The Boy

By now, you must have noticed how much I have mentioned the Boy in my posts as we have been spending so much time together.

While I initially called this whole thing "The Great Dating Experiment", I no longer feel (and have not for a while now) that it is an experiment at all. It did start out as a concerted effort to let someone in, even just a little bit. It was about me trying to trust a man for a change after being hurt so badly a couple of years ago. It was about giving a chance to someone lovely, very interesting, available and who seemed to want to get to know me. And I guess it was also about giving myself a chance to be happy.

But we are past that point. The Boy simply has never let me down, a fact that continues to surprise and amaze me. Of course, we have only been together for three months, it is still very early days and neither of us knows where it's heading but we are enjoying the present. But it feels real.

After 5 years of being "technically" single but tangled up in dysfunctional trysts, I didn't think I was actually capable of being in a normal, straight forward relationship again. With all the good things and not so good things that come with it.

I promise that I will never become a smug "coupled up" person. I have too much life experience to ever take it for granted or expect that it will last forever. I also would never jeopardize the wonderful friendships I have here. My priority is to ensure that I spend as much time as I always have done with my adopted family, the dear friends who are the bedrock of my life, while still nurturing my burgeoning relationship with the Boy. Of course something had to give and so between my friends, the Boy and the gym, I'm afraid the gym had to go! Tough choice but someone had to make it ;-)

Right now I just feel incredibly lucky that I am able to balance everything and get the best of both worlds. To have met someone who likes adventures (cultural, intellectual, physical) as much as I do, someone who is not threatened by my ambition or thirst for life, who does not want to change my life but adds to it, is a wonderful icing on top of what was a pretty tasty cake in the first place!

But (and there is always a "but" in this crazy City) nothing is ever as straight forward as it seems. I remember writing a while ago that everyone here is slightly damaged and it remains a true statement - between his emotional baggage and mine, things are not always easy. But it's worth it. And regardless of what happens, I hope I will never regret trying.

"New" York

I am dating someone. As in "hanging out, going to the movies, holding hands while walking down the street" kind of dating. Normal dating I guess. But for me an incredibly foreign concept in New York where the relationships I've had here have been (by choice) either fleeting or very complicated.


I am calling it "The Great Dating Experiment" - I have no idea how long it will last before my commitment phobia kicks in but I am enjoying the ride for now. Besides, he's single, smart, nice and very laid back - key attributes I have never found bundled up into one man in this City before (the single part is usually missing)!

One of the good things about "The Great Dating Experiment" is that I am going to completely new places that I wouldn't have otherwise discovered. While I enjoy being the social organizer in my group of friends, there is something wonderful about being taken somewhere you haven't chosen.

Yesterday, we walked almost the entire length of Manhattan, grabbing lunch in Chelsea, exploring the newly opened extension of the High Line and drinking a beer at the food trucks spot that has opened underneath it. We then made a quick pit stop at the public basketball court on West 4th to watch guys play a game of 21 (he already knows that basketball is the way to my heart!).

Afterwards, he took me to Fat Black Pussycat in the West Village. The outside appearance of the bar would have normally guaranteed that I wouldn't go in but I was surprised to find, as he guided me towards the back of the bar, a really cool swanky lounge with a rather gothic decor playing the kind of tunes that had us hitting Shazam on our Iphones constantly.

From there, we walked to the Lower East Side and he took me to Karma, a hookah bar in the East Village. While I like to think that I have done a lot of things in my life, smoking hookah has never been one of them. While the place is dark, a little rough around the edges and the service pretty appalling, I loved it because it was so different and the great hip hop anthems loudly blasting also helped.

I feel almost like I am re-discovering New York through the eyes of someone else.

Even after four years here, the City is still full of surprises waiting to be experienced. And I am more open to them than I have been in a long time. Dating included.

Love & Hate

I really like this post from The Frenemy. I think it really reflects the love/hate relationship that most New Yorkers have with the City.

You can go and read it on her blog here or read below.



When you move to a city, you become meaner. 

You are harder. Less optimistic. Tough. Do not make eye contact with anybody in the subway. Read the book you’re kind of halfway through, listen to the terrible music you hope you’re not playing loud enough to hear. Pretend you’re the kind of person whose feet doesn’t move when the train makes a turn. Don’t look up, just push and shove and move. In the city, you are the most important person you know. Dislike and accept that. Walk that way, walk so fast and eye roll when somebody slow is walking up the stairs as you are trying to switch trains. People will ask you for money on trains, drunk people will piss on themselves, babies will cry and you just have to pretend they are not there. It’s a subway. You don’t know anybody.

