Um yeah bye

OCTOBER 20, 2022

        When I was seventeen, I woke up at 6:00 a.m. and I moved to New York. I carried my trinkets, my clothes, and my memories to the sixth floor of my new West Village apartment and I placed them within 400 square feet of emptiness. I said goodbye to my dad, I shut the door behind him, and I climbed on to the crumpled plastic of my new mattress to cry.

        I spent two years preparing that goodbye. Looking for apartments between Google searches like “Fashion Internship NYC” and “How to tell if an Aries man loves you.” I was moving to New York for a career and a boyfriend, neither of which I had, but desire and a few friends were enough incentive.

        When I was twelve I made plans to move to Paris and I thankfully transcribed them in my journal. “When I turn thirteen, I am going to move to Paris to invest in Chanel and eat scones.” I had never visited Paris and scones originated in Scotland, however, that was the life I imagined. I had never imagined a life in Manhattan, but at least I had visited and was old enough to realize any expectations as unrealistic.

        The most unrealistic expectations began with a “cool” boyfriend and a career that required minimal effort. I wanted a job that would allow me time to party, and ponder, and spend time with this future boyfriend, and the few friends I moved for.

        When thirty days had gone by and I didn’t have the job or the man, my schedule was quite free. Giving me time to learn how to ride the subway.

        I was always jet-lagged in New York. I never woke up before 1:00 p.m. and I always called a car or a cab. Most of the time, I had no idea where I was. The city was for occasions—Christmas, my birthday, a good party, and a male prospect. I had never spent a New York day in productivity or cognizance.

        I learned how to make myself seem desirable on a job application and on Raya. I followed Sally Brompton’s Free Daily Horoscope in the Post blindly. I journaled five times a day. I bought “groceries” (cookies and bagels) at Citarella to feel “normal.” I learned how to drink, and I became quite good at that.

         I spent most week nights alone in my apartment, stoned out of my mind, FaceTuning my Raya photos to perfection, thinking I was one step closer.

        Blissfully unaware that any man who wanted me based on a well-curated slideshow of altered images, set to Carly Simon’s “You’re So Vain,” would never be a cool boyfriend. Not mine at least. He would be just as stupid as the 12-year-old who wanted to invest in Chanel and eat scones, and the 18-year-old that never wanted to say goodbye in the first place.

        I spent my last year of adolescence alone in New York. Screaming and crying on my rooftop. Believing Sally Brompton was God. Buying the cheapest Amtrak tickets to anywhere else at the first sight of betrayal. Eating bagels, cookies, and nothing more.  Spending my first and last dollars on the skimpiest Margiela dresses I could find. Hoping all of this would spare me from another big “goodbye.”

        It didn’t spare me and it never could’ve. It only led me to smaller endings. Goodbye, little by little, one step at a time. Goodbye to avoidance. Goodbye irrationality. Goodbye to fear. Goodbye to adolescence. Goodbye to my delusions. Goodbye, Citarella. Goodbye, Sally. Goodbye altered images and altered mind. Goodbye West Village. Goodbye emptiness. Goodbye, to 12-year-old Bella and to 18-year-old Bella. Goodbye to all that.