Not King, but... Visiting Dignitary of Queens?

My son and I traveled to New York last week with my girlfriend and her 2 kids. That's a big moment, right? Traveling together, staying together. And I met her family and friends for the first time. I'd met her mother and sister before, when they came here to visit, but I met her father, brother, and lifelong friends for the first time. It should have been intimidating. Nerve wracking. But it was none of those things.

We stayed in an AirB&B, the 5 of us in a 2-bedroom apartment in Queens, not far from where her parents live, and a couple of days in a row, we took the subway into Manhattan to be tourists. We went to Times Square, the Natural History Museum, Central Park, the Staten Island Ferry view of the Statue of Liberty, the World Trade Center Memorial, and 1 World Trade Center (I have a hard time calling it the Freedom Tower; it sounds like something out of Idiocracy and ought to have a corporate sponsorship attached, as in "The Verizon Wireless Freedom Tower." Anyway. I digress). I think the highlight for the kids was M&M's World.

For me, though, the highlight was Queens. I'm so glad we stayed there, right in a neighborhood home and not in a hotel, especially not one in Manhattan. The feeling of being somewhere completely different from anyplace else I'd been was much stronger there. Manhattan was different from Austin, certainly, and even from Boston, where I'd lived for 8 years. It's massive, of course, and it's packed with people and buildings and sights and sounds. But it still feels familiar.

But Queens seemed more real, somehow. 

In some ways it reminded me of the neighborhoods of Boston, especially