Strut down the street briskly when you are only getting a bagel, a slice of pizza, or a gin drink that will take the edge off of being alone all the time.

Dress like an idiot. When you end up in the suburbs or you end up home you think ‘why the fuck am I wearing so much black and where did these accessories come from?’ Take a long shower, eat your first big meal without alcohol in years, and try not to brush anything and everything off your shoulder. Find yourself afraid of trees.

Still, in a city filled with so many people, you must not acknowledge them. This becomes somewhat difficult because there are so many interesting and attractive things, most of them wearing plaid or shorts. Grumble while eating a falafel or some kind of street cart food. When somebody talks to you at a bar, coyly laugh when they are a part of the city you just don’t venture to. Know a lot of people, just barely.

Be afraid of ‘nice guys’ because you are no longer nice. Be afraid of things that last longer than two months. Get nervous whenever you enter some part of the town that ‘that guy you hung out with’ lives. The city is big, but it is small. Never see anybody again, except some kid you went to high school with. They have a new haircut and you kind of brag about your life because you are nervous. Send e-mails to people telling you how excited you are to be in the city. Be terrified of your bank account as you furiously eat money with no utensils. Bury your head in your hands when nobody is looking. Think about how stupid you were in college, abandon those dreams and make new ones. Find fog really romantic. Find employment really romantic. Drink on Tuesday nights. Meet people on those Tuesday nights that you high-five but never get their number. Make friends and never keep them. Take personal days in the tiny kitchen that is filled with jarred spices, condiments, and a bag of chips. Learn about sushi. Have a small circle you already knew before you moved here, the kinds of people you always complain about your love life to. Hold onto and love those people fiercely. Find friends of friends you think are cute, get annoyed that you meet people this way like in high school. Have numbers in your phone that you don’t need. Preface those numbers with ‘that night at (bar).’ Find it impossible to meet anybody until you do.

Roll around with that person in a small room in your overpriced apartment. Feel like this is an accomplishment until you feel restless. Feel like being restless is a thing you should feel. Try to fix it by getting a pet. Dance in a stupid club and tell everybody the next day you can’t believe you danced. Have ‘spots’ you think are ‘the usual’ except the bartenders never remember you. Fall in love with a new kind of ethnic food and fall more in love with brunch than you thought possible. Make connections with dogs on the street. Spend too much time contemplating life on long concrete walks. See the sunrise more than you should. Barely see anybody you like during the day. Get annoyed at couples grocery shopping and miss making out in your basement. Forget to buy paper towels and use napkins to clean the table. Take cabs at 3am. Pretend to clean your apartment, pretend you are going to eventually do laundry.

Meet nice people somewhere you didn’t expect. Have a conversation with somebody you never thought you would meet. Talk to somebody out of the blue. Enjoy these moments of fate immensely. Have more faith in humanity than you did when you lived wherever you came from.

Come home late smelling like smoke. Wonder how that happened, but really you know exactly how that happened. Promise you won’t spend too much money, expect free drinks but really only get shitty weather. Send texts to everybody you miss who is not in town because you are nostalgic for everything. Be single, ‘kind of single’, and ‘sort of single’ for months. Find somebody you like enough to watch movies with. Send bills in late. Revel in the fact that this is what youth is. Barely eat fresh vegetables anymore. Loathe the summer because it is too hot and miss it when it is gone. Get to know yourself and be surprised by it. You’d never bite your nails, you think, until you bite your nails. Forget all the great reasons why you moved here, fall in love with the reasons you didn’t think- cool breezes, car honkings, and knowing how to get places. Revel in being alone, revel in learning a city. Hate every job you have. Hate every bar you go to. Love both of these. Love everything. Have really, really good days. Stare at the city like ‘I got this.’ Swear you will eventually leave.

Then you stare at the skyline. Hate it. Be satisfied.

--------------------------------

My account of my own love/hate relationship with New York back in 2008 still rings true sometimes today ...

About me - Part 2

Cycling in France

Here is the second part of the interview that the lovely Amelie from The Heimweh Safari did with me. As before, you can read it here below or over on her blog.

