falling out of love with new york city

a personal essay about leaving new york city after six years

when i first moved to new york in the fall of 2016, i was eighteen, wide-eyed, and deeply unsure of myself. i, ryan elizabeth peete, was a freshman at nyu, romanticizing every crack in the sidewalk but entirely unprepared: for the cold, for the subway delays, for the sheer velocity of it all.

the vsco filter here is such a tbt

in those first few months…i stuck to what i knew: my classes, my dorm, and the dining hall—it was easier to stay in my bubble than try to navigate everything all at once.

if you’ve ever been to new york…it can feel like the city is constantly swallowing you whole. i didn’t go out much at first…clinging to solitude like a security blanket. but the more time i spent in a city as vibrant and chaotic as new york…the more its energy rubs off on me.

with each year i lived in new york, the city peeled back another layer of me. it wasn’t an immediate transformation—but a continuous, gradual push toward someone braver, bolder, and less afraid to be seen.

spending spring afternoons laying in the grass at tompkins square park, letting strangers’ music become the soundtrack of my day.

revamping my wardrobe with thrifted pieces from l train and beacon’s closet that would’ve gotten stares back home.

cycling through every hair color under the sun…

feeling like the baddest bitch in the world when my fake id worked…

kissing strangers i never learned the names of…

falling in and out of love with the wrong people…

wholesome dinner parties…

late nights recording music…

making art with friends until the early hours of the morning…

it was a time when everything felt like a possibility—when every day and night could become a story i’d potentially tell my grandchildren someday.

and i lived all over: from the west village, to the east village, to bushwick, to prospect park…each zip code held a different version of me. honestly, every version of me existed somewhere in that city, and it gave me exactly what i needed at the time.

until it didn’t.

i went home to los angeles for covid in march 2020, but when i moved back that fall…there was a shift in energy.

my post-grad new york experience wasn’t the cinematic version i knew in college. it felt hollow and bleak—a direct response to the aftershocks of the pandemic. my favorite cafés had shut down, storefronts were boarded up, the subways were quieter, and so many elements of the city i knew and loved were gone.

i spent nearly two years trying to re-spark the magic. i met new people, explored new neighborhoods, tried new restaurants…but i consistently felt like i was trying to fit a square peg in a round hole.

eventually…i had a “come to jesus” moment where i realized my time in new york was up—that it no longer gave me the aliveness it once did. it wasn’t the same place that had once been the catalyst for my boldest transformations, for every reckless, beautiful version of myself i’d ever dared to become. the more time i spent in nyc post-grad, the more my relationship with the city felt like a romantic partner i was quietly falling out of love with.

so…i left and moved back to la. i had other reasons to return—practical ones (like getting foot surgery, for example)—but deep down…i knew it had more to do with outgrowing the city than anything else. i accepted that my time in new york…the six years i spent there…nearly a quarter of my life so far…had run its course.

since moving back to la in 2022…i’ve softened.

i started to care more about peace than excitement.

i traded late-night trains for flea markets and herbal tea.

i started wearing different clothes.

i started listening to different music.

and slowly…i just started wanting different things. i became so rooted in who i was becoming, i forgot all about the version of me who once belonged to that city.

fast forward to february 2024…i found myself in new york for fashion week. it had been almost two years since i’d been back, and the second i stepped off the plane…i could feel her: the girl i used to be here, the one i’d nearly forgotten. being back made me feel like she never really left.

i passed prospect park on my way in from jfk, the spot i used to run to when the city felt too heavy. i walked the hudson river greenway, just like i used to—music loud in my headphones, staring out at the water as the sun set. i wandered past bars, cafés, museums…tiny time capsules that carried all these past versions of myself.

i look back at her with love…but cities…like people…change. and at some point…we stop chasing the version of ourselves we once were…and start making room for the person we’ve quietly become outside of it.

some stories don’t need to be rewritten. they just need to be remembered…before you move on and write new ones somewhere else.

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