I want to talk about New York

I want to talk about happiness and well-being, about those rare, unexpected moments when the voice in your head goes silent and you feel at one with the world.
I want to talk about the early June weather, about harmony and blissful repose, about robins and yellow finches and blue-birds darting past the green leaves of trees.
I want to talk about the benefits of sleep, about the pleasures of food and alcohol, about what happens to your mind when you step into the light of the two o'clock sun and feel the warm embrace of air around your body....
I want to remember it all. If all is too much to ask, then some of it. No, more than some of it. Almost all. Almost all, with blanks reserved for the missing parts.

from Brooklyn Follies by Paul Auster

I want to talk about New York.
It's almost impossible to put into words how it felt living in new york this summer.
My mother-in-law asked me to try and explain it to her.

I told her, I feel like I'm a better person when I'm there;
Ooohhh, she said, who can resist that? who doesn't want to be a better person?!

And, I must say, I totally agree.
New York turns me inside out. On my head. In the very best way possible.
It was ridiculously hard to contemplate that we might not actually move back there someday. There is a possible scenario, of a future in the near future, that doesn't include moving back to new york. That's a hard reality I have to face.
I just had no idea it was possible to feel this way about a city.
A boy? Yes.
A friend, sure.
But a city?! A place? really?

Accepting this new possibility, I decided to try a new approach to the city I DO live in. Come back to your city with the person you were in new york.
Possible? Hmmm.
Struggly? for sure.
And yes, I still miss the place desperately, but I'm finding some comfort in applying molly 2.0 on san francisco.

Trying to rationalize this wicked-strong connection to a city, just a city, mind you.... an example rose to the top of my mind: within 10 hours of being in good ole new york, the boy that worked at the deli across the street from our summer-swap-apartment asked me three things I like about myself and the next day, he wrote me a poem.
This is how it goes....

MOLLY

Laugh, Interest in Other People, The way i feel about my husband



Do unto others as you would like them to do unto you.

Thats what my mother would say.

Since you take such good care of yourself I know you treat your husband the same way.

Reciprocity should always be priority.

If we perpetuate unity there will be longevity.

My philosphy is governed by simplicity.

Love is all we need to build a better society.

So be happy and keep laughing

You will recieve everything if you keep asking

Show that pretty smile to everyone you meet.

Cause you never know who lives across the street.

Author, Nelson Serieux.
And, for the rest of the week, RK and I made our brand-new connections that felt like home. We bought our coffee at the same coffee shop one block over, bought our middle-of-the-night necessities from the deli on the corner and caught the F train to anywhere we needed to be.

The weather was classic, ridiculously hot with crazy-ass-humidity. I'm a big fan of that forecast for the summer. New York doesn't miss a beat with summers. It doesn't know any different. Standing in the subway, your skin is glistening, your clothes sticking to you, and all I can feel/think/believe in this place is that you never, ever know what's going to happen next. The energy is thick in the air. This place makes me feel beyond strong. I feel super powerful there. Walking down the street, with every corner you turn, you make a decision about possibly the rest of your week, let alone the rest of your night.

Okay, yes, I can start to get weepy about it. It's a ridiculously magical place. But we don't live there. So, maybe, just maybe, I can trick my mind into believing the idea, Now, make that happen here. Where there's a will, there's a way.