---------------------

I introduced you to Stephanie last week. Again, I want to praise her blog Biting the Big Apple and herself. I didn’t attribute points last week. That’s a default. Finding Stephanie in the internet, reading her blog and getting in touch with her has helped me a great deal. 

It gave me the perspective that liking New York might just be a matter of time. That New York might be a city that kicks everybody’s ass at first, in some way or another, (although nobody admits it) and that it’s not just me. Reading Stephanie’s blog is therefore worth more than anything else so far on my Heimweh safari: 8 points.

In the second part of my conversation with her you can read about her first experiences in New York: “American hair”, a broken heart and finally feeling at home.

What was your most mundane and unexpected problem at the beginning (f.ex. laundry, food, etc.). How did you solve it?

Not so much problems as rather interesting discoveries, which were, in no particular order:

• Realizing that there are no washing machines fitted in any Manhattan apartment. Quickly followed by the realization that dry cleaners here can do your laundry for $8 a pound and thereby making me the happiest girl on earth (I hate laundry).

• Making myself understood! NYC being probably one of the most multi-cultural cities on earth, you’d imagine that people would be pretty used to accents. But not so in my experience and I’ve had some funny moments at the salad bar counter of delis, trying to say “tomayto” instead of “tomahto” so they would get my order right! And to this day, nine times out of ten, the staff in Starbucks hears “two” coffees when I ask for a “tall” coffee.

• Getting used to the fact that everything is larger here: paper towels, bags of crisps, chocolate bars … Everything seems to be super-sized! Even hair apparently as whenever I visit my local hairdresser, I always seem leave with what I now call “American hair” – just that bit bouncier and bigger than you would get anywhere else!

• Getting used to the subway was quite a challenge at first as I found it to be really unintuitive. I, of course, got the hang of it eventually and I am now even used to the fact that it is completely unpredictable at the weekends as express trains become locals and sometimes vice-versa!

In one of your posts you write, “Despite our enduring love affair, New York has kicked me pretty hard to the ground a couple of times very early on and taught me tough lessons…” What are you referring to? 
You end the very same sentence by, “… some of which I only very recently finally absorbed and accepted.” How? What helped you—in the beginning and over time? Again, in the same post you write that New York has actually become home for you. 
What gives you that feeling?

I’m afraid that I was referring to a good old-fashioned heartbreak! I alluded at one point on my blog that I was infatuated with a New York man who was as complicated, gorgeous and fast-paced as the City itself. Unfortunately for me, I met said man a mere two weeks after moving to NYC and I came to see my feelings for him as interchangeable with my feelings about living in the City itself, the peaks and (mainly) troths of one directly affecting the other.

I struggled for a very, very long time to come to terms with the fact that while we would never be in a normal relationship together, it didn’t mean that my time in New York had been a failure or should be marred by what was a pretty painful experience for me.

So I guess that the feeling of New York being a happy home for me took longer than it perhaps should have done – it kind of creeped in on me as my heart slowly mended and when I finally managed to completely disassociate the City from the man!

Many expats try to recreate their countries of origin in some way. Do you? If so, how? 

I wouldn’t say that I have tried to recreate my country in NYC, maybe because while I am French, I feel very close to British culture and therefore I am not sure which of the two countries I would want to try to recreate here.

Romantic New York

My friend CT, who is just about to move to NYC from London with her husband, emailed me today asking for ideas for a special and romantic evening out in the City to celebrate their wedding anniversary.

It is with a touch of sadness that I realized that, while never having given it much thought before, I knew exactly what the ultimate romantic night out would entail for me ... yet I have never done it precisely in that way with someone I love.

To be frank, from a romance perspective, this City has been a disaster for me. I moved here a year after the (amicable) end of a 10 years relationship and while it took me some time to get used to being by myself, I was very much enjoying being single and carefree. Was I looking for a fresh start? Yes of course, but the last thing I expected in these heady first couple of weeks in New York was to fall in love ... but I did, head over heels, and quickly embarked on a short, intense and very much doomed from the start relationship (though "entanglement" may be a better description!). It took me 2 horribly long years to quash any lingering feelings I had for him and mend my broken heart. And despite various distracting flings, I have not met anyone since that I have felt any special connection with and would therefore want to spend a truly romantic evening in the company of!

Still, for what it's worth, here is what - to me - is the ultimate romantic night out in the City ...

