me and this city: an ongoing saga

Today I finished another page in the "come so far" book I'm working on. One of the biggest things in my life that has changed me has been this city. This stinky, huge, exhausting, colorful, dynamic city.

It took me a long time and a lot of wrestling to come to a peace about living here. I went through years of hating it and feeling betrayed by people that liked it. One of my favorite things to do was sit around with other-people-not-from-New-York and talk about what a crazy town this is. We would all nod in agreement about things that I can't even remember now, but at the time were clear indicators that this was not the place for me.

And then, sometime in year SEVEN (!!!) I began to feel at home.

This town has changed me a lot. When I think about the change I feel, it's an odd one. I feel like New York has both made me more globally minded and completely New York-centric. What I mean is that I understand a lot more about people from all over the world, because they are my neighbors. When I hear news from the Middle East, I wonder what the middle-easterners I know think of that news. In that way I feel more globally minded. But there are other ways that New York has made me New York- centric. New York has a way of sucking you into its bubble and making you feel like this one town represents the country itself. Which, of course, it does not. And unfortunately that is something I have to remind myself of a lot.

But, for now at least, I am really glad to be here. Glad to be raising my kids here, glad to be learning and seeing and so much, glad to call it home.