TTGI170: "Am I just romanticizing being somewhere else?"
On determining where you should live after college.
K: hi everyone! welcome to the first installment of ttgi170, our brand-new advice column. thank you to everyone who sent in a letter. we each chose one question to answer this month and will be releasing them as separate posts. the second letter, from ebie, is arriving tomorrow. enjoy!
p.s. we’re happy to receive new letters for our march edition at oneseventystories@gmail.com from now until the end of february. <3
💗 on determining where you should live after college.
Hi guys! My question feels a bit simple, but it's something that I've been thinking about for a while now. As a college student still in my hometown, I always feel the urge to move to a different city/state/place. But, I feel held back by the point that I don't know anyone there or if I'm just romanticizing being somewhere else. My question is how should I determine where I'm going to live after college? Should I follow my heart or my brain? Thank you, I love reading about your stories! Much love from Kansas City, Missouri!
K: Love from Kansas City received!!! Thanks for sending in a letter. I’ve actually been thinking a lot about moving, too, since I graduate in four months and make my first big-girl move in six. I am also constantly romanticizing being somewhere else, as you put it, and had something of an epiphany this summer, when I realized New York maybe wasn’t the right place for me immediately after college. Not the most earth-shattering realization to have, but for me, it sort of was. Exiting the faith of New York represented not only a departure from all these Tumblr-addled teenage dreams I once had about my future—the backward decadence of a shitty apartment in the City of the World, wholesale suffering at my disposal for writing projects, the most interesting people in the world for my closest friends—but also a silent acknowledgment that I was never, ever going to find what I was looking for there. (Where, then? I thought to myself. If I can’t find what I’m looking for in New York, the city of cities, does it even exist?)
I think when people say “I’m moving to New York to find myself,” what they really mean is, “I’m moving to New York to fix myself.” (Or Seattle, or Chicago, or LA, or whichever postal code you hang your dreams of perfect living on.) Unfortunately, New York is not in the business of fixing people. On the contrary, most American cities specialize in manufacturing lack in your life. There’s always a taller, thinner, shinier skyscraper you could be living in; always a sexier, more exclusive club you could be invited to. It’s not really that New York is the gathering place of hungry dreamers—you have to admit that the city, for as long as you’re living in it, has a way of keeping your dreams just out of reach.
One of the most peculiar effects of capitalism is the way we now view abstract and immaterial things as material and consumable. Cities, for example, have changed from just places to live and work to these incredibly complex socio-cultural packages, complete with branding, iconography, rituals, and the implicit promise of filling some sort of hole in your life. I’ll keep using New York as a case study, since it’s one of the most popular destinations for new college graduates and my first and only personal “dream city.” A lot of the mythos surrounding New York goes something like: You will find yourself here. You will transform into someone worldly. Purpose will assemble itself into a series of neon-lit arrows, leading you down the path to success. You will become privy to that shared secret of all beautiful people (who all live here), which will also make you beautiful.
So powerful is the spiritual, emotional, and material symbology of New York, that we speedrun everything vaguely pleasant about it into fodder for cultish idolatry and spin everything ugly into nuggets of wisdom worthy of contemplative admiration. Meaning, the good things about New York are amazing, and the bad things are, too: The mentally ill and impoverished people on the streets serve only to further your personal character development. The elderly Asian woman who collects trash in the subway station is a harrowing portrait of The Human Condition for twenty-somethings to photograph and post to their Instagram. The non-livable rent induces an enthusiastic “apartment hunting” culture, wherein you “earn your right” to a windowless, AC-less studio in Manhattan by “fighting” 70 other applicants for it. The rats are lovable in an inside-joke way, the chronically overworked professionals are hustlers, and every grimy night out is shot through with the electric, voyeuristic pleasure of knowing you’re having a night out in New York.
I think we project so much of who we want to be onto these “dream cities,” we forget that the only force strong enough to transform our lives is ourselves. Capitalism is able to harness profound organizational efficacy and influence because it convinces us otherwise. By packaging the most basic and quintessential facets of living—community, purpose, pleasure—into saleable goods, we become workers to our dreams, rather than masters. Think about it: How much of our desire to move to X place is motivated by the invented social status that accompanies it, which we go on to giddily flaunt in our social media bio or geo-tag in our stories? How much of our attraction to these so-called perfect places stems from our obeisance to the narratives that have been spun about them, whether in art or history? As if standing outside the same SoHo bookshop Donna Tartt did before The Secret History was published will grant me her powers, vision, and purpose in this world. As if I don’t still need to hunt for those things on my own.
The systems we live and work under would like to convince us The Good Life is a scarce commodity that comes at a premium. New York is an incredible city, full of cool people, meaningful work, and beautiful moments. But I happen to believe you can find cool people, do meaningful work, and experience beautiful moments almost anywhere else, too. The world is a large and miraculous place. If you feel called to a certain city, I think that’s great! Book a weekend trip, go see what it’s about, validate your gut instincts, etc. Sit on a park bench somewhere, shut your eyes, and try to imagine what your life would look like in this place, while also accepting that there’s no way you can actually know. Most importantly, consider what it is exactly that you’re looking for in a dream city—and check that it’s not something already inside of you.
thanks for reading! TTGI170 (to the girls in 170) is an advice column released on the 1st of every month. ask us anything about love, friendship, fashion, career, life, etc. and we’ll answer in long form. published inquiries will remain 100% anonymous. our inbox is now open for questions at oneseventystories@gmail.com. email us!! we can’t wait.