In recent weeks a big question has been doing the rounds in my head. "Should I leave Newport and move to Brooklyn?". This post shall be a discussion of most of what has transpired.
When I first sensed the presence of this question I shuddered inside and then outside (in that order). I did not want to leave this place. I had come to visit a good friend (now my room-mate) and had fallen in love with this place. Walking on the riverside is one of my favorite things to do and most of my friends have at one point of time or the other threatened to bludgeon me to death if I mention taking a stroll. I love Newport, I love the fact that I step out of the apartment and take a few paces and presto! I am on the waterfront walkway. I like that another few paces and I am at Morton Williams which despite being a burning example of the term "Daylight robbery" is still a convenient place to get basic groceries at. A little bit of a longer walk in yet another direction and one finds oneself in Hoboken which despite being called a New York wannabe by many a New York city resident is still quaint and charming.
Add to the above the fact that the commute to work is a breeze and the commute to practice with my band is a...some other form of wind..a gale..wait no...let me just call it another breeze for now.
How can this be a bad place to live in?
While I want to say, it isn't, the answer is not quite as black and white.
Most of the residents of Newport are the Bourgeoise of the current day and age. The majority of these residents work in IT (like your's truly) and they are great examples of the planned trajectories that Indian lives tend to follow. Living here and seeing these people is like seeing what my life is going to be a few years from now. I see people trying so hard to convince themselves that they are happy, not trying to simply be happy even though that might be infinitely easier preached than practiced. I see couples immersed in the "system" and if one looks closely one can see the cables that run from them into some place that the human eye cannot see but where the "system" is conceivably housed. I see kids and sometimes I ignore them completely and some other times I feel like punching their lights out. The perfect neutrality of the world overwhelms my senses and I am left in a state akin to nirvana but more Cobain than the dalai lama.
Just when I am about to erupt in a puff of cynicism I see a few couples who look like they might be alright. The dude looks not like a complete zombie and the female not like a complete harpie and they seem to be having not a completely horrid time. Perhaps due to some combination of the above three the cable though present is frayed. Perhaps that's as good as it gets.
So then I had friends and acquaintances tell me about moving to Brooklyn since apparently that's where all the cool people are. Brooklyn seems to be full of the young crowd with a fair smattering of hipsters and so on.There are places which are nice and then some which are not so nice. I for one did not find anything special with the place. I also did not understand one of the main points in their reasoning which had to do with hanging out being made easier if we moved to Brooklyn. I did not get this since even from Newport Brooklyn is only two trains away neither of which are a pain to ride. Over and above all of this, my being just did not resonate with Brooklyn.
Every time I considered moving away from Newport a weird sort of dread seemed to take hold of my heart and to be entirely honest I do not know what this is. By no means do I intend to live the rest of my life in Newport but I think that when I eventually do find "home" it will be a place that is similar to Newport in geography and location. I think my home will be a place very very close to if not on water. Perhaps I should have taken up my father's vocation and gone sailing the seven seas.
Water indicates escape. An opening. A path for you to take if the world becomes too much to bear. I don't mean chuck yourself into the drink and die, I mean to sail away. I see dark ships making their way slowly past the lights of New York, the water disturbed in their wake slap against the not so old stones of the pier in exchange place and within this ancient rhythm one can almost make out whispers of far away lands and stories of people. I see one of these ships and I remark to whoever is standing closest "I wish I could be on that". On a dark ship heading to destinations unknown.
The wind in Brooklyn is different, it speaks of different things, new things. It is a controlled wind, hurt at being regulated through so many narrow openings and gaps between buildings which struggle amongst each other for space. It strives to be free but stumbles and fades away into a few whispers that softly lap at your face as if in farewell. The wind in Newport (when it blows) is mighty. It is free and comes roaring in off the hudson and declares itself with that blatant confidence which only an ocean-born possesses.
I stay because of the wind. I stay for the song of the water. I remain because there are many ships yet to leave the lights behind to travel the mighty seas.
Newport has it's faults, no doubt, but I love it for what it means to me. A place where I can be close to the water.
Quite a random and digressive post I admit, however I do believe that a few of the paragraphs do deserve some merit.
Until the next one and here's to hoping that no kids get clocked in the face.
Sentinel.
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