(To our Tumblr followers: we read you on the feed side b/c Cindy really loathes using the Tumblr interface for reading posts.)
But in Brooklyn, the visitor, whether native son or total stranger, can experience a very special sense of beauty. Much of it derives from a simple fact: Manhattan is a vertical city, and Brooklyn is horizontal.
40th Anniversary - Pete Hamill Revisits His Native Brooklyn — New York Magazine
Yesterday, as I stood outside Maggie Brown with Cindy and our friend Aubrey, waiting for a table for brunch, I turned to Aubrey and said something like “Why the hell would anyone want to live in Manhattan?” and meant every syllable. This was after a 20-or-so minute stroll (in the rain) through the heart of Bed-Stuy, from casa Rich Girls in Stuy Heights, over to Aubrey’s in Bed-Stuy proper, and into Ft. Greene near Pratt via Franklin, de Kalb, and Myrtle. Though I know the East Village and LES like the back of my own hand, I love my neighborhood more than I ever loved any dream of living in Alphabet City or on Bowery. When you realize you deserve a home, rather than a place to keep your stuff and occasionally sleep, your priorities start to change. And I’m more than a little tired of the intimation that I’m settling simply because I have a 30 minute commute to my office in Chelsea. (This came up again during lunch today when I was asked if I’d ever be moving closer to Manhattan.) I think Aubrey summed up everything quite neatly when she said that at the end of the day, getting to go home to a house means everything.