The City So Nice

i spent the first week of april in new york, hanging with good friends and loving on the city more than i usually do. it’s a love that surprised me especially, given my generally lukewarm feelings for new york, which amount to regarding it as a great place to visit, awful place to live. but this trip was different. this trip, i found myself enamored with aspects of the city i’ve long disliked, like the subway, which is still a cesspool of bacteria that makes me yearn for a full-body chemical peel each time i ride it, but it does go places — far more places than the cleaner LA metro. i can't say it didn't make me jealous.

even the congestion, the prices, the daily hassles that make life in the city seem like an endless pain in the ass suddenly appeared exciting. i found myself taken by the fuss of it all, infected by the contagious energy that defines new york and its residents, my fabulous friends among them, who make living there look so glamorous and alluring. there’s a palpable feeling among them that they’re the privileged few who live at the center of the world where everything important happens. this trip, i felt that, too. this trip, i wanted to remain a part of it. i thought of defecting, of uprooting and restarting.

the thoughts lingered as i looked upon the faces of my smiling friends, while sitting across the table from them for drinks and dinner, drinks and brunch, sometimes just drinks and drinks, spending days with them loitering in central park, at the whitney, eating oysters at grand central station, pub crawls through the lower east side, meals in fancy restaurants, shopping in soho, even a celebrity sighting.

life was good in new york. i had fun in new york. it was an intense, much-needed fun, my first real getaway since taking on the house last year. only when i was flying home to los angeles, eager to see the pups and enter into Mo’s arms again, did i realize that all my daydreaming about living in new york was the result of a damn good vacation, one that hypnotizes you with escapist fantasies. a week of work-free gluttony, spent anywhere, will do that.

now that i’m back in LA, back to the daily grind and still dealing with the evil fridge, i no longer daydream about moving to new york, only vacationing there again, anywhere again. (i hear cruises are cheap.) big thanks to the friends who made new york so enjoyable by housing, feeding and liquoring me up: jon-david, cesar, john john, karen, als and zahra. all nyc photos can be viewed here and below.