"Are you sure you're OK?"

She asked me twice just to be sure. I was OK. I am OK. Really. But Donna was observant to recognize that a little part of me had been broken that morning. A tiny little fantasy crushed by circumstance and bad timing.

"We've been struggling with this decision and while we feel you're still a strong candidate for this position, the timing isn't quite right for us with the current match of project load", the email from New York said.

When I was younger I remember learning about faith at church. One teacher presented a challenge for the class. "How do you know New York City is real if you've never seen it?"

I'm here to tell you, I've seen New York City and it isn't real. It's all a pretend fairy tale. A reality show passed off as life using clever movie cliches and made-up languages on the subway. Counterfeit reality.

Murray Hill Market

There are about eleventy-two copies of this email in my outbox.

Please consider me for your [fill in name of exciting-sounding job here] position. I believe I would an excellent fit for this position. I am looking for a position that pays [an amount adjusted for ridiculous Utah v. Manhattan cost-of-living inflation] per year plus medical and retirement benefits.

...read the rest...

I'm not getting all giddy or anything yet. In fact it's probably way too early to even be talking about it. But I may or may not be applying for a job I'm pretty excited about in New York City.

I'll know more details about the position tomorrow like... umm... does it pay enough for me to eat and stuff. I am exactly qualified for the job and I know I would kick its ass. The company also does work I could get very excited about. Some might even call it important work but I wouldn't go that far.

This may be nothing at all. My resume may find its way to the bottom of some dusty inbox, never to see the light of a beautiful, elegant, Manhattan autumn day. But for me, even applying is something. It says that I believe in myself enough to at least consider this an acceptable risk.

I sat in the passenger seat of the rented SUV with the windows down, snapping pictures as we came to the red light at the intersection of 45th and Broadway... Times Square. As we pulled to a stop, this dude came right to the door of the car, stuck his head well into my personal space and asked, "Hey! You guys like hip-hop?"

I was dressed for the theater in the only dress shirt I own. I am, it should be pointed out, the whitest person you've ever met.

"Yes. I love hip-hop. It's all I listen to."

Last week, after I got back from New York, I was flooded with a rush of emotions. Some of which had everything to do with my trip and my personal regret about not having followed my dream to be the cliche struggling actor, scraping by in the city. Others had been festering for a while and just came along for the ride once the gates were opened. Still others were nothing new and are the same old things that always get thrown into the mix.

It's no secret that Donna and have more than our share of painful history together. It's also not news to any regular reader of this site that, while each of us has done a lot of work and come a long, long way, it's very likely that there will never be a time when we are free from the burden and hurt of those common experiences. There are some issues that no amount of therapy will help us overcome.

The long and the short of it is that while Donna is a terrific person for whom I have a great deal of love I most often feel like we each spend a lot of time disappointing each other. And while that's certainly not unique to our marriage, the combination of those incompatibilities and our rocky history might make it hard for either of us to get close enough to each other for either of us to ever be as happy as we might be apart. Does that make sense?

I've spent the last 24 hours, or so, scheming a way for me to live and work in New York City. If you had asked me when I was half the age I am now what I would be doing when I am the age I am now, I would have said, "living, working, starving, whatever in New York City".

I've hearted NY since I first visited the summer I was fifteen years-old. That city is alive and dirty. Sexy. It scares me and intoxicates me all at once. Now, every time I stand in Times Square and watch the throngs of people press into the theaters at 7:45 while cardboard-scented steam seems from the manholes, I am transported back to that summer. I am filled with my dream to starve my way from audition to audition.

Coming home, I leave a part of myself there. Maybe someday I'll get a chance to go back and find it.

In the summer of 1989 I took a two-week trip to Washington DC, Philadelphia, and New York City with a group of about 20 theater students. At fifteen, I was the oldest kid in the group but still not nearly old enough to realize that I was a complete idiot.

Being too cool to hang with the younger kids I took the opportunity when I could to do a few things on my own. One afternoon, I stood in line at the TKTS booth on Times Square and bought last minute tickets to a matinee of Les Miserables.

After the show, being the drama fag I was, I waited by the stage door to meet the players. I stood there, program and pen in hand, greeting each actor as they stepped onto 53rd street into the afternoon sun. Everyone was very nice. Nicer than they had to be.