empire state of mind

Another day had gone by with my job hunting prospects getting dimmer and the bills in my apartment piling higher. I sat on the park bench near the Brooklyn Bridge, Manhattan mocking me in the background, nothing special to get back to. My only consolation, a hot cup of freshly brewed hazelnut coffee and the warm summer breeze. The park bench is one of my favorite spots in the city, the sights of cyclists whizzing past me onto the bridge swearing at the tourists engrossed in recording their sweet moments on their camcorders, executives trudging after a long day, some to catch the ferry at the end of the bridge, some to catch the metro rail but all bound homeward. I sat there looking at the milieu of people around me, everybody with a purpose. I couldn't help thinking about my joblessness, I needed to collect my thoughts, I knew.

It has been three months since I came to the city, old dreams, new ideas but same old me, the stereotyped small towner. I have a degree in hand, a year's experience in a not so bad company, and still here I was wanting to make something out of my life. In the beginning, it all seemed to go by pretty easy. I stayed in a friend's apartment, they are always nice at the start, very understanding, no current bills to pay, no apartment rent to pitch in for, I was the guest, I just had to make sure that the door was locked when I left the house. That was for two weeks, and then my honeymoon was done. I wasn't going to take advantage of the situation either, so I offered to share the rent and the electricity bill. The food, we did not cook at home and we had our separate cell phones so that wasn't an issue. So it came to be that I shared a single bedroom apartment with another "tenant" equivalent to ex friend, while living in New York. I did not expect to get a job immediately but that it would take this long, I hadn't imagined.

The first month went by, the employers seemed pretty reasonable, they wanted somebody from a different technology, apparently that was the trend. By the second month, it was just pitiful nods. No, they would have hired me if I had come earlier, just last month there was a need for people with my background. When the third month came, I could feel their contemptuous stares "So what were you doing these two month of unemployment?" they'd ask. It is an exhausting exercise. Waking up every morning, full of hopes for a bright day ahead and then hopping from corporate to corporate, hoping that this would be the one, having your morale butchered, and then heading home, jobless. The time spent on the park bench with my evening coffee was the only part of the exercise that I enjoyed.

Today, nothing was any different. I saw what I had seen every single day through those months in the city. There were scores of people out there, just like me, living their lives aching to achieve what was thrust upon them. Destiny, like mine, had brought them here to New York. Everybody was walking along the rainbow trying to get to that pot of gold at the end. And then, my joblessness did not really seem that unfortunate. There was still hope, another bright new day ahead filled with possibilities. Come sunshine, I could still find that job that I dreamt of.

My cup of coffee done, I picked up my folder and laptop and walked towards the bridge, homeward, like I had done every other day in those three months with hope in my heart and a prayer on my lips. Somewhere in the park, I could hear a hobo singing my new favorite:

Concrete jungle where dreams are made of,

There's nothing you can't do,

Now you're in New York.

These streets will make you feel brand new,

The lights will inspire you,

Hear it for New York, New York, New York.