The awesome week we had planned in NYC for our family turned out to be little more than half a day of misery. Well, not all misery. But a good amount of it. We flew in, no issues. Got to my brother’s office to pick up his apartment keys. Let ourselves in, rested up and then took the girls out for dinner at a little diner around the corner. I wanted moussaka, and you can always count on a traditional NYC diner being run by a Greek family who makes the best moussaka. We don’t have diners here in Texas. But as it turns out, 3 hours by plane is a little bit ridiculous – even for us – to travel for some good old Greek diner food.

Let’s just say that last night was hell, of the kind that I’ve never really lived through. My brother’s ridiculously small loft apartment is little more than a living area and a kitchen area. And while it’s luxuriously large by New York standards, when you are coming from Texas and are used to having 3,000 square feet, his apartment was positively claustrophobic. Add to it the bewilderment that I had at knowing that he paid nearly twice for his little home in NYC that we paid for our big comfortable home in Fort Worth, and I could barely breathe. And I’m not knocking his life there in NYC, it’s a cool life – all hip and interesting and intellectual and all that… But those walls were closing in on my family and me. And fast.

Pea basically slept in an alcove in the kitchen – right next to the front door. I had to creep past her to get to the bathroom several times, me suffering from world’s-tiniest-bladder syndrome, and all. And Coco slept in the living room, which is conveniently the same room as the bedroom. And she decided that she didn’t want to sleep. So by 1 am, when I’d already been to soothe her several times, I’d had it. And let me clarify: we are not wimps. We are brave road warriors, even with two baby girls in tow. But this was rough. It was so loud. Noise that I just don’t remember. I kept asking my husband “is this how it was when we lived here?” He swore it was, that we just got used to it. But is that really possible? To get used to that kind of grinding, squealing, honking noise? There were dump trucks, delivery trucks, a bunch of drunks at one point, all outside our window. And then, the flashing lights of a police cruiser, bouncing rhythmically off of the walls of the apartment for what seemed like hours. It just never stopped. I literally had three minor panic attacks during this time, it was insane. I just don’t remember that part of New York City. The energy just doesn’t ever die down, even when you want it to. When you need it to. It was clear we were not going to get to sleep there. Ever. So I did what I always do when the going gets rough. I ran into the bathroom and threw on some sweats with the determination to escape – to flee the apartment – alone – and just wander the streets of NYC. By myself. I was going to get lost.

And that’s the beauty of New York City. You can literally get lost in it and never be found. It’s such a tiny little island, too, Manhattan is. And I just longed to be out there. On my own. I wanted to walk and walk and walk. And then walk some more.

But then Pea came into the bathroom and reminded me why I not only cannot “get lost,” but why I also might not want to. She hugged me. Said she loved me. And that she was now ready to party. She was not going back to sleep and I was not going to escape that stifling night and so we – as a family – were simply going to get on the first flight back home. Wow, it was hard to hear that from my husband, that we were throwing in the towel. But he was so convinced that this trip was not going to work. We were cramped, it was noisy, and we just had to go home. So we did.

Four am this morning, we were in the back-seat of a cab on the way back to LaGuardia. No visit to my father’s home in Locust Valley for dinner with the family. No NY slice. No chana masala at Baluchi’s. No salt bagel with butter. No Central Park. No Serendipity. No FAO Schwartz. No showing Pea mama’s old apartment building on Christopher Street. No Bigelow’s.

I went to New York City and all I got was a lousy piece of moussaka.