I could be the poster child for Change.  My life is this non linear succession of jobs I’ve held, experiences I’ve lived, places I’ve been and relationships that didn’t prosper.

The sole constant amidst these changes was my interest in broadcasting.  The only problem was that I looked at broadcasting the same way an inexperienced acrobat looks down at the trapeze she has to jump on to for the first time; with fear and sweaty palms.  I had a business degree, no journalistic background and no contacts in the industry.  Those shortcomings constituted an abyss that neither myself nor the trapezist within were ready to leap. So instead I took off and began an international career. But at the end of the day, Splenda is just a substitute and it came a point where sugar was what I craved. I had to give a valid shot at my dream, however elusive that dream was.  So once again I packed my bags and this time headed to the Big Apple.

Ironically I used to think of NYC as this gritty, dirty place where too many people shared the same oxygen, but I was turning 25 in a matter of months and I figured the hell with it!  After all, it was NYC, the financial capital of the world, the magical place where one walks down the street and ‘gets discovered’. It’s the place where imposing buildings rise from the ground and pierce the sky; where clandestine posh lounges are strategically sequestered between seemingly abandoned dodgy buildings. It is where a 10 foot poster of P. Diddy greets incoming tourists on Times Square. After all it is New York City, so I came; I saw and was ensorcelled…

Transitioning in this fast paced environment and getting a crash course on the true measure of ‘the New York minute’ was fascinating.  First there was the search for an apartment and it became clear really early on that ‘space’ was a nebulous concept.  On my quest for a pied-a-terre, I saw all sorts of canisters posing as apartments. Baroque constructs with no windows; apartments with no living rooms and no closets with unapologetic astronomical rents. I even saw a place with the shower in the kitchen…That display gave new meaning to ‘convenience’. The frenzy of the house search aside, other realizations had me bewildered; the size of the rats in the subway for instance.  I recall being at the Canal street station and spotting a mammoth size rodent trotting about, and I wondered how come the city despite all the taxes they levied from people like me, couldn’t afford strong enough pesticides to get rid of the rat problem.  

My thoughts didn’t stay focused on the pest for too long, something else captured my attention. A bona fide subway singer was exhaling jazz tunes in the middle of the platform. His eyes closed, his palms extended and a hat, garnished by a few dollars in front of him.  Such a display wasn’t unusual.  Those who couldn’t afford the rent or were victims of the treacherous ways of life, still tried to make ends meet by either openly begging for money or attempting to entertain ambivalent commuters from subway cart to subway cart.  I wondered how much the subway singers earned.
 
My reflections on the state of the subways and whether or not underground performers evaded taxes never lasted too long. There was too much visual stimulus, too many restaurants, museums, too many Broadway shows and random celebrity sightings to analyze one peculiar occurrence for too long.  The city had vibrancy and life.  I was dating a soon-to-be neurosurgeon and having escargot for dinner at French Restaurants. NYC had me spellbound. The train ran all night, and got too crowded during the day. People of all creed, race and background roamed about the city.

Although many isolated themselves behind huge sunglasses or visible ipods and resolutely avoided eye contact, they were still connected. They were all New Yorkers, all immersed in this accelerated, swift changing flow that was life in the NYC. As the city lights kept burning while taxi drivers raced through intersections, my relationship crumbled and I turned 25.  I dried my tears, blew out a candle and rushed to work.  The story of my life simultaneously rolling along side that of 8 million others; they and I crossing each others’ paths and without making eye contact, sustaining the pulse of this dirty, gritty, amazing city. It’s definite, I’ve officially began my sex in the city life...