There are a lot of things I love about Ohio, neither ironically nor just out of sentimentality for the first twenty-four years of my life. Of course because my family and my lifelong friends live there, but also because the people are kinder, everything’s wildly inexpensive, and it’s just generally easier to exist there in the wide-open spaces. The cool things in Ohio seem cooler because they’re undiluted by a million other cool things around them, you know?
But after the most perfectly Ohio goodbye with a lunch at The Cheesecake Factory with my best friend and our friends Erin and Jenn, I came back to NYC on Saturday afternoon, and the city felt welcoming for once. My plane flew way up past the airport in Queens over the Bronx and City Island, over sailboats sprinkled in Pelham Bay, over tiny islands I’ve never seen before with a single house on each one. Pea Island! Goose Island! Hog Island! Kamran and I walked to Grand Central to shop once I arrived at his apartment, and the employees at Banana Republic were extra nice, the desserts at Financier were extra delicious, the cheese selection at Murray’s was extra impressive. We ordered organic grass-fed burgers for dinner, which you have a hard time finding in the grocery store in Ohio, let alone have them delivered to your house for free by a man on a bike. And then we stayed up all night watching ancient episodes of “X-Files” in which people wear pink eye makeup.
On Sunday, a Mila Kunis/Zoe Saldana/Marion Cotillard/Clive Owen/Billy Crudup movie was filming outside Kamran’s building, which we only figured out when we realized we’d been hearing squealing tires on the street below for three hours straight. The modern street signs had been pasted over with “Knickerbocker Ave.” and “54th St.”, and 70s-era cars filled the parking spaces while cops in old-fashioned uniforms staged a chase between them.
There was a rainbow over the United Nations building, which we attempted to follow to the river but lost somewhere between 43rd and 51st Streets. The sky in general was brooding and bright blue at the same time and somehow more expansive than it’s ever seemed. The French pastry place was closed and the Jamba Juice was closed, but we found a restaurant specializing in Indian kati rolls and stopped by Crumbs for cupcakes, and everything was more delicious than ever. And we went to our grocery store that only has natural and organic products, and we ordered dinner from our usual favourites that don’t exist in Ohio, and it felt like this place missed me.
I love Ohio, and I love NY, and they’re almost complete opposites, but I still think of them both as home.
12 Comments
Welcome back!
I think both places sound amazing. I’ve only lived in sort of in-between places, not-that-uncool-but-not-THAT-cool-cities, and I’d love to live in a really big city with organic grass-fed burgers and movie sets someday.
So jealous of your delivery food and organic heaven. I’m also super jealous of that pumpkin festival. I have to say, you’ve got two amazing homes.
This totally reminds me of Sweet Home Alabama. Maybe you could just fly south for the winter?
I missed you! Your snark, your wit, but most of all your writing. As beautiful as your photographs are Katie (and they are) it’s your way with words that leaves me breathless.
XO
Daaaaaang, lady, this comment made my day.
I’m heading to visit my buddies in Ohio next week. Can’t wait. It’s the perfect place to just go and do nothing. (Well, unless you count drinking heavily as “something.”)
Stop it with these amazing photos already, would you?
Just stop.
No, really don’t. I’d be lost with out them.
OK, I need to know how you’re getting skies like those in your photos. Seriously, email me.
It’s sooooo funny you say that, because I feel like the NYC sky is overcast and white 90% of the time. It just happened to be interesting this day! These were taken on an iPhone, so nothin’ fancy.
I was so prepared for this post to be all about how much greater Ohio is than New York, because I consider posts like that a win for my team. (We have Netflix here, too, you know!)
But I guess I’m glad that you’re happy in the city where you live.
MISS YOU!
I always assumed that at some point in my life I’d live in a big, hip city, though I never really imagined myself in New York – except once, in 2003.
Obviously, the chances of a change like seem increasingly small … however: If I suddenly get dumped, I’d say you have a pretty decent chance of a third roommate. Jack wouldn’t mind, would he?
There are many (sometimes conflicting) parts that make up the cigarette smoking man (or woman) in all of us, U.M.
*cough cough*
The truth is out there.