Gettin’ Carried Away

Before moving to New York City, I had only visited the island for four days, with a huge group of teenagers, accompanied by several adult chaperones. In 2005, at 19 years old, I was moving to the biggest city in the U.S., all by lonesome. However, because my mom is… my mom… she decided to stay with me my first few nights to help me settle into my new apartment.

Even though it was the beginning of January, when I arrived in NYC, it was raining. Hard! I had never been to my apartment building before, so all I had for the cab driver was an address. My mom and I hopped in, and I eagerly shouted, “80 Lafayette Street, please!” The driver instantly took off as if he knew where he was going… but he didn’t have a clue. A smooth ride that should have taken 40 minutes was actually an uncomfortable, bumpy ride that took about an hour and a half. We pulled up to an unfamiliar building and he asked, “Is this it?” My mom, being my mom, replied in a stern tone, “Um, no. We have no idea. We have never been here.”

Squinting very hard, attempting to look past the heavy rain and read the addresses on the buildings, I saw that 80 Lafayette Street was just a few big steps away from the taxi. I kindly asked the cab driver to pull up a little closer. We got out as fast as we could, grabbed my oversized bags (I am a girl, you know) and headed into the building.

I’ll skip the whole drama-of-getting-into-my-apartment story, because it just made me frustrated back then. In a nut shell, you need a student ID to get into the building. Being a new student, and arriving after all the offices were closed, I didn’t have a student ID yet. Needless to say, I was eventually allowed to get to my 12th floor apartment, room 1208 A.

My new roommate Jenny had e-mailed me a month before to apologize and to tell me that her old roommates would probably leave a huge mess in the apartment before they moved out. So aside from the fact that some of the previous inhabitants of 1208 left the apartment in shambles, when I walked in, I was instantly impressed by this breathtaking dwelling! Very high ceilings soared above the sparkling hardwood floors that began in the common room and extended into the two bedrooms. A small kitchen was nestled in the corner of the common room. It came equipped with ample wood cabinets, a double stainless steel sink, an electric stove, a large refrigerator and enough counterspace to prepare a yummy meal.

I was to share my bedroom with one other girl, Georgie. We really lucked out, because we were living in the bedroom that features a double closet and an ensuite bathroom. While the three-person bedroom was bigger, their bathroom (and closet) was in the corner of the common room. There was also a huge cut-out in the wall, allowing all noise being made in the common room to travel up and over into the second bedroom at any given time.

Because it was late, and because the apartment was rather dirty, I spent the night in my mom’s hotel room. However, in the days to come, after lots of cleaning, rearranging and decorating, the Fab Four of room 1208 had a rockin apartment!