chron·i·cles: Sally Forth!

                I'm in a Boston state of mind.


This post is coming to you weeks later than I had intended. Life went and got all crazy on me. You see, there were goodbyes to dispense and lots of packing to do, followed by a whole lot of unpacking and even more hellos than there were goodbyes. PLUS, we started our life here in Boston with two weeks of overnight guests and tons of city exploration! Boy, are we tired!

Today, I am dedicating to you! We are going to get you all caught up on this whirlwind adventure we're on. Excited? You should be! I know I am :)

To start, here is the nostalgia-soaked goodbye letter I penned instead of _____ (fill in the blank). There are so many damn things to do when you move states and I postponed every single one of them because I'm a dirty little fun have-er now. I've come a long way, wouldn't you say?!




Surprised that this gung-ho New York chick is leaving Manhattan? Yeah well, me too. There is obviously so much to love about this city and I have dedicated the last two years of my life to experiencing (and blogging about!) absolutely everything in it I could. And I have had some seriously good times! More than my fair share I'd say and in the process have come so far from being that broken girl I once was. I was warned when I moved here that New York could be a very lonely place - that even with its millions of inhabitants it can be hard to meet people and to make genuine connections and friends. This is in no way the city I have come to know. My New York is the most welcoming place on earth. 'Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.' The Statue of Liberty, she don't lie and I see now that on the day I arrived she was speaking to me too. What that poem should continue on to say is that beyond taking you in, New York will make you strong. It will challenge you every day and make you fight for what you believe you have earned. With all the options this city provides, it will also force you to have an opinion and will demand to know what you really want. It will make you actively seek the life you feel you deserve. There is no room here for a passive existence. 

There is a great school of thought that claims a community, no matter how big or small (a country, a city, hell... a family), will somehow naturally define itself within a single word. The citizens of Italy, for example, have somehow collectively blanketed themselves with the word 'Sex.' Italians are generally sexy people (don't you dare disagree) and motivated by passion. Its who they are as a people and they do nothing to stop the world from seeing them this way. The people of New York then, it is said, are collectively empowered by the word 'Succeed." We are all here trying to make it. Trying to get something accomplished. Trying to better ourselves and the lives of our families and friends. This theory goes so far as to say that if your personal word, the word that beats in your individual heart, does not match the community you are in, you will never truly feel as though you belong. Success. I most definitely dance to that drummer. 

Cristina and I first rolled over this topic almost two years ago when our friendship first began. We had decided that our individual words were very similar though the connotations behind them put a mile between us. She is 'Discover.' She stumbles through the world often without direction and comes eagerly upon new experiences as if simply by chance. Sometimes she feels like an explorer out seeking a meaning to her life, but more often she trusts that no matter what path she's on she'll inevitably find something to treasure. My word, 'Learn,' is much more structured. I no longer wander. Instead, I analyze, evaluate and take on the world decidedly. I have a goal, I see chapters and I feel successful and somehow more wise every time I flip a page.

But I'm starting to think that my defining word has changed. 'Learn' was definitely my word back then and may very well have been all my life, but being a New Yorker has changed me. Hell, turning 30 alone has changed me! No longer does it feel like everything requires study, concentration and effort. Having already squeezed into my short life a terminally ill papa and losing him before his 39th birthday; a family riddled with drug addiction and their constant threat of catastrophic poverty; a world-class lair of a husband who pretended to have a job for years and who once cut off by his wealthy family let our home be just about foreclosed upon; the bankruptcy and divorce that followed; and my own battles with health, I feel now that I am indestructible. Writing all that out... man, does that sounds like a story Jerry Springer would salivate over, or what?

Standing here now, thanks in part to my happy years in New York City, what I take away from my life thus far is: the unshakeable truth that my daddy was an incredible man and I was so lucky to have known him at all. (Not generally a poetic man, the advice he left behind for my brother, sister and myself - to "live your life with force" has given my days purpose even when entire years felt hopeless.) I completely accept my family now for who they are today and though I can see a clear path for them out of their addictions and into what I would consider a happier life, I understand that there is little more that I can do to fix them and that beyond constantly reminding them that I am here to walk the steps with them to sobriety, I have resolved to simply enjoy what time I do have left with them. For the family members that are doing well - I'm so excited to be a bigger part of their good times! My former husband? I have let go of him and the pain he has caused. In saying goodbye to him for good, I have left behind all the fears that something terrible is still simmering beneath every bit of happiness I manage to find. I take away from my years with him a new found strength, one that initially carried me through those early months of shock and misery and then onward through bankruptcy and finally here, where not only have I recovered financially but now stand with a masterful understanding of credit and how to improve it in America. Like everything else now in my life, I am proactive about my health and thankfully feel pretty great. 

New York and I are one in the same. 

We get beat up and at times completely torn down, but we always bounce back and our newly rebuilt selves are stronger and more organized and streamlined than ever before. We are a place where a million conflicting needs and desires can somehow co-exist. We are seen by others as an entity constantly in motion, but what others do not immediately know is that we can always find a quiet corner within ourselves where we can go to be still. New York and I, we burn with a constant desire to push forward and still we take the time to smile wide in moments of peace because we know that we have earned them. Glance just beneath our steel facade and you'll see romance and magic and an ocean of pride and nostalgia. 

No doubt, I will miss it here and the people I have come to love, but I am ready to go. New York has given me all the strength and self awareness I will need for this next chapter in my life, one that I hope will add an equal partnership in marriage to this sweet love that Matt and I share and will bring us a million little babies. I hope that moving home after all these years will feel good and that I not only keep with me this positivity and joy for life that I have found out here in the world, but can also find a way to infect my disheartened family with the same.

Thank you, New York, for being a place that allows me to define myself as anything I want to be. Thank you, Matt, for showing me how much fun having fun can really be and for letting me stop trying to be so perfect all the time and for loving me just the way I am. Thank you for being everything I need in a man and for growing in the same direction I am growing. I just deleted a sentence - that I "can't wait to start our lives together." I deleted it because we started it years ago. We are living it together every day and I am so grateful to have found my match. Thank you for working all these hours to build a more stable future for us. I recognize that we are lifestyle people and that we value our time together and with friends over everything else. Time is the most precious commodity to us and you give it up every day because you love me. I won't ever forget that and I promise to deserve this sacrifice. I can't promise that it will always be easy, but I can promise that nothing will break us.