Looking for an apartment at the end of July was stressful, difficult, frustrating, and at times felt impossible.  My friend Roman told me “You are who lives in Brooklyn,” trying to keep my spirits up and trying to prevent me from giving up.  My mantra became that statement: “I am who lives in Brooklyn.”  I repeated that over and over when times got tough.  But nothing was working out.  After one too many bad appointments, I reached a point of frustration so great I got out my legal pad and vented.  These statements left me feeling better and relieved, as I looked out the train window coming back into the city.  I was filled with hope that can only be provided by the New York City skyline.  Sometimes this beautiful skyline mocks me in my struggles to make it here and then fades away to the greatest Frank Sinatra song ever written.  But most of the time it provides promise.  It’s this endless hope that keeps me here in New York, and provides the freedom in which I wrote the following.  This ended up resembling a poem or a mantra and it is unchanged from when I first wrote it.  Enjoy.

I am who lives in Brooklyn.

I will find my apartment.

It will not frighten me.

It will be within my financial limitations.

I will know it when I’m in it.

I will know the sacrifice will be worth it.

It will make me feel good.

I will not chicken out and settle/move to Astoria.

I will not be too hard on myself if I can’t find a place.

I will hold my head high if I end up finding a place while my stuff lives in storage.

I will not prank call my old management company with death threats because they tricked me in 2005.

I will follow my instincts.

I will follow my gut.

I will keep my options open.

I will hunt for the gems.

I will connect with an owner.

I will stop crying when I’m left waiting in the 90- degree heat while a broker leaves me hanging next to the parole board outside a dilapidated apartment building (Read: shithole.)

I will graciously smile and thank each broker I meet even when I know what they’re about to show me is reflected in their eyes as an inevitably total dump.

I will decipher, decode, and detect all Craig’s List descriptions, getting to the bottom of what neighborhoods they “think” their listing is in, and uncovering Park Slope (Gowanus), Park Slope (Crown Heights), and Park Slope (Flatbush).

I will not give up.

I will fight the urge to give up.

I am who lives in Brooklyn.