Meet at the Metropolitan Museum late in the afternoon. Perhaps linger in the museum a little first for a stroll through the Greek and Roman gallery with its collection of handsome marble statues and imposing columns, or through the Sackler wing which houses the Temple of Dendur under a huge conservatory. Then head for the rooftop sculpture garden or more precisely the Martini bar there. Sipping a couple of cocktails above the green expanses of Central Park and the Manhattan skyline in the background is simply incredible.

Walk across the park before it gets dark, heading South West. Make your way towards the Boat House and the Bethesda Fountain and then hop into one the many rickshaws available across the bridge that overlooks both. They're great fun and will get you out of the park much faster than walking.

Arriving at the Time Warner Center, at Columbus Circle, in time for dinner is the plan. In the event that you can't score a table at the amazing but eye-wateringly expensive Per Se (which I was lucky enough to go to once), Landmark (lively) or A Voce Columbus (classy) are both great restaurants with beautiful food and plenty of dark corners to huddle into.

The perfect end to that evening for me would be to catch a late night performance at the Dizzy Jazz Club, also located in the Time Warner complex. The Club is both intimate because of its size yet impressive because of its high ceilings and particularly the wall of windows affording a magical view of Columbus Circle, the Park and the glittering skyscrapers in the distance ...

The Lover

One of the things people most often ask me about my life in New York is what dating really is like in the City.

The thing is that I don't really do dating. Primarily because I seem to only possess an on/off relationship switch with nothing in between - I either fall in love (which has only happened to me twice) or I just want very casual fun. In the latter instances, I am terrifyingly commitment phobic and basically run away before anything even resembling a relationship can materialize.

But in the anthropological experiment that is New York City I recently met a strange and rare species, the Relationship Guy, and somehow fell into the dating trap. I certainly fought against it and most of my friends only know him by the nickname I gave him from the start: "The Lover". But I enjoyed his company and therefore decided to at least try for a change .... or my own dysfunctional interpretation of trying anyway.

I was very clear and honest with him from the start about what this was for me - I wanted to keep seeing him but I didn't want us to be a couple. I found excuses not to meet his friends and never gave him the opportunity to meet mine. I usually only made time for him in my schedule once a week, normally after I had already been out with my friends (I believe the technical term is "booty call" - ha ha ha) and I turned down his offers of doing couple things - even when they included innocuous activities like going to the cinema together.

Despite what should have been obvious warning flags, the Lover moved very quickly through the relationship cycle all by himself and much to my horror and panic. A few hours after we first met and upon telling him that I was here on a visa, he made me google the words "Green Card". By our 3rd meeting, he was telling me how much he wanted to meet my family. By the 5th, he told me he was in love with me (I completely freaked out) and by the 6th I had to have the cliche and awkward "it's not you, it's me" conversation.

Even after that, he stuck around with the patience of a Saint or perhaps more accurately that of a mad man. And at the exact point when I was wondering whether I should give him a proper chance or end it once and for all, he went from Relationship Guy (albeit a scarily intense version of him) straight to your garden variety New York man - he stopped calling and basically vanished into thin air with no explanation.

I felt relieved that everything came to an end without anyone's heart being broken. Neither his as, despite his grand words he knew exactly what was going on and I am convinced that I did not hurt his feelings - I was on the wrong side of unrequited love once and would never wish it on my worst enemy, let alone put someone through it knowingly. Nor mine as I never invested myself emotionally in the relationship.

However, this latest experience does nothing to change my perception that New York men are, quite frankly, complete freaks. I hate to generalize but I can't think of any other reasons why I just do not understand them and all my single girlfriends feel the same way.

Of course, I am far from being perfect myself and I carry my own complex emotional baggage, my own little dose of freakiness. But I am more convinced than ever that having a straight forward relationship in New York, one that unfolds at a standard pace or without undue complications, is nearly impossible.

So dating in New York City? Not for the faint hearted although it does provide plenty of funny stories to share with girlfriends over a few glasses of wine ... The key is simply to lower your expectations quite substantially and to keep your heart well out of it!

Case in point

I had drinks with a couple of my account directors from our media buying agency the other night. I had always thought that the guy, J, was gay. Nothing in particular suggests it apart maybe from his collection of almost exclusively pink shirts ...

Anyway, my gaydar is clearly failing me quite spectacularly as he spent most of the time rubbing my back and even, much to my horror (as I don't like him in that way), touching my hair. At this stage I was still really hoping he was gay, but the conversation we proceeded to have proved me very, very wrong.

