leave New York

Leaving March 31 – bought my plane ticket and already mailed some things back home.

It’s almost over.

I’m leaving.

April 6th is the end of the NYC chapter in my life.

I’m packing up my place – and telling my friends one by one.

It’s kind of bittersweet – but I feel relieved at the same time.

It’s really coming to an end – I took a bite of the Apple – and now I’m spitting it out….

I can’t say that I’ll never ever leave New York – but for now I’m staying.

For the past 19 months I have been going back and forth – should I stay or should I go? And I thought I had reached my final decision to leave in February. But every time I thought about leaving I didn’t feel sure – I felt panicked.

And that’s when I realized that I wasn’t ready to leave. I came to New York with a whole list of things that I wanted to do and see and experience. And in being honest with myself I realized that I hadn’t done that. I had merely been staying here – but I haven’t been living here. I really hadn’t tried.

In knowing that, I felt that I couldn’t leave until I had really given my all to the experience. If and when I leave New York I want to leave proud – knowing that I did all that I said I was going to do. Or at least went down trying. And that’s my final answer :o)

I can hardly put into words how peaceful I finally feel with my decision.

So I’m giving up on this goal for – and I’m going to stick it out.

It always had been my dream to live in New York City. And now, after being here for over a year, all I want to do is leave.

For the last few days, I’ve been trying to find a resonably priced plane ticket so that I can fly home for a short visit with my family. All the tickets that I’ve come across are ridiculously high priced. And it’s frustrating. My mom’s helping me look and I’m so tempted to call her and tell her to just forget the whole thing.

All I keep thinking is that it’s so not worth it. All this time and energy spent on trying to fly home. The trip is less than a week and it’s going to take me that much time to get back into my routine and stop being sad that I had to {once again} leave my loved ones behind. I can’t look anymore. All I keep thinking is that I wouldn’t be here struggling to find a way home if I never would have left home in the first place.

I really hate to admit this to myself, but I regret ever coming here. It’s been hard and disappointing. Hard to find a job. Hard to make friends, even after a year. Hard to get used to the rudeness and face pace. I honestly thought that if I believed in myself that I could “make it” here. I could live out my glamorous dream. Now I can see how foolish I was.

Just some friendly advice: If you want to move here, you better have a whole lot of money and a whole lot of friends. Because if you’re out here on your own, you will see first-hand how glamorous this city is NOT. As thankful as I am to have met some of the people that I’ve met and experienced some of the things that I wouldn’t have otherwise, if I had to do it all over again, knowing what I know now, I wouldn’t. City life is not for me and that becomes more apparent everyday.

I’ve made up my mind that I am definitely leaving. A part of me feels down on myself. Maybe I could have made it work if I had just tried hard enough. But another part of me knows that I did the best that I could. And it’s just not working. Overall, I’m not happy living here. And right now, I feel like I’m just planning my escape.