How I'm a New Yorker

Okay, okay, okay. So, I wasn't born in New York nor did I grow up there. Well, I didn't spend my childhood there, but I did learn a lot there during my late twenties and early thirties. I claim that, after having lived in Queens and worked and played in Manhattan for eight years, that I am a New Yorker. Talk to any New Yorker and they will tell you that I fit the criteria ... Well, anyone who has lived there eight years. :-)

I never anticipated living in New York. When I was in high school and I went to NYC to visit my boyfriend at the time's relatives, I was a little intimidated by it. When I left graduate school to take a job in New York, I was apprehensive. I had taken the job in NY because I couldn't get a job in technology in Boston. My boyfriend (who was in Boston at the time)'s and my plan was: I would work in NYC for a year and then either transfer to my company's Boston branch or quit and find another tech job in Boston. Within three months of moving to the Big Apple, however, I broke up with my Beantown beau (who, incidentally, was cheating on me with some girl in Boston anyway), hooked up with another guy and discovered how wonderful NYC life could be. Fast forward eight years later: I was offered a job at a Silicon Valley company and I wrestled with the question as to whether I was done with New York.

After a couple of years and another line on my résumé, I figured, I could always move back.

Yeah, I had no idea that New York wasn't quite done with me ...

In the immortal words of Madonna:

I don't like cities, but I like New York
Other places make me feel like a dork
Los Angeles is for people who sleep
Paris and London, baby you can keep

Baby you can keep (repeat 8x)

[Chorus:]
Other cities always make me mad
Other places always make me sad
No other city ever made me glad
Except New York
I love New York
I love New York
I love New York

If you don't like my attitude, then you can F-off
Just go to Texas, isn't that where they golf?
New York is not for little pussies who scream
If you can't stand the heat, then get off my street

Get off my street (repeat 8x)

[Chorus]

(Get off my street) (repeat 15x)