He asked me if I was dating and I said "kind of". Then he asked if I was in love and I could not help but burst into laughter. I told him that I had given up on New York men as potential serious relationship material a long time ago. He asked me why and I explained that when you've been seeing someone for a month as I have and yet are seriously considering asking the guy if he may already have a girlfriend*, you know that you have spent too much time in New York already ...

He seemed perplexed and I explained that a lot of men here seem to have a "don't ask, don't tell" attitude in that unless they are specifically asked they can quite casually go on without mentioning a small, insignificant detail like being in a relationship already. At this point, J reached over to me, touched my leg and said "I'm not like that", only to be interrupted by the other account director who exclaimed "J, you not only have a girlfriend but you also live together!" ... to which he replied, completely undeterred, "yeah but I'm not married!".

Case in point indeed.

* I asked. He doesn't.

Prey

I went to my lovely friend F's birthday party at the weekend. She had picked an Irish pub, primarily because she is of Irish descent but also because the birthday girl gets to drink for free there and her guests for half-price. I must say that it wasn't exactly my kind of watering hole (large TV sceens, wet floors from all the alcohol spilled) but we had fun and danced to incredibly cheesy tunes while singing at the top of our lungs until the early hours of the morning.

What struck me about the evening however is that I felt I was on the set of a wildlife documentary ... F had invited some of her girlfriends but primarily a lot of her gay male friends. A couple of the girls in particular seemed frustrated about that - complaining to me that they were never going to find a man if they hung out with gay guys all the time. It's at that time that my friend K turned up and came over to give me a hug and say hello.

It's like the atmosphere changed in a split second. I had brought with me the only single, straight guy to the party! Not only that but one that also happens to not be bad looking and can actually string two intelligent sentences together. The two girls in question immediately asked me who he was and whether we were seeing each other - turning before my very eyes into what I can only describe as predators. I explained that K and I are just good friends and the hunt started to unfold with both girls trying to get some alone chatting time with him.

K and I spent most of the time hanging out together and I could feel the predators getting increasingly frustrated ... their evil stares at me turning into full blown sulking from one of them towards the end of the evening. I wasn't trying to get in the way at all and in fact made a conscious effort not to, but K and I get on well and were happy to catch up.

I unwittingly delivered the coup de grace when K and I left the party together to share a cab as we both live on the West side. I could almost feel imaginary knives being thrown at me as I turned my back to walk away.

K and I chatted about it on the way home - about how as a single, straight guy in New York, you can sometimes feel like a prey. Not that he is complaining about it much though but I get the feeling that it does get a little tiring after a while.

Have I ever felt like a prey? I'm not sure I would even realise .. most of the time I am blissfully unaware that I am even getting chatted up in the first place unless the guy makes it blatantly obvious - it's one of my quirks that my friends find highly amusing when a typical exchange after an evening out might go "Steph, that guy was hitting on you" - "Really?! I thought he was just being friendly!!!".

Single

Yesterday was Valentine's Day and marked my third year as a bona fide "Bridget Jones Singleton" - complete with reluctant scrutiny over my Body Mass Index, cigarettes and alcohol consumption monitoring and occasional parental disapproval.

I have always despised Valentine's day, even when I was one half of a happy couple for 10 years - the crowded restaurants, heart shaped balloons and corny cards were never my thing. But negotiating the rose-tinted cliches of Valentine's day as a single girl is another matter all together and it is an art that I seem to have finally perfected with a little help from my friends.

After grabbing a bite to eat early in order to avoid the pre-set menus and hordes of couples, my girlfriends and I went to see "He's not that into you" at the Loews cinema on 11th and 3rd. The film was as mediocre as I expected it to be (I hate chick flicks) but at least was not as one-sided as I feared it might be in the fact that there were instances of "she's" not that into you as well, which Libs, Marie & I identified with as much as the other way around. What I did like however was the atmosphere in the movie theater. It was clearly filled with disillusioned New York single girls and the unrealistic Hollywood romantic moments were received with loud caustic comments - much to my delight. For example, when Ben Affleck's character produced an engagement ring after swearing he would never get married, someone shouted "yeah ... right!?" and the audience burst into hysterical laughter. We finished the evening in "winebar", a cosy, brick-walled, candle lit bar in the East Village, sharing more laughs over a great cheese platter and an excellent bottle of Malbec.

