Lusting For Large Open Spaces

Have I told you lately about my cravings for wide open spaces? I suppose it's a given now that I've been living in Manhattan (officially) for just about a year. Seriously. They should call it "Smallhattan". Or, "Minihattan"! THAT'S IT! MINIHATTAN! Because everything is so damn small.

Last night I dreamt that I was getting an apartment with Dopey and she had put first dibs on the bedroom with the huge walk-in closet. And I was like, "Wait a minute! I've been living in NYC for the last year! I NEED A WALK-IN CLOSET MORE THAN YOU!" But she wouldn't budge because she'd gotten first dibs and that was that. So I consoled myself with the knowledge that at least this new normal-sized closet was about ten times bigger than the closet I was used to in NYC, so it was still an up-grade. This is what I am dreaming about, readers. How sad is that?

Did I mention how when I was in LA recently, I could not get over how enormous my parents house was? This is the very same house that I was raised in, that I was embarrassed of in high school because I thought it was so much smaller than my friends houses. But it suddenly seemed cavernous. It shocked me. I didn't remember my childhood bedroom having so much empty space between pieces of furniture. I mean the floor space! It was incredible. I grew up thinking my room was tiny. Compared to the bedrooms of my friends, it was tiny. But now? Now I walk into that tiny room and I feel a little awkward. I'm not sure what to do with myself in such a large room. The room is actually bigger than my one-bedroom Hells Kitchen apartment. I'm not exaggerating. No, I'm really not.

You know what else I am lusting after? A garden. I want a garden. Badly. I want to grow strawberries and tomatoes and carrots and an apple tree (from a seedling, not a grafted one, even though the apples will most definitely be inedible, I still want a seedling apple tree) and cucumbers and kale and chard and mushrooms and avocado trees. I want to be able to harvest my vegetables and eat them for dinner every night. You know, ever since I read "In Defense of Food", eating is so much funner because I am exploring all kinds of new and interesting vegetables and fruits that I've never eaten before. And they are yummy! And healthy! And that debilitating fear of getting fat that I've been carrying around with me for my entire adult life is beginning to dissolve because, no way I'm going to get fat eating vegetables all day long. So now, along with eating all kinds of wonderful vegetables, I want to grow them. I'd be happy growing them on a beautiful roof-top terrace, I don't need a backyard. But I do need a roof-top terrace. So, now I'm lusting after that too.

Maybe it's time I get a gig on Broadway so I can afford a larger, more roof-top-terrace-with-organic-vegetable-garden-y apartment?