13 More Things We've Learned Since Moving to NYC: 8-Month Anniversary Edition

1. Don’t leave stuff in the lobby of your building (like a stroller), even if you plan to come down and get it in an hour or two, or else it will undoubtedly be gone when you return. [Author’s Note: Someone had taken our stroller and put it down with the trash cans, so there was no harm done.]
2. Snow makes the streets shrink. Piled snow prevents cars from parking right next to the curb, so where two moving cars could previously squeeze past one another, now only one car can drive at a time.
3. A corollary to #2: Snow takes up perfectly good parking places. More than once I drove right by a wide-open space because I knew that I’d have a heck of a time getting back out again.
4. In the midst of a bitterly cold winter, if the temperature rises at all out of the 20s, it feels as though everyone comes outside.



The frozen Harlem River

5. Leave plenty of time for doctor’s appointments. Yes, we can walk to their offices, but the sheer number of people in the city and the demand for medical services mean that no appointment ever happens when it is scheduled. Ever.
6. Simply being made in New York City doesn’t mean that the pizza is any good. Some of it is pretty lousy, in fact.
7. Don’t park over manhole covers during winter or early spring. Apparently the salt they use on the roads has been known to seep underground and eat away at underground wiring and – I kid you not – the manholes can explode. Check out this video: https://youtu.be/I8go5G3-J5g
8. Leave your windows open a little when you go out so that when you return to your apartment, you won’t be walking into what feels like a pizza oven.
9. Twitter is great for keeping up with what’s happening in New York City and our Bronx neighborhood. Just be ready for the bad news along with the good.
10. Mormons are vigilant in our area. We’ve had at least four pairs knock on our door since we moved here.
11. Perceptions vary: To some people our neighborhood (Bedford Park) is a nice, quiet one; others, however, have described where we live and where the Priority 1 apartment is located as “the hood.”
12. Melting snow is a blessing and a curse. It’s great that there’s more than just a narrow pathway to traverse, but every pedestrian ramp turns into a sludge-filled puddle, and all of the trash and dog poop that had collected (and been preserved) in snow banks now reappears as a disgusting obstacle course on everywhere you turn.
13. We live in a predominantly Hispanic area (and of that, the majority are Dominican), and as such, our girls get called “mami,” Bethany gets “mamma” or “mami,” and Greg has heard “boss” several times. All of these are familiar, friendly terms.

Why We Skipped Church

The ironic thing is I had finally decided to drive to church that Sunday, for the first time since we moved to the Bronx.

See, we’ve been attending a church that is across the 207^th St. Bridge in the Norwood section of Manhattan. To get there, we walk about a half mile to a bus stop, wait for the bus, ride the bus for 5 stops, then walk a couple more blocks to get to the church building. We leave at least 40 minutes for the trip. We do it this way because the church has no parking lot, only on-street parking wherever you can find it. And finding it is difficult. On Saturday night I had seen that rain was forecasted for the majority of the next day and I thought, “Well, this would be a good day not to ride the bus.”

Our beloved Bx12 SBS

Riding the bus has its downside, of course. If the weather is bad (too hot, too cold, too monsoon-like, etc.), then the walk to and from the bus – with 3 little kids – can be very annoying. Too, there is no guarantee of a seat on the bus, depending on how full it is. Unless, I must say, you have a child with you. We have NEVER had to stand if we’re holding Juliet; someone always gives up their seat. Always.

Anyway, it was supposed to rain, so I decided we should try driving and see how bad it would be. At the very least, even if I had to drive around for 20 minutes looking for a parking place, it would be better than walking a mile in the rain.

But then the warnings from my phone’s weather app began: “Wintry mix.” “Icy conditions.” “Take extra precautions on the roadways.” My resolve was waning.

Amber, our Priority 1 colleague who was under the weather that day, texted me and told me to be careful, that there had been two car accidents near her building already that morning.

Hmm.

I even started seeing warnings about sidewalks and stairways. Ice. Slippery. Use caution.

Ultimately, we decided simply to stay in. The thought of the mile-long walk in the rain on icy sidewalks was just as bad as driving, considering that (as I saw on Twitter) the police were “urging” people to stay off the roads.

Yep, we skipped church. Turns out we made the right call though, because around noon they suspended all bus service in the Bronx because the roads were so bad. So even if we had made it to church, there would have been no bus to take home.