I sometimes feel that your love life is like a scorecard and you actually need to go through a number of experiences in order to appreciate or even just recognize true love when it finally comes along. Like many of my girlfriends, I seem to have exhausted all the scenarios over the years - the "he's not into you", the "she's not into you" and the horribly confusing "it's complicated", as well as every other shades of grey in between.

Of course, being single is not always easy and it certainly was a shock to me as I have never been single before in my entire adult life. But I am actually grateful for this experience and I know it is something that I have to live through and enjoy, if only because I would have never otherwise experienced all of the above scenarios and therefore missed out on some invaluable life lessons.

There are things I miss from being in a stable, meaningful relationship (although topping the list is having someone helping me change the bed covers - my most hated household chore!) but joke aside, being in a committed relationship is fantastic. I hope I will have that again some day. But in the mean time, I see no point in pining for it and putting my life on hold while waiting for my "knight in shining armor" to magically appear ... there are far too many things I want to do and achieve by myself before that and I'm only getting started.

So here is to another year of filling up my scorecard!

Revelation

I remember an episode of "Sex & The City" when Carrie, still coming to terms with the painful end of two significant relationships and adjusting to the single life, realises that New York is in fact her true love ... the main character in her life and the infatuation that will never fade.

This has never felt more true to me than now as I must admit that my love for gorgeous, fast-paced, complicated New York has been inextricably linked to my irrational infatuation for an equally gorgeous, fast-paced, complicated New Yorker and I have struggled to separate the two in my mind until fairly recently.

But another perfect New York weekend further helped me to come to the same revelation as Carrie.

My friend Mario was in New York for business a few weeks back and stayed with me. Late on Saturday morning, we walked to the Natural History Museum to have brunch at Ocean Grill, one of my favourite neighbourhood spots, where we sat at my usual corner banquette in the bar area (which I prefer to the main restaurant) and had deliciously lemony lobster eggs Benedict and bottomless coffee while catching up on the latest events in our lives.

We hopped on the subway to the Lower East Side as Mario works in fashion and I wanted to show him all the small vintage boutiques scattered in the area. In between shops, we stopped at Economy Candy on Rivington to pick up retro, wacky sweets and then leisurely strolled through Chinatown and its weird & wonderful food items (dried oysters anyone?), weaved through the fake goods of Canal Street and cut through Little Italy before arriving in Soho. After a quick pit stop at Lure for a blueberry gin (for me) and a passion fruit caipirinha (for him), we felt saintly for getting one of our five portions of fruits & vegetables in a single cocktail and proceeded to Williamsburg in Brooklyn, where Erickson (Mario's old flatmate, who also works in fashion) had invited us for a cocktail party at his apartment.

We met Larry for dinner at Sea first, a Thai restaurant with an impressive interior - huge industrial space with candle lit indoor pool, imposing sculpture of Buddha and swing bubble chairs scattered around. By the time we left, it was packed and the atmosphere was more that of a club than a restaurant, with booming music and crowds waiting to get in. Erickson's apartment was an amazing split-level affair which makes you realise how much more you get for your money in Brooklyn. The view from his terrace was of the glittering Manhattan skyline and we made full use of his telescope to get close up views of the Empire State and the Chrystler buildings ... and to catch glimpses of his unsuspecting neighbours of course!
We ended the night at a club called Sugarland and much fun was had between chatting to a guy dressed as an angel and cutting impressive shapes to Madonna's "Vogue" - she would have been proud of us.

On Sunday, we met Erickson for brunch at the Pink Pony, an eclectically decorated bistro on the Lower East Side. A delicious Nova Scotia salmon omelette and a "why not" glass of Champagne later, we walked all the way to the West Village and the Meat Packing district for more shopping. We stopped at Patricia Field's* store on Bowery and marveled at all the crazy 80s clothes and accessories. As Mario was trying on a pair of tight gold shiny trousers (which he subsequently bought), Erickson pointed to Patricia herself, chain-smoking in the tiny salon at the back of the boutique, while having her bright red hair crimped.

It was one of these perfect days when the sun is shining brightly yet the air is cool and crisp. The kind of day when New York seems to deliberately stage itself to its best ... The city seemed about to burst with energy and happiness, every green patches of grass full of people enjoying the weather. New Yorkers were singing to themselves in the streets without any trace of self-consciousness. 80s style kids sported boom boxes and brightly coloured fluorescent trainers with matching caps. The street performers and market stall holders were back, marking the beginning of the more clement season. The prospect of the hot summer days seemed so close and a sense of hope and longing filled the air.

