Mention New York City and those who have been smile knowingly, and say, " I love it!! and I am going back as soon as I can."
Some who have never been and are NYC virgins say, " Meh..don't need to go there! Too big, too busy, too expensive..why shoud I do that
when I still haven't been to Biggar, Saskatchewan?
and it's bigger than New York, yucka yucka."
Some who have never been and are NYC virgins too, say " I can't wait to go!! It's big city mecca, the big apple, the whateverwhereverwhenever!"
And everyone is absolutely right.
But...once you go, you know.
It's an ode to urban. A capitalist's dream. An anarchist's orgasm. Sensory overload. Everything you ever wanted...and nothing you can't find.
Be all. End all.
It is the definition of superlative.
There is no end to the litany of descriptors, to the age old icons,
to the visions, the views, the captions and the quotes.
It is simple chaos.
And all things in between.
Incredibly brilliant architecture.
Breathtaking parks and monuments to greatness.
Endless opportunity and bottomless depravity.
Wit and witless. Charm and ignorance
It's the entire ball of yarn.
Constantly being unravelled and rerolled.
It is Everyman's City.
It is Gotham. It is Camelot.
It is all places betwixt and between.
It may be American on paper..but it's really a Country unto itself.
The vast majority of visitors find it familiar, and happily, feel at home, once the country bumpkin urge to jay-walk is quelled.
New York is the American dream personified.
Greed capitalized. Culture refined. Cuisine defined.
It is the alpha and omega of western style.
It is empathy. Sympathy. Boredom. Indifference.
And especially Patience and Fortitude.
A lesson to be learned on every corner.
A must see - again and again, and once more with feeling!
This is the City your dreams and your nightmares created.
If you don't feel alive here, you're probably not.
It's New York.
New York is the end game.
If it won't work here, it won't work.
Weird. Wired. Wonderful.
An ode to hope and humanity.
Go!
You won't be alone.
Just do it. And do it. And do it again.
3 comments:
I have no desire to do New York but I can understand why people are fascinated with it. My daughter toured New York for one day and can't wait to get back.
Like the way you set up your posts and your poetic style.
When I was growing up in the New Jersey suburbs, I could hop on a local bus and be downtown NYC in twenty minutes. I started going downtown when I was 15, destination: Greenwich Village, circa 1967. It was the BEST. I love seeing these photos. I am not drawn to going back, though. All those buildings and people, and hardly a tree or flower among them.
We didn't see a lot of green space, true, but one that stood out was an inner courtyard within an office complex..It was completely enclosed - all four sides and roof..and filled with about 10 white birch trees, and a carpet of grasses and ferns. It was quite lovely, and obviously, what would have been in that spot before the buildings came. An field of echos.
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