Where I Live

Let me tell you about where I live.

I live in New York City. In NYC there are five boroughs: Manhattan, Bronx, Brooklyn, Queens, and Staten Island. (Although, no one has heard from Staten Island since 1972. We're not even really sure if it's still there.) When you live in NYC, be prepared for people to ask you where you live. Subsequently be prepared to have this seemingly harmless question spawn a plethora of terms that I had not heard in relationship to living space...ever. The following terms will arise when someone mentions their residential status in NYC:

Gentrified.
Bridge and Tunnel.
Hipster.
LES.
UES.
UWS.
LWS.
Yuppies.
Trust Fund Babies.
My Landlord's niece, uncle, sister, or daughter who is taking over my apartment so I have to move out.


This list is not exhaustive, but rest assured that as soon as you mention your neighborhood, people will try to classify you into one or many of these divisions.

I live in Brooklyn. Brooklyn is considered bridge and tunnel because you have to take a bridge and/or tunnel to get to it. For the record, everyone is bridge and tunnel if you live outside of Manhattan. Be prepared to have friends that refuse to go bridge and tunnel to see you if it means they have to leave Manhattan.

Be prepared to immediately drop these friends. No one has been able to live in Manhattan since the 80's and even then, if your rent was affordable, you had to do without luxuries... like heat and windows. And maybe even clean air.

When you live in Brooklyn, you are welcomed by the benevolent folk of Manhattan, but sort of pitied at the same time. These days almost anyone who is under forty and works for the government or is artistically inclined can be found living in Brooklyn. Brooklyn has become acceptable if you give back to the world, either artistically or through civil service... but which neighborhood to choose?!!


I live in Williamsburg. Oh, yes. Now you've figured out where to live, and you have chosen a neighborhood that either impresses or revolts your audience. I told a coworker the other day that we were having a party at my apartment and when he asked which neighborhood I lived in, immediate trepidation overcame him. His response you ask? "I'm not cool enough to hang in Williamsburg." Williamsburg has been gentrified from the neighborhood it once was... all of fifteen years ago (because it takes no time for things to change around these parts). Williamsburg has been likened in recent NY articles to Greenwich Village (or what people remember Greenwich Village to have been thirty years ago). There is an abundance of creative people here, with glasses, facial hair, plaid shirts, and vintage ______. Apparently anything can be vintage with the right window dressing and knowledgable salesgirl. As long as it's old and you put the label "vintage" on it, you can mark up the price by about 200%. I have cracked the code to owning a resale clothing store stocked with sweater vests and Doc Martins from the 90's. Truth be told, if any store owner was really doing their research, they could save a pant load of cash and time from buying back local hipster's clothing and just call my parents in Texas. My dad has been waiting for someone to call and offer him any amount of cash to take on the overalls and Doc Martins that he refuses to let me give to the Salvation Army "just in case".


I live off the Lorimer stop. Here comes the immediate relief, and sometimes pity that people develop when they find out you do not live off of Bedford Ave. Bedford Ave. is exactly one stop before mine. It is exactly three stops from Union Square and one stop from 1st Avenue (Manhattan's LES). I can walk to Bedford Ave. from where I live. In fact, everything in Williamsburg is walkable, but it might as well be on the other side of the bridge, in my very naive opinion. When I get on the train at Union Square, I almost have to sit in a stranger's lap to get a spot. Painfully I wait (and grunt) along with everyone else on the train as we slosh to and fro on this line of steel... until we hit Bedford Ave. Mass exodus takes place as "all the beautiful people" exit the train. Fishnet pantyhose, Nantucket red shorts, and tattoos all escape the line of steel, and the rest of us are left to watch as they make their way up to the North Side of Williamsburg.


I live in a loft. I am immediately cool by proxy because of the people with whom I live (I came late to the party) and where we live (It was decorated when I got here). Two of my roommates speak other languages fluently. One of my roommates can design houses. One is the boss at their job. One knows all about film and things film-ish. I am still trying to find a skill, although since all-things-domestic annoy me and I have no party tricks, I am going to have to think fast. Our building has a landlord who is somewhere between the ages of 17-34, although none of us really know. He himself has many skills, one of which includes hiring a super that likes to grunt at us and a sidekick for the super, who doesn't grunt, but just smiles as we come home to find them painting the stairs for the 17th time this week. Although we never see any progress, we know they have been there due to the brilliant color scheme (brown, lime green, and now back to brown) and the fumes (Surely they are using lead-free paint, right? I mean, WE LIVE IN WILLIAMSBURG. WE DO THINGS ORGANICALLY AROUND HERE!)

If it was eleven years ago today, you would be able to see flames and smoke from the roof of my apartment. I'm glad that I remember where I was on that day, and I'm glad that I wasn't here. I am not brave enough to stay calm and persevere through something like that. Not when it is just a bridge or tunnel away. And so I sit; someone who used to be a Lone Star (State) has now joined an Empire (State). In the wake of horrible tragedy, I remember where I was eleven years ago, but more than ever, I am aware of where I am today. I live in New York City. I am Bridge and Tunnel. I am (gulp) a Hipster. I live in Brooklyn. I live in Williamsburg. I live off the Lorimer stop. I live in a loft. I am home.