It's Our Anniversary

My Beloved New York City,

You know what today is, don't you? Of course you do. It's our anniversary. Ten years ago today, I gave up my old life to move here and be with you. It wasn't easy at first. There were a lot of tears (all mine) and some cruel tricks (those would be yours).

While I knew Woonsocket and I weren't meant to be together forever, giving up my old love for you was still tough. W might have been all wrong for me, but he was comfortable. And you, well, you challenged me. W never left me stranded on a platform because I wasn't aggresive enough to push my way onto a crowded train. He never dumped me off in Harlem because I was reading a book and didn't notice I was on the wrong subway. That trick you played, New York, the one where I was all dressed up and lost one shoe on your subway, and ended up at work in a velvet dress, blazer, and sneakers, with no shoes to change into? Not cool. And that same day, when that cheap black velvet dress dyed my entire body purple? You laughed, I know you did. And that was all just the first month we were together. You're lucky you shaped up, New York, because I'm not sure how long I could have kept going like that.

But let's not rehash the way you hurt me. Let's focus instead on the good times. And in our ten years together, we sure have had some. There was the cocktail party you made it possible for me to attend, with Arthur Miller and Studs Terkel. The one where I had a whole conversation about John Steinbeck, my all-time favorite author, with his son. It took me weeks to be able to talk about that without giggling like a little girl.

There were nights walking your streets, and mornings when it was already light out as I left the club from the night before. That one time, when you threw in the early-morning snow for dramatic effect--I really appreciated that. There were drunken cab rides, going over the 59th Street bridge, looking at the lights below me, while I dangled my feet out of the cab window and giggled on my cell phone. There have been Broadway shows, perfect days walking along your rivers or sitting in your parks, and more opportunity than I ever could have dreamed of finding with another city.

I don't know what I'd do withhout the people you introduced me to. The friends who taught me that the expression "urban family" is more than just an expression. The roommates who were far better spirited about me coming home late at night and getting into bed with them than I had any right to expect. The road trip friends, and the dancing friends, and the party friends, and the playing Scrabble in a coffee shop friends, and the comfort me when I'm sad friends, and the watch football and eat wings together friends.

New York, for a relationship that I first thought was only temporary, we've sure been through a lot together. You taught me and stretched me, and made me grow up in a way I never would have in that cozy cocoon I was in before you. And I'd like to think that even just a little bit, I've made you better too. Or at least a little bit brighter and filled with a little more laughter.

Happy Anniversary, New York. Love you. Mean it.