heart) NYC

Man, I love New York.  I’ve been here roughly forty-eight hours.  It’s crowded and it generally smells kind of foul.  Cars honk right in front of signs that say ‘$200 fine for honking’, and the noise wakes me up at dawn as if they were roosters.  Taxi-doodle-doo.

But, people aren’t afraid to be outrageous.  I was at a gallery opening last night in Chelsea and there was a man with leopard hair and one wearing mid-evil knight shoulder pads made of cardboard.  At home I’m afraid to wear a mildly unique cocktail dress or funky booties.  Also, Patricia Field was there, which was a super special star sighting for me, a former stylist myself.

There are a few tricks I need to pick up.  I’ve already mastered actually stepping into the street while waiting for the ‘walk’ light.  I have to practice ignoring people.  I guess eleven years in the south has effected me, and I keep trying to make eye contact and smile.  It makes sense, if you were to smile at everyone you pass on the street in a day your cheeks would fall off.  I also have to find a way to shake this southern accent I’ve picked up.  But that’s another story.  People are actually pretty nice when you need them to be.  More than once someone has apologized for bumping into me.  I chatted with a girl on the subway about which stop was next.  No scowls, no rolled eyes.

Also, you can have any kind of food delivered to your door in about fifteen minutes.  It’s brilliant!  The architecture is beautiful – they sure don’t make things like they used to.  The weather, cool and cloudy, is perfect.  Now I’m headed to brunch with some girlfriends at a cute little french place on Madison.  After that, who knows!

I’m looking forward to spending a few weeks here, trying on for size the role of ‘New Yorker’.  Could it stick?  We will see!

*Photo: Maybe I’ll go by Kimberly Golightly…