So I have realized in the past couple of days that it's Gay Pride in New York City this week/weekend. I have been so much removed from it the last two years I had almost completely forgotten. For the moment I am still living in San Diego and Pride here is the last week of July and although a fun filled event, it doesn't compare to Pride in NYC.

I can't help but think back on the first Pride parades I watched. I had just moved to New York, and although knew a few people from work, for the most part I had no community of my own. I was waiting tables at the time and would always ask for the day off and would wander down 5th Avenue until I found my spot (somewhere around 12 Street). I would stand and watch the parade with goosebumps and think that someday I would be a part of the greater community and not some lone person standing on the steps of an apartment building with no one to share the day with.

I eventually found my community, which included having people to watch the parade with. In fact I marched in the 2003 parade with my boyfriend D.L.C. We marched with the 12 Step/Sober group that was at the front of the parade. I am not an alcoholic but my boyfriend at the time was and we wanted to march with a group that we felt connected to. It was an exhilarating experience walking by those thousands of people who were cheering us on. It's the first and only time I felt completely a part of the gay community.

Much has changed since that summer. I moved to San Diego to pursue my graduate degree. D.L.C. dumped me (I'll post on that sometime I am sure) my friends continued their lives in NYC without me, and time moved on. It's been three years since that summer and I can't wait to get back to NYC and find that connection again. In the past couple of months I have been reaching out to some of my old friends. S.H. has been a huge wealth of support and guidance. Which is funny because when I moved from NYC he had just found out he was HIV+ and barely paying the rent. He's now healthier than ever, and has started his own company that appears as though it's going to do insanely well.

So I sit here melancholy about what has been. I want to go back to the NYC I was living in when I left. I know that I'll find my way back there. But I want it now. I don't want to go back to the city and be an unknown. I don't want to go back and have less money than I had before, less friends, less connections. I think that's why I have been putting off packing my things for the past week. I know that things are not going to be the way that I want them to be. I am going to have to begin again. Not from scratch because this time I have people that I have maintained connections with while I have been gone, but different all the same.

In the meantime, I try to remind myself why I left NYC in the first place. I try to remind myself that although not in NYC, my graduate school experiences were the best they could possibly be and the wealth of knowledge that I gained was worth every penny that I borrowed to get them. I just have to stay the course and know that within a few days/weeks/months/years I'll find myself being one of the gang again and life will be better than ever.