NEW YORK

I think I just realized that I live in New York…

Yes, I’ve been here since I returned from my sabbatical. Yes I had all my belongings moved here and gave up my apartment at the end of January. But it’s not until now, on the train from Rensselaer to Penn Station — running along the beauty that is the Hudson — that I realize, I’m a New Yorker!

Friends ask me “Do I miss Boston?” and the answer is, no, yes, and sometimes. A friend said it best “it’s bittersweet”.

For the last year and a half (maybe longer) I started to long to live outside the ‘city’. To have a detached house, a yard, a driveway. Perhaps it was my 40s calling “settle down.” Or maybe it was growing up in Marblehead, a suburb 20 miles north of Boston that is the picture perfect New England town, calling me back to my roots.

But in any case, I’m truly appreciating many things this move has afforded me. And yes, there are things I’m missing (and will begin to miss) about my life in good old Bean Town.

I was in my apartment in the South End for 10 years, and in Boston for 15. The South End had become my home. Living within a 10-block radius, it had all that I needed. Work, shopping, Starbucks, a gay gym, a florist, a dry cleaner, and (most of all) an abundance of friends. But over a 15-year span the South End had begun to change — as did I. No longer was I the 25-year-old 'twink' running from party to party and event to event. I had matured. And along with friends moving out of the Gayborhood came my desire to move out of Boston and into the next phase of my own life. But where would that be?

My Sabbatical was in part a much-needed rest from 17 years of work. But it was also an opportunity to see friends across the country — as well as many cities I had never visited (or not previously with the lens of possibly living in one). But never did I expect NY, upstate no less, to become my next home. But what comes love…

And as far as NY — I couldn’t live here without the Hudson. Without Washington Park. Without Empire Plaza. Without establishing a strong friend base and a landing place for my 12-step work.

So today I am on the train running along the Hudson…one gorgeous vista after another. So much unscarred land, a few towns and houses scatter the landscape. Campgrounds. Farms. An occasional bridge. A tugboat pulling a barge. Geese lingering by the riverbed. It’s beautiful, even though the sky and thus the river grey. I can’t imagine how beautiful it will be when the trees are in full bloom and the sky crystal clear, as it will be later in spring or summer.

Today I will visit with friends in NYC, and tonight Denny Camino’s art opening in Tribeca. DJ will drive and meet me in the city tonight after work, and he’ll take tomorrow off for some ‘big city fun’.

And after our time in good ole New York, back we will go upstate, home to our house, our yard, our friends, and our life in the Capital City.