I am moving back to New York on Thursday and I’m excited to (re)start there with a bang: a social gathering, a party, and a protest all within the first weekend. But beyond that, I can’t say I’m enthused about heading back. In fact, I was in the city overnight last weekend and though I was very happy to hang out with friends, New York itself did nothing for me. I did not feel even a slight thrill to be back amongst the skyscrapers and yellow cabs and sidewalks overflowing with people. Just a resigned, “Alright, fine, let’s do this.”

So… clearly I need an attitude adjustment and to remind myself of what I have to look forward to in the city. Off the top of my head:

• Being close to my friends and family and being able to squeeze my niece and nephew, who live an hour away.
• Picking out books at Albertine, the lovely French bookstore, and at my favorite used bookstore in Prospect Heights.
• Having fewer language-based misunderstandings than in Senegal or France.
• Visiting the next exhibit at the Met’s Costume Institute, which opens in May.
• Storing my bike at my friend’s place in the Bronx so we can go on impromptu adventures together.
• Having hundreds of movies to choose from in theaters, and not having to confirm that they’re not overdubbed in French.
• Being eligible for the jobs I most want. (In Paris I did not even bother trying to break into the French documentary industry because I was too intimidated by my imperfect French.)
• The ubiquity of clean and well-equipped public bathrooms – as well as private ones you can easily sneak into – so that you need never walk around with a full bladder or pay to pee.
• The Lower East Side Tenement Museum, my soul mate institution.
• Gluten-free pizza is relatively abundant.
• There’s a volunteer oral history recording project I’m excited to get involved in.
• I can become more deeply involved in the “Resistance,” as the expat Americans activist group I was part of in Paris calls it.
• Weaving classes at Brooklyn Brainery (I decided I wanted to learn to weave while living two blocks from this studio and never went. Senegal re-inspired me, and I finally took a class last year in London and loved it.)
• Driving my parents’ cars when I’m in the suburbs – it’s been way too long since I’ve been behind the wheel.
• Picking back up where I left off with my Spanish learning and being able to practice with NYC residents.
• Going back to New York as a French speaker and someone who, on a good day, can call myself bilingual.

I suppose that was somewhat refreshing…

I won’t bother listing what I’m not looking forward to – what’s the point of being negative about it?