Now that I'm home for the holidays I have come to a major realisation, Manhattan is fast. Before I blinked I have been there for 2 months and it hardly feels like a week sometimes. The last 6 months in general feel crazy fast. After moving like what 4 times, I can tell that I am exhausted. The truth is that after the crash I would have never survived Manhattan, the 5 months of recovery were so crucial for me to understand Manhattan by myself. I am so happy I did my recovery in a little place called Minnesota.
Even though Manhattan is a 3 hour flight away it sometimes feels like another world. I am home were it is calm and easy and my mind is almost confused with the sudden change in scenery. I never realised how fast I was running in New York. Chasing after this thing that ding dong ditches me, as I run out the door into the streets of Manhattan trying to follow it. I created it afterall its my own fault but in Minnesota I sorta mellow. Feel less of need to run.
Manhattan is a wonderfully beautiful place that I am fortunate to say that I am conquering but my heart will always be in Minnesota. Its so familiar and my heart is here because my wonderful family is here and that's so hard sometimes. I hold baby Hartlee in my hands and wonder how I could ever say goodbye to this beautiful child. My heart breaks but I know I need to be in Manhattan while I keep one foot on Minnesota soil. Its the most grounding place on earth. It slaps me back to my roots, its a nice reality check for me. It doesn't matter where I go, who I meet, what I do there's a small town girl that will never change. One that loves the town she was raised in, knowing where all the stop lights are. All the back roads to get somewhere quicker, what every house looks like leading up to the home that raised me. Manhattan is so unfamiliar and constantly changing that it sometimes gets exhausting trying to keep up with it. Sometimes we all need familiarity, some things never change. Although Forest Lake is changing it will always be my home. The real kinda home, not the home (or creative laboratory) I made in Manhattan but a place that gives me such a peaceful sleep, such a powerful sense of who I am, and when shit hits the fan I know Forest Lake will always be where I go to come back down to reality.
There is no more complicated feeling then to loss your sense of being grounded when in a unfamiliar new place. It would be the scariest place on earth if I didn't keep something in Minnesota, lucky I placed my heart here. I heart NYC but I heart Minnesota more. Minnesota will always win because all my growing happened here. Manhattan will give me my dream and an experience that I will never forget but Minnesota will raise my children.
Manhattan is a hard, crazy fast place filled with some real assholes that think they have everything (money) but I love when people know I'm not from there because it lights something within myself to say that I'm from some place so real and honest. A place I call home, a beautiful little place called Minnesota and this makes Manhattan seem like a whimpering little shih tzu where its bark is far worse then it's bite.
