When I started telling friends and family that we planned to move back to Brooklyn from upstate New York to have our daughter, I was met with equal parts bewilderment and confusion. Wasn’t I doing the opposite of what most families do? Why would we leave our house with a yard for, well, not that? Don’t you want her to have space to run around and play?
But it was a no brainer for me.
I’ll be honest, the move upstate wasn’t exactly my idea. My partner (now husband, AJ) and I had been going back and forth to the Catskills pretty much since the day we met, in February of 2020. We found solace in the space during the prime days of Covid, in which we were navigating the early stages of our relationship while facing an empty, quiet, eerie city and a studio apartment that we (mostly) quarantined together at. If you were here during that time, you know the strangeness. A quiet New York City is like nothing else in the world, ominous and frightening. I would walk back and forth between his place in Bushwick and mine in Williamsburg - although we spent most of our time together, we had only just started dating, and trips back home for more clothes and a small break were necessary, and I was glad to have the escape on occasion.
On those walks it was easy to forget we were facing down an invisible virus, as it felt more like a zombie apocalypse. I was waiting at every turn for something to jump out at me, chase me down, eat me alive. There were some walks in which I didn’t see a single soul. Except, of course, for the block in which I passed a hospital, where instead of living souls I saw dead bodies, piled up, stacked eight feet tall, covered by makeshift tent refrigerators, always with staff wheeling a new one out. Those moments will forever haunt me, the sheer devastation so clear and visible, as I went to my new boyfriend’s house to drink boxed wine and watch movies and figure out how to fill the hours. The lived experiences of that time varied so greatly between people, and the immense guilt of honestly kind of having a nice time hit me like a wall every time I would see that hospital, talk to friends and family working in healthcare, learn of another death. But what else were we to do but go on? So we clapped every night at 7 pm and watched Cuomo’s briefings and sat in the designated social distancing circles at Domino Park. But eventually we would also leave, rent a car and drive to the Catskills to “camp” (RIP Tentrr). We could be in nature, the two of us, hiking or cooking over an open fire, maskless, not really worried about seeing other people. It provided an escape from closed storefronts and empty restaurants and to go cocktails (petition to bring them back!). It was always a nice reprieve amidst the chaos, or, rather, sameness, of the lockdown days. Groundhog day, but with wine and puzzles and Zoom parties. We aren’t meant to be inside like that, for so long, so we were glad to get out.
And then the more we went up, the more we fell in love with the area, and eventually that led to AJ buying a house up there. The timing wasn’t perfect, and it wasn’t our dream home, but he had big dreams of becoming a homeowner, and the opportunity presented itself, so he took it. The plan was to split our time, keep an apartment here and go up on weekends. That dream quickly faded, as we realized the financial and logistical burden that would cause - we weren’t ready for either - so we made a rather hasty decision to off load our Crown Heights apartment, panic buy a car, and move up full time. We were both fully remote at the time, and I couldn’t really think of a good reason why we shouldn’t. So we did.
And for a time it was great. Space! Guest bedrooms! Multiple bathrooms! Storage! A yard! We outfitted our basement with a gym, immediately painted all the walls, and went to work on making the house our home. AJ built an elaborate fire pit in the back and we promised ourselves we would sit out there all summer. We did what every good millennial homeowner does and painted the exterior black, and we got an Oktoberfest table for the front porch. We expected visitors and dinner parties and nights under the stars drinking wine. And that happened, sometimes. But most of the time we did what we would do back in the city - work all day and eat dinner in front of the TV, with a little bit of yard work and home improvement projects thrown in there sometimes.
The weekends up there were great, filled with fresh air and outdoor space and trips to our favorite breweries and restaurants and hikes. We ended up finding an excellent community (hey thanks, Catskills Cocktail Club) and eventually got used to driving everywhere. It had started to feel like home, or at least somewhere we could make our home.
And then I got pregnant.
And the tug that Brooklyn still had on my heart got stronger. And I started to look at the house, our community, and our lives upstate in a new light. And I knew then that I wouldn’t be able to have and raise that baby there, that I needed to come back to the city, back to Brooklyn, back to what I knew and loved and to where I felt more at home.
That’s not to say I wasn’t sad about leaving the yard, the space, the multiple bedrooms and bathrooms. I knew going back meant downsizing. It meant a smaller apartment, probably without private outdoor space. It meant a tiny kitchen and less storage, despite likely needing a lot more stuff. It meant loud noises and public transit and people. And that’s what I wanted. I wanted people. I wanted community. Community that I knew didn’t exist in the way I wanted it to upstate. If there was one thing I heard over and over from my fellow mom friends, it was about how lonely the journey could be. And I’ll admit I was so scared of the loneliness. Despite being a full fledged introvert, I still crave people. I crave community. I crave being anonymous in a sea of strangers, all going about our lives together, but separate. Knowing that in times of need, someone, anyone, is out there, just a few steps away. I wanted to be able to strap that baby on and go to a bar, or a coffee shop, or a restaurant. To be able to easily get out of the house, without the need to drive. I wanted to be able to walk to a park and see other moms and parents and caretakers. Other kids and babies. I wanted to know, without having to hear the words, that I wasn’t alone.
So we came back, and that’s what I got. We have a single bedroom for three people. We don’t have a yard. We have one bathroom and one closet. But we have playgrounds on every corner. We have a 7,500 person strong parent group that spans most of Brooklyn. We even have a text group consisting of moms of babies born in August of 2023 that live in Clinton Hill. We have our local haunts - bars, restaurants, coffee shops, parks - where we are met with familiar faces and where our little one can make friends and play and roam (crawl) around. We have same day delivery and corner bodegas for emergencies, and yes, we still have a Target.
And we’ve learned to live with less. Less space, for sure. And less stuff, as well. We learned that babies don’t need as much as the internet will have you think, and that they are fine with a small apartment as long as there is love and fun and food and care and support and safety.
We know eventually we’ll have to explain why her friend has a whole house with a yard and stairs and space. We know eventually we may be met with a need for more - more room, outdoor space, more stuff. We don’t know that Brooklyn living will be forever, because we don’t know where we will end up. But we do know that she loves the subway. She loves sitting at a bar getting all the attention from strangers. We know she loves crawling around Fort Greene Park with the other kids listening to Hop Along Andrew every Saturday morning, and we know she loves the croissants from Prima right around the corner. We know she loves walking around the neighborhood pointing at all the dogs, and we know she loves the omelettes from Sailor because we may have accidentally created a fancy foodie baby.
But I wouldn’t have it any other way, because here she is exposed to it all - the people, the smells, the sounds, the languages, the food, the culture. Her eyes are always wide and curious, and I hope they forever stay that way. I want her to know how to live with people, all people, and to learn to take care of herself in a city. I want her to to always want, crave, need all that this wild place has to offer. To explore the best museums in the world. To run around the wide open spaces of our parks. To rely on the kindness of neighborhood strangers and to give that kindness back. I want her to try new foods and play with friends from somewhere else and keep her open, curious mind. And most of all, I want her to be happy. And I want to be happy. And for now, that is here, in Brooklyn. In our little apartment with tiny windows and lots and lots of love.
love,
jen
Cheers, from another BK mom :)