Men will come and go ... but the cities, the sights, the sounds, the experiences and the friendships they bring with them will stay forever.


* For the straight male readers: Patricia Field is the stylist for "Sex & The City".

The New York Man

I believe I now have the statistically significant sample size to describe the New York man, a very distinct breed, fairly accurately.

I usually hate to generalise and I realise this will make me sound bitter (I'm not), but the following observations are not based on my experiences alone, but also that of my girlfriends.

They are obsessed with their appearance - 5 times a week gym sessions, pedicure, manicure and eyebrow threading are all part and parcel of being a New York man.

They really believe that the grass is greener on the other side, not letting a small detail like being in a relationship get in the way of trying to sleep with you or at least flirt with you. There are many more single women than single men in the city, so you *almost* can't blame them.

Their blackberry is surgically attached to their hands and any attempts to distract them from it will induce withdrawal symptoms and a strange, vague look in their eyes - until said eyes settle on your cleavage or legs.

They come in 5 categories: married (50%), gay (30%), in an open relationship (a fact their girlfriends are unaware of - 10%), opportunistic single (5%) or desperate to get married (5%).

They always try to impress you, usually with tales of their glittering careers, marvelous friends and refined tastes in wine or food. If that fails, they will resort to flashing their membership card to the latest trendy club.

They never call the morning after the night before, no matter how much they want to. That would be, like, so uncool. There is an unbreakable 3 day rule that men have institutionalized here.

Their concept of commitment usually only stretches as far as booking that elusive table at the latest trendy restaurant for next week.

They are intelligent, successful, well read, up on current affairs and completely at ease with women - making them great company and irresistibly attractive unfortunately.

In 32 years of existence and with, what I thought, plenty of experience under my belt (no pun intended), I have never been made more aware that men are indeed from Mars ... it does make dating in the city that little bit more challenging but never dull!

Sex And The City

I had a slightly surreal experience today. I was working late and bumped into my boss’ boss (our Senior VP) on my way out of the office. She lives around the corner from me so we took the subway home together.

After some chitchatting, she mentioned that she had signed up to match.com a couple of days earlier. I admitted to her that I did the same thing too!
Now, one does not expect to discuss the upheavals of dating in the city with one’s big boss … but that’s exactly what we did, exchanging horror stories during our 30 minutes ride. She’s forty-something, obviously very successful, intelligent, attractive with a wide circle of friends and interests – in summary, she’s a catch!
But finding Mr Right (or even Mr Right Now) is an elusive quest, especially in New York it seems.

I have yet to meet any of the guys who have got in touch with me through match.com. I’m not sure I actually really want to. I signed up on a whim rather than with a purpose – so much of my life is facilitated by the Internet that I thought I could at least try to meet people that way too!

But it has been an interesting experience already. I find reading people’s profiles fascinating and hilarious at the same time … from the 30 years old cute widower, who didn’t bother writing about himself and instead stated that he was looking for older women with big breasts (I guess that’s one way to cope with grief)… to the guy who emailed me saying “It must be nice to be the kind of woman who enters a room and turns every heads” (nice try, not like you’ve emailed that same line to every women on this site!) … to the 5’4 “lovingly cuddly” geek who thought it was a good idea to admit to a love of computer games & sci-fi books …Oh, and of course, there was the freak who posted an intense, very long love letter to his future wife, littered with complicated and poetical words he clearly didn’t know the meaning of!

Anyway, I’ll stay on match.com for the entertainment value if anything. I’ve realised that dating in your thirties is harder because we have more expectations and more baggage than in our twenties. We know what we want and what we don’t want. We have mostly achieved our ambitions, built a great network of friends and traveled all over the world … We don't need someone to define us anymore but we start looking at everyone we meet and think “is he/she the one?” and “can he/she fit into my busy life and add to it?”. We tend to forget about just having fun and taking things slowly.
In New York, it's like a race with too many contenders - apparently, there are 185,000 more single women than single men in the city so the grass always seems greener on the other side ... for men!

I have to say, the more I watch “Sex & the City”, the more I realise how realistic it really is and how we all have a bit of Carrie/Samantha/Charlotte/Miranda inside of us … only wish we had the same wardrobe too …