Happy Anniversary!

So yesterday was our one year in New York moment. We arrived at 11:30 at night to a less than favorable situation (as I'm sure most of you have heard the story, I'm not allowed to write it), exhausted from the flight and emotionally drained from the airport goodbyes with my family. The description of crying zombies still makes us laugh until today. It has been everything that I expected and at the same time so much more different than I had imagined. It still feels pretty new to me as I really feel like I've only been out here for six months. That's when things changed for me. Previously I was living like the walking dead. Eyes open but not quite there. Anyway, this being a celebration we needed to find the most New York thing we could think of to celebrate. We ended up having an impromptu dinner and drinks with friends, which is always a positive sign in an experience like this. Having friends is after all something that helps one to feel settled. Then we went up the Empire State Building at midnight. I still couldn't believe that there was a slight queue at that time, but the main thing was that I couldn't believe how long the queue would be during the day. There wasn't an express lane we had to walk the barriers as normal and it was a long walk! Seriously if you come to visit do it at night. 

So I'll leave you with our highlights of the year.

Hipster-Dufus

1. The spirit of enterprise that exists here. You all know how much he loves food and quirky things and NY really encourages you to try a business idea and make it happen. If you take away the big gross chains the individual restaurants, stores, grocery shops and boutiques are definitely more than in the UK (sorry UK). 

2. Tulum, Mexico because that's when I stopped being depressed. No lie. 

3. Stepping through the building at the UN. Sitting in the security council was definitely a highligh for him. Especially as he remembers seeing his father's UN passport as a child and wanting the same adventure for himself. (Not that any of this information was given to me freely, I had to decipher it from grunts and nods).

Me:

1. Living in Midtown. You have no idea how lucky we are to live in Manhattan. A reality that is virtually impossible for most. And while I wouldn't have picked this as the area to live in, it's great to live somewhere that's so close to all the tourist things to remind me that this is where I live. 

2. My job at the New York Historical Society. I came here for a reason, my career and when I got this job I felt like I was moving forward and actually improving. I love this job. 

3. Tulum, Mexico. That's the moment I stopped being depressed, that things changed, I got a job, I met people and I started to settle in.