New York Now

The ten things I have noticed about New York City since I lived here back when I was a younger man.

1) Central Park is crawling with raccoons. In broad daylight, they forage through trash receptacles and eat like pigs. They are cute. They are like our local pets.

2) Really rich people take themselves very seriously. This behavior would not fly so well on the West Coast.

3) Manhattan has lost its young generation of artists. With an older, less-risk-taking crowd, the island has become safer, easier to manage and better maintained. But less interesting. However, it is comforting to know that if you are crawling the streets at 4AM, chances are you will not get bopped over the head.

4) There are still dive bars and they are still very cheap.

5) Outer boroughs have become perfectly fine places to move to. Though Queens is still not considered that hip. Brooklyn, while hip, is almost ludicrous.

6) People work hard in the way that people used to always work hard. In Los Angeles, people work toward big pay outs. In New York, people sell, sell, sell so they can buy, buy buy. Endlessly.

7) There is so much water here.

8) The flora is truly lovely. The trees are extremely old and large.

9) The sound systems in most movie theatres could use upgrading.

10) Most people in New York do realize that it is just one place and not THE place any longer. However, it is amazing to listen to the smug narcissism that spews forth…I mean, the depth of narcissism a person must be gripped with to still feel like the center of the universe when there are all those other people around—stops the mind.