Two Years in New York

Or, 10 Things I *Don't* Hate About It

The skyline from Bushwick.

Ironically, I’m not actually in New York as I write this. Instead, I’m on my friend’s couch, on her farm in North Carolina, looking out onto the front porch, which gives way to the pond and pasture. The cicadas drone on in a symphony punctuated by the intermittent croaks of frogs, and no other sound can be heard for miles, except the occasional boom of a rifle. At dusk, sunlight the color of sherbet kisses the treetops. After blue hour, you can see the stars and the shadow of the Milky Way. In New York, I forget that there’s an entire universe beyond the jungle of concrete, stone, and glass. Birdsong is replaced by the wails of sirens, blasting and angry horns, people cursing, people begging. New York is boisterous and chaotic and messy. The countryside isn’t quiet, but the sounds soothe, lulling you to sleep on hot summer nights.

Saint Basil Farm, my city refuge for two weeks of every year.

The first week of August (the 3rd or the 7th, I can’t remember) was the official start of my third year in New York, and the end of the second. In many ways I feel like I’ve still just arrived. In others, it’s so familiar that I do, in some ways, call it home. The memory of the first day I moved into my apartment is still vivid. My father and brother had just pulled away from the curb, and I hurried up the stairs of the third floor walk up, sat on a pile of boxes in an empty space with no other furniture, and cried my eyes out while the air conditioning made a feeble attempt to bring the temperature down from 90 degrees, as the apartment had been empty for the summer, and so had been disconnected from the electricity. I didn’t have a bed for a week. My cousin’s ex-girlfriend ended up helping me build it. I ate weird spinach wraps for five days until I could find a proper grocery store. I got on the express train in the wrong direction and walked two miles cataloguing the laundromats in the neighborhood to see which one wasn’t charging $100 for dry-cleaning.

Keeping the magic alive in the city of rats, LES.

Two years in: new job, new friends, same apartment. It’s the longest I’ve lived anywhere in my twenties. My initial assessment persists. I don’t love New York, but I like the stability, the familiarity. Whether or not I like it, the city has become mine. And in many ways, it’s been beautiful.

Someone recently pointed out to me that I’m a bit of a fatalist—shocking, perhaps, because I write a newsletter about joy—but if you know me in any capacity you also know that I often think of the worst-case scenario. (I finally admitted that I’m neurotic.) Chalk it up expectation management or what-have-you, but yes, it is true. I think it doesn’t help that I’ve had the epiphany that most media I consume (from The New York Times to The Atlantic to New York Magazine) often take the angle of the devil’s advocate/pointing out something that’s wrong. And I realized I don’t want to do this anymore.

Bethesda Terrace and The Lake.

In my third year in this city, I’m embarking on a project: 365 days of gratitude. It’s not that I don’t presently practice it, but I do want to be intentional about doing so. Thus, starting September 1, my goal is to write down, every day, ten things I’m grateful for. They can be repetitive, and they can be mundane, the point is to practice focusing on what’s going well, what’s good in the world. If you feel so inclined, join me! I’ll be sharing the highlights here. I might even make this extraordinarily hard for myself and share them daily in the “notes” section of Substack.

To kick things off, here are ten things I’m grateful for about New York:

1. I love that here, everyone is so…themselves. And nobody cares! You have the freedom to be whatever. However.

2. And that being said, it’s full of some of the coolest people I’ve ever met.

3. New York is creative, and I think that energy emanates from both the people and the institutions.

4. I swear fall is heaven on earth.

5. There is so much to see and do—having a “boring” weekend is impossible.

6. The public library system is 10/10.

7. You really don’t need to drive. (If you know me, you know I live to be a passenger princesses.)

8. And the public transit makes it easy to get out of town.

9. It’s a very literary city. IYKYK.

10. If you can make it here, you really can make it anywhere.

Cheers to 365 days of intentionally looking for joy and beauty. May it meet you today, and every day, lovely friends.

The Wus (3/5).

What I’m Reading

• Go Tell It On the Mountain by James Baldwin (book club pick)

• “Pack Lunch, Drop Kids Off, Skate, Work: These Moms Have Found Community While Picking Up the Sport, Falls and All” by Melissa Guerrero (featuring my friend, Leila!), The New York Times

• “The Myths and Lore of the Milky Way” by Or Graur, MIT Press Reader

• The Remains of the Day, Kazuo Ishiguro (after seven years on my bookshelf. I’m converted.)

• “Exactly Why Are Friendship Breakups So Brutal?” by Melissa Dahl, The Cut

• “The Psychology of the Psychic” by Chris French, MIT Press Reader

• You Exist Too Much, Zaina Arafat (rec’d by my brilliant writer friend, Daniel)

• “You’re Probably Misreading Robert Frost’s Most Famous Poem” by David Orr, Lit Hub

• “Alice Munro Was a Terrible Mother” by Xochitl Gonzalez, The Atlantic

• Our Narrow Hiding Places, Kristopher Jansma (my writing teacher!)

• “The Complex History of American Dating” by Ashawnta Jackson, JSTOR Daily

What I’m Writing

• Someone I Love Died by Suicide. Do I Have the Right to Be Angry?

• The 11 Best Red Light Therapy Masks in 2024, Tested & Vetted by Editors

• I’m 27 and I’d Never Watched Reality TV Before This Season of ‘The Bachelorette’ (& Boy Do I Have Thoughts)

• I Analyzed Every Royal’s Enneagram Personality Based on Hundreds of Pages of Interviews—Here’s What I Came Up With

• The 13 Best Hairsprays for Fine Hair, Tested & Vetted by Editors

• The 31 Best Fall Vacations in the U.S. to Avoid Big Crowds (and See Some Beautiful Foliage)

• What Is the ‘Trifecta Skincare Routine’ and Why Is It Causing Drama on TikTok Again?

• The 14 Best Concealers for Mature Skin, According to Beauty Gurus Who Are 50+

• What Your Birth Order Says About Your Love Language