As Luck Would Have It

23 years ago, I spent my first winter on the east coast.

I had given up my rent-stabilized apartment in San Francisco to move to NYC…and ended up in New Jersey. I had painted and turned over a studio apartment in Duboce Triangle (way below market rent) and drove to Santa Fe, NM (December 2000).

My plan was to work for a couple of months, live with my mom; save as much money as possible and move with my best friend to Brooklyn. As luck would have it: plans have a tendency of not following as planned. I had just finished the last brush stroke when my friend told me she found something else, somewhere else, with someone else…to be honest, our friendship was threatened with WTF that wasn’t what we talked about. Blame it on her mom, blame it on the economics, blame it on me for not having a more secure plan. No matter who was to blame— I still wanted to move to NYC. I had set something into motion that felt like a calling.

Who stepped in was my new lover/boyfriend who had just relocated to San Francisco from NJ (and who had helped me paint my surrendered apartment). In the chaos of the holidays and new year resolutions, he said I’ll move with you. We can do it together. There’s so much freedom in being young and in love. He took a bus to Santa Fe where my disapproving mother warned me of what a bad idea it was. I took no heed of said warning, judgements, or concern. I was moving to New York City!

Or New Jersey?!

Me and the guy drive across the country in my silver Ford Extended-cab truck with a camper packed with all my belongings. Pulled over in Texas… questioned whether he was a run-away. Yes months in hormone treatment, he didn’t quite look older than a teenager boy. Was I stoned out of my mind when we got pulled over? Was he scared shitless that in this red state, the officer would see Female on his identification?! Did we get a ticket for “not wearing seatbelts” because it was under my armpit? Did I just say we were visiting my friend who had gotten back from Cuba?!

Yes all of that happened. And we kept going. We stopped in Michigan to visit friends and then landed in Montrose, NJ on the couch of a friend.

I ached for Brooklyn. I yearned to cross the bridge(s) and land in my future life. But as luck would have it, NJ was where he had contacts. I had none. And thats where I got a job.

I got a job at Arthur’s Steakhouse in Hoboken. As a waitress.

I have worked in restaurants since I was a preteen. Bus girl, hostess, cocktail waitress, waitress (later in life a bartender) but this was high volume, a very popular, historic steakhouse just across from the Infamous island: Manhattan. It was a wild short ride —in the middle of blizzards and an introduction into east coast winters, I navigated the Jersey turnpike to go to work for tips. I turned down coke and meth as a strategy to keep up with the pace and I was seriously questioning my decision.

My last weekend at Arthurs was St Patrick’s Day. I finally succumbed to the pressure of snorting something up my nose in the bathroom to get thru the hang over from the night before. My self-induced suffering was loud and collapsing around me with frat boys, men in suits and tourists ordering 16-oz green beers in mugs that we carried 2-4 in each hand. I looked around and felt the spinning of my life come to a still quiet message: I don’t want to live in NJ.

As luck would have it or was it smart, I finally moved to Manhattan to Spanish Harlem.

To be continued.

From NM-to-NJ-to-NYC-to-Brooklyn

2001 was the beginning of 21 years on the east coast.

Stay tuned.