Why I don’t like living in New York
April 14, 2008 – 4:43 pmSo if you know me, you’ve probably heard me say more than once that I hate living in New York. If you don’t know me, I’ll say it again for your benefit. I hate. living. in. New York.
What?! But its the city of lights! Its the city that never sleeps! The theater! The culture! WHAT?!
I know. It’s hard to grasp. I’ll give you a moment before I continue.
Better? Ok, I’ll continue. For a long while, I kept bitching about living in New York without giving much thought as to why. It became a huge polarizing topic with certain friends of mine and none of them could get how I could ever hate New York. I got a lot of “oh give it time, it will grow on you” speeches. A year and some change later, it has yet to grow on me and I still dislike it as much as I did before. Over the past week I’ve given a lot of thought to why some love this place and why I hate it so much. It comes down to this: values and Quality of Life.
Let me give you a bit of background. I lived in what could arguably be called a suburban area of Alaska for 12 or so years. Before that I lived in the suburbs of Miami and before that the suburbs of Clovis, New Mexico. Suffice to say I am a suburban girl. I like trees, I like being able to hop in the car and go somewhere, I like being able to walk/bike around with not a lot of worry that some jerkbag cab driver is going to hit me. I also like having a good amount of space in my residence and I like having grass. I like waking up without a lot of noise going on outside me. I value the majority of the things I just listed immensely. I don’t have the things I value so my Quality of Life is low and I’m pretty unhappy with my living situation.
Many of the people who don’t understand why I don’t like living here don’t put a lot of value into those things, yet they enjoy the hustle and bustle of the city. They value the bright lights, the plays, the food options, the “culture.” Thus their Quality of Life in New York is fairly good and they’re relatively happy.
So that’s pretty much that. If you’re a New Yorker reading this and you’re just appalled at the idea that anyone could dislike living here, think about what things make you happy here and then try to understand that those things don’t necessarily make others happy too.
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