I started romanticizing New York practically the day I was born. I’ve always had a fascination with the East Coast in general. To me, it was where all the most sophisticated and successful people lived. To a little girl growing up in a very small town with “farm” in the name, New York was fascinating. 

I had never even been to this city, but I always thought It was where I belonged. I never felt like I belonged anywhere where I was raised, so I think I just picked a place where I thought I would. 

When I was in middle school, I begged to go on a trip to New York. My whole family wanted to go to the beach like we did every year, but I managed to convince everyone to go to New York City for Fall Break. 

It was so surreal for me! I looked around in awe. As every person passed, I wondered if they were a tourist like me, or if they actually lived in New York!  For so long, it felt so untouchable, like a made-up thing in my mind, but here I was. Standing in Times Square at 14, I promised myself that right when I turned 18 I would be packing my bags and moving to the city. I think what I fell in love with at first was simply that it was different. I always loved the thought of people not knowing who I was. Every 14 year old craves anonymity, right? In short, I had an idealized version of a place I knew nothing about and planned to move there as soon as I possibly could. 

I visited New York as much as possible between then and when I finally got here, which ended up being 3 times. Each time I visited, I discovered something completely new and fell in love more and more. I did not move here right at 18. Not even at 19, 20,or  even 21. It just didn’t happen. The more I aged and the more things got “real”, the less I believed in my ability to leave home. When I was younger, I would tell people I wanted to live in New York City one day. They would laugh and tell me how expensive it was to live there. I would scoff at them because, of course, I was going to be rich when I grew up. Duh! Well, Spoiler: I did not get rich when I grew up. Yes, New York City is very expensive. 

Time went on and I slowly but surely started putting down roots in the same place I always thought I wanted to leave. I got married, got a dog, and even started thinking about buying a house. New York was always on my mind. I knew that if I gave up on this dream, I would always regret it. Buying a house would have been really cool, but it wasn’t really what I wanted then. I felt like I owed it to myself to experience it all. I wanted to step out of my comfort zone and see the world. I wanted to get off the merry go round I was on. My husband and I explored all of our options. We wanted to be sure we were doing the right thing for us.  We researched building a van and living on the road. We visited Oregon, California and Colorado and explored living in all of those places. It just had to be New York. 

In November of 2021, we decided once and for all that we were going to just leap. We moved to Manhattan in March 2022. We’ve been here 4 months, and it’s been an incredible experience so far. It is a million times different to live here than I could have imagined. It’s so different from anything I’ve ever known and that’s exactly why I came here. 

I am still new around here. I am a very small fish in a very large pond. I am not an expert on all things New York. There is no shortage of things I haven’t done or experienced yet. Everything is so new. I walk down a new street every single day. I’ve made so many connections with new people. I’ve had so many beautiful little moments that I’ll remember for the rest of my life. Every day I make sure to just stop for a moment and breathe. I look around and make sure I feel this. I look around and make sure I’ll remember all of it. I’m just trying to take it all in. 

My love with Gus  has always felt like it was written in the stars. However, the most serendipitous thing that happened was finding out that he wanted to live in New York too. I couldn’t have done it without him and I wouldn’t want to be here with anyone else in the world. I love watching him live this too. I love seeing him fall in love with it here too. We’ve never been closer and we’ve never been more in sync. As long as he is around, nothing can ever be that bad and that is where a lot of my courage came from.

People move to New York every day. Millions of people live here. I know I’m not special for living here and I try not to make it my entire personality, but ya know shit happens. 

 It was the act of getting here that I’m most proud of. The act of pushing through my fear. Letting go. That was the scariest part of all of it. Letting go. 

Well, I’m here now and I don’t know what’s next and, for the first time in my life, I think that’s okay. I’m so used to looking ahead and planning the next thing. For the first time, I haven’t really even thought about what’s next. For now, I’ll just keep making lattes 4 days a week and I’ll keep you updated. 

Gabby