For the love of New York

And when I come home to Toronto I look for the things that remind me of New York. New York outfits, New York attitudes, New York smiles, New York moments (that happen in Toronto) and my New York happiness.

 

This blog post is dedicated to the fabulous city that is New York and all those people who love how it makes them feel. 

 

I don’t quite know what started my timeless love affair with the City. It could have been my obsession with Sex and the City while I worked in Ethiopia. Hours and hours of watching my roommate’s DVDs on my computer while curled up on my bed. We brought in the snacks, we brought in the mango juice, and we blocked out the seriousness of what life was outside. For a little while we escaped into Louis Vuitton purses and lavish love affairs.

 

But it must have also been when I decided to move to New York. When every person that I told I was moving there said: you look like you could be from New York. I began to love this place I wasn’t even from because I belonged to it already.

 

Or maybe it was when I finally did move there.  I felt like A New Yorker. I saw facets of myself reflected in the city.

Whatever it was one thing was certain, that feeling was not going anywhere.

 

I had a long conversation with some dear friends on the way to a wedding this weekend trying to explain what it was about the City. The energy, the food, the architecture, the people. What was it? I found myself stumbling over my words. It wasn’t one thing in particular. It was a feeling.

 

I have yet to find a place where I feel so at home in any situation. Where an annoying subway delay could be turned into a situation that made me smile. Where I’d had my wallet returned to me not once, but twice, when I lost it. Where I could reinvent myself at every landing, every morning, and at almost every moment.

 

It is the city where anything is possible and people come to carve out their dreams. Where writers and artists find their muses and their clients. I know, it is a romanticized idea and somewhat cliche. But I am a romantic. And I subscribe to it.  

 

Perhaps Georgia O’Keeffe said it best when she said: “One cannot paint New York as it is, but rather how it’s felt”. To me it has always felt like perfection.