PYHO: Coming Home...

As I begin to write this, the song "Coming Home" by Diddy who was once P. Diddy and is now Diddy- Dirty Money runs through my head.  It's all about returning home to the place where you came from - going back to your origins, your roots.  At least that's how I'm reading it.   I'm feeling a little nostalgic as the song's chorus goes through my head.  Maybe because soon I will be returning home.


In about 24 hours, we are heading back to New York City, a place that was once home.  I'm excited to be going. I'm excited to see old friends and their families.  I'm excited for the boys to see the city again, and to soak in the city's energy.  They're old enough now to retain the memories.  Hopefully the busyness and the constant noise of the city won't affect them too much.  I'm looking forward to revisiting and getting reacquainted with the place that was home to me for over thirty years.


It's been almost two years - 21 months to be exact - since I've been back there.   Things most likely have changed.  We already know that The Husband's favorite Cuban-Chinese restaurant, La Caridad's located on the Upper West Side is no longer there.  We had several dates there -- it was a favorite haunt of ours.  And I've heard that the Barnes & Nobles where I used to frequent a lot is no longer on 66th and Broadway.  It's closed.  That bookstore was a second home to me.   Hopefully the one on 84th store is still in existence.


Like I'm really not trying to be sentimental, and yet here I am, close to tears.  I think of a line from the movie, Grosse Pointe Blank, where John Cusack says "Well...you can't go home again, but at least you can shop there."  It's one of the funniest lines in the movie, especially because he pulls up in front of his old house and it's been turned into a little mini-mart along the lines of a 7-Eleven.  That line resonates with me because it expresses the point so well that things change, and home won't be exactly what it was when you were living there.  I feel that way about New York City.  Home is no longer what it once was.   And that's usual and pretty typical of any place where we've spent our childhood and early adult years.  And yet I'm still affected...


I love that my two older boys get to see NYC again...to see the subways that they talk about often and love .  They'll actually get to ride them, now and remember the experience.   Hopefully we'll make it up to the Bronx and the neighborhood where I grew up and where the Grandma still lives and I can show them the house I grew up in.  We can show them the new Yankee Stadium and they can ride that 4 train past it just like they see on t.v. when we watch the Yankees play baseball at their home stadium.


I'm looking forward to walking along Riverside Dr. near Grant's tomb and Riverside Church  - the area where I used to work and the setting of one of my novels.   Maybe we'll hit the Chelsea area of Manhattan where I used to live as a single woman, where The Husband courted me for a year.  We'll see those restaurants and diners along 23rd Street where we used to have lunches and dinners - is  the Empire Diner still there on 23rd and 10th Avenue?


As I write this, an anxious pit settles in my stomach.  What else has changed?  What places will we go to that will not be there anymore?  Because, truthfully when those places close - the La Caridads, the Barnes & Nobles' - those symbols of our old life, the slices of evidence of what we used to do and where we used to be back then, disappears as well.  All we're left with is the memories-- and the memories tend to get fuzzy over time.   I mean, I rely on those symbols to rekindle the old memories.  I need to see Grant's Tomb because it triggers my memories of the days when I worked near there.   Otherwise, I begin to forget what it was like back then, and I don't want to forget.  I don't want to forget the place where I came from, grew up in, and lived a good part of my adult life in.


So...I'll try to go with no expectations, just an open mind to the way the Bronx and Manhattan I used to live, work and breathe in - is now.   Enjoy the city as it is, with the Husband and the boys.  Can't wait to show the boys the big public library on 5th Avenue between 40th & 42nd streets with the two big stone lions sitting in front.  With the few days we have there, I'll soak in the city, enjoy it and take a package of Kleenex with me to carry along the way because, you know, The Husband might just get teary-eyed.  
:-))