No buses = No go out

So we had family church. I put my church shirt back in the closet and reached for my guitar. We’d sing a song or two, then pray together as a family. We sang “Oceans” because I knew that Ginny could sing along with that one, and then sang “Who Is the King of the Jungle?” complete with motions. Then we went around and prayed for each person individually, especially for anything she was afraid of or worried about. My favorite moment came when Ginny (a week shy of 8) prayed for her baby sister. Cora is still pretty shy about things like that, and just shook her head when we asked if she would pray, but no matter; she still got a glimpse of Jesus. Juliet, of course, is only just learning to say her own name (She currently refers to herself as “Et”). We didn’t belabor it, didn't force it. Altogether, it was maybe 20 minutes. But it was a great family church service.

We don’t want Jesus to be someone we go visit once a week at church. Our kids (and we ourselves, for that matter) need to know that He is always with them, and that all they have to do is knock, and the door will be opened for them. They also need to see their parents following hard after Him, even if we’re just in our living room.

We’re not perfect. Not even close. We have plenty of areas where we can – no, must – grow. But we hope and pray that as we learn to listen and obey our Father better, that our girls will watch us growing and then turn and do the same.

And we'll see about driving to church next week. They're forecasting no precipitation, but I'll keep checking my Twitter feed, just in case.

"That's Just How We've Always Done It"

Stopped in traffic on the 207th Street Bridge

We used to poke fun at locals in Pennsylvania, both in Juniata County (where we taught high school for two years) and in Franklin County (where we lived for eight years). Though born-and-raised Pennsylvanians ourselves, we each hail from different parts of the state. And we saw everywhere a kind of indigenous logic that the "natives" simply seemed to know, but which non-natives such as ourselves struggled to comprehend. Have you ever gotten directions from someone who included landmarks that no longer exist? (Our favorite in Franklin County was “Turn where the Sheetz used to be.”) Bizarre intersections mock common sense (“Stop except left turn”), but somehow traffic flows through them without incident (most of the time, of course). If you’ve ever been frustrated by local “traditions,” bristled when someone pines for “how it used to be,” or – worst of all – states the dreaded words “That’s just how we’ve always done it,” then you know what I mean.

New York City is completely different. Completely.

And by that I mean, of course, that their bizarre traditions and cultural oddities are different than the bizarre traditions and cultural oddities we had to learn in other places.

It doesn’t surprise us, really, that we’re still dealing with this stuff up here. We knew that we would become OAFs (Outsiders/Aliens/Foreigners) when we moved, and that learning how to do NYC life would take some time. And I should say that it has not been all weirdness and stress since we’ve been here – not at all. But the weird things do stand out, of course.

We haven’t been here long, and I’m sure we’ll have more examples as time goes by, but for us so far, the most glaring example of this cultural weirdness has to be parking. It’s crazy and terrible and stressful. Most places, outside of big cities, take parking for granted. Wherever one goes, whether to Walmart, the post office, the grocery store, or a friend’s house, there will be parking; when I go home, I will park in my garage/driveway/etc. Not so in the city.

Parking is a crapshoot. Unless you pay exorbitant fees for reserved spaces, there is no guarantee that you will be able to find a convenient parking spot anywhere, including where you live. As a general rule, if you can take public transportation somewhere, then you should take public transportation. We’ve been to a particular church four times now, and haven’t driven there once, even though it would definitely be faster than taking the bus. But there’s hardly anywhere to park, so we bus it.

Complicating everything is the misery that is alternate-side parking. This video from the New York Times explains it much better than I would be able to: Swept Away: The Parking Dance in New York City (I am all for the councilman's proposal, incidentally).

I am constantly thinking about our van and where it’s parked. How long can I leave it there? Did I fold back my side view mirror? After I come back from dropping Ginny off at school, will there be a spot on the right side of the street? If not, what am I going to do for the hour and a half when I can’t park there? What about if someone comes to visit us? Where will they park?

It’s weird that I am constantly thinking about parking. But ironically, stressing out about parking, I’ve found, makes me fit right in with car owners in New York City. Everybody deals with this! It’s reassuring to find out that you’re not the only one who has a problem, that someone else (or in fact, everybody else) has the same issues you do.

Our first busted mirror

So yes, it’s weird, and the system has lots of flaws. But we’re learning some strategies, some little tricks (we found two nearby grocery stores that do have small parking lots, so I’ll go when they sweep the street).

And I’ll never again take a parking space for granted. Even if all the locals are weird.