I have never considered myself a "city person". I grew up on Long Island, NY and always lived in the suburbs. We went boating and swimming at the beach and always had a big backyard to go sledding in. When I was 14 years old we moved to Florida. Again to the suburbs. We had a two car garage and a swimming pool in the backyard. We were two minutes from the beach.
Hubby grew up in the city. First, Jackson Heights, than Ridgewood and finally Sunnyside, Queens. He grew up on public transportation...subways, buses, trains. He also moved to Florida at age 14. To the suburbs, but the city was in his blood.
After we were married we moved to NYC and I found that I really did love it. I missed my car and I missed my family but I loved the ability to do anything you wanted. Central Park, museums, restaurants and the theatre. After #1 was born we moved back to Florida to be near our parents and we settled back into life in the suburbs.
This trip to NYC made me realize that the city is now in my blood. We hadn't been back for 4 years so the last time we were there the children were only 2 and 5. This time at almost 7 and 10 it was much more manageable and they were able to really experience all that the city had to offer. We took them to Times Square, Central Park, the Museum of Natural History, China Town, Little Italy, Battery Park, Statue of Liberty from the Staten Island Ferry and of course Sunnyside, our old neighborhood and the same neighborhood that Hubby's cousin and family still live in. Being able to walk to dinner or play at the park or talk to your neighbors on your front stoop was so much fun. The best part of the whole trip? Getting to see the children with their cousins. For five days they all played nonstop. From the moment they woke up until the moment they went to sleep. They swam in hubby's uncles pool in New Rochelle, they ran around and caught firefly's ,they shared ice cream in the park and ran through the sprinklers. They experienced hot dogs and pretzels on the street and climbing the rocks in Central Park. The stared in awe at the big buildings and the even bigger whale in the museum of Natural History.
One night we had the opportunity to go out just with the adults. Hubby's cousin and her husband and hubby and I. We walked down the road to a wine bar and drank a bottle of wine. Then we walked over to a restaurant for muscles. We talked, we laughed, we reminisced about when we were all first married before children, living in NYC. We used to party hard and laugh even harder. This trip made me realize how close we all once were. We've vowed that now that the children are older it can't be 4 years before our next trip. We need to make sure we see them more often. Right now I feel sad. I love living in Florida but I miss the city. I wish our trip would have been just a little bit longer.
