It's real hard sometimes

Ever moved around? 

Spent a chunk of time, years, maybe in places other than where you grew up? 

I lived in NYC for a good length of time and sometimes I'll dream about it...and when I wake up my heart hurts.  It's like a breakup that still haunts me.  

While there are a zillion reasons I am glad I don't live there right now (like how I hate a crowded subway, how you can't be sure the subway won't stop for an hour underground and make you late, how you have to walk everywhere in the dead of winter through snow up to your shins, or in the middle of summer and after five minutes your hair is frizzy and makeup running down your face, how you really can't have a car so there's no such as thing as a leisurely drive to the grocery store...etc.) I sure do miss it at times.  

There's a part of me that feels like I was a completely different person when I lived there.  I can't quite remember what it felt like...I can't quite believe that was me.  Maybe that's part of what haunts me.  Every day that time in my life slips further away and I'm afraid to lose those memories and what it all felt like.  It truly was "the best of times and the worst of times"! I've never grown so much as I did during that time.  I was a baby then but I was fearless and adventurous and thought I knew everything there was to know in the world.  

I had my heart broken beyond belief...a boy who left me and in me leaving the city itself.  

It's SO funny where life takes you! I have not had many times in my life where I feel settled, where I feel home.  Where I am in my life at this very moment is only the second time I've ever felt it, the first being the childhood house I grew up in.  A lot of it has to do with being married and living in my own house now.  I am in love with my life.  I'm very lucky and I am amazed at how fortunate I am every day.  

Yet a restless part of me exists that will never go away.  It's me.  

It's a good thing.  

I'm not sure what I'm trying to say here...or sure I know how.  I guess I feel like my precious time in nyc is like I once lived another persons life and have a zillion experiences in me tucked away in a hidden place...like I have a secret and nobody knows.  I guess I just wanted to say exactly that.  

That my heart still breaks over nyc in the greatest and hardest way...and I never want that feeling to fade.   Even when it hurts I'm aware that it's there, and that was me, and that was my life, and I couldn't be prouder of all that I achieved and went through in that strange city. ..

xoxo Deena Marie