January 15, 2003.
The Call of The City


One curious thing about New York City is how everyone who lives there calls it The City. I guess that if you live in New York, you have this secret understanding that New York is the best city, and therefore the only city. It's just The City — and nothing else needs to be said.

I think that if I lived in New York, I would call it The City, too. I would think that was pretty cool.

But I don't live in New York. I don't think I ever will. That's 900 miles from here, and cold.

So here are some pictures that were not taken in New York City. They were taken here in Atlanta. These are very bad, blurry pictures. I apologize for that.

I had to park on the very tip-top of the parking garage this morning — if I had driven up any further I would have crashed my car through the cement wall like some unfortunate, disposable character in a Bruce Willis movie. I grabbed the last spot in the deck, and it felt like I was parked halfway to the stars.

Really, it wasn't that far up. Only about seventy feet high, maybe. But when I got back to my car tonight, I took out the digital camera, because I like the way the city looks from seventy feet up.


From seventy feet up, the skyline of Atlanta is really kind of thrilling. It looks sublimely intricate, a complex engine of commerce. All those people, all those offices, all that money, all that life. The tip-top of the parking garage offers a unique glimpse into the heart of downtown; you feel like you are standing in the middle of the secret boiler room of Atlanta. You want to grab a shovel and throw in some more coal.

I don't expect you to get that from these photos. I don't think there's much you can get from them, except maybe disoriented.


So I was standing at the very top of the parking garage with my silly digital camera pointed at the sky when the elevator dinged and a guy wearing an expensive suit strolled out, and saw me there, shivering in my ugly green winter coat, aiming the camera halfway between the Equitable Building and the satellites. He turned around and craned his neck to see what it was I was shooting at. I don't think he saw it. (My digital camera didn't, either.)


So I got some really bad news last week.

José and his wife Nikolle are planning to move to The City.

Yes. That is bad news. In fact, it is worse than bad news. It is Awful, Stinky, Terrible, No-Good, Cigar-Smoking, Beer-Burping, Morning-Breath, Matted-Hair, Fuzzy-Teeth news.




José is one of my favorite people in the world and someone I consider a very close friend. It sounds hokey, but he is like a brother to me. We worked together for four years at the agency where I still am still employed.

In August José decided to quit agency life and start his own company. Although I was thrilled to see him make such an exciting professional move, watching him pack his things and leave the office was definitely one of the Top Bad Things of 2002. I hated that. That daily camaraderie we had — which was so easy and pure and perfect — it just dissolved. It had to, I guess.

And now he and his lovely wife want to pack up and move 900 miles away.

I'm pretty sad about it.

I admit, we used to waste a lot of time together at work. Perhaps his departure has been good for me, in that respect. When we worked together, we would take these terrifically long breaks in the middle of the work day for chit-chat. Our offices were right next door to each other, so there was always some sort of banter flying back and forth. Halfway through the morning, José would save whatever he was working on, and shuffle over to my office with his second cup of coffee, and say, "So do you ever think about what your life is going to be like in thirty years?" or whatever. And we'd talk for half an hour, maybe more, until another more diligent employee walked by, obediently doing their work, and we'd realize that most of the morning had gone, and that we were supposed to be watching our billable hours...

It was great to have such a good friend right there at work. I don't know if I will ever get that back.

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After José told me that they were considering moving to The City, I wrote him and his wife a very sincere, very rational e-mail respectfully instructing them to reconsider. (Silly, maybe, but I had to voice my feelings. I don't take bad news lying down!) I hoped that if I poured my heart into this e-mail, and made a strong case for why they should stay, maybe they would reconsider.

In my e-mail, I tried to line up all the good things about their life now, and then scrape together some potential bad things about life in New York ("It's cold there!... And you could get mugged!").

I don't think any of it is having an effect on them.

What can I do? They have heard The Call of The City. (To me, it is like one of those fabled Whistles That Only Dogs Can Hear.)

Oh, I know it's not done yet. I guess there's still a little hope left. There's a lot of stuff that needs to be worked out. Nikolle is still searching for a job in New York, and they will have to sell their house here in town, and take care of a thousand other concerns.

But I bet that they will do those things. I bet they will figure it all out and move to New York City and call it The City and wear leather coats and raise ridiculously bright children and walk through Central Park in the springtime and cook sexy food in their stylish New York City apartment and eat it by candlelight. I bet they will.




This little town of mine will feel smaller and less lovely without them. Atlanta and I will both miss them terribly.