Being Back Home Isn’t Ever What You Think It Will Be

The city’s energy rises around me as soon as we enter, pulsing, buzzing, beating like a heart. I’m in a cab on the way to a reading for my book, Crooked Lines. I am trying to decide if I could live here again.

New York, in all its glory, looms over and around me, concrete, loud and never still. When I lived here many years ago, the energy made me feel like an adventure was always around the corner.

After living in the Midwest for longer than I ever imagined, I am almost a stranger here. Driving around midtown or the upper west side, it feels congested, like there are too many people on the streets.

At home, when I walk around the lake near my house, I may see seven or eight people; rarely more. Here, people are everywhere, and it’s all I can do to keep from running into them.

I am here not only for a book reading; I am here to see my sister, who is struggling with a variety of health issues. I am here to see friends and relatives and have spent a few days with my son and his family outside the city. Now it is New York’s turn, and I am up for that.

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Photo by Michael Discenza on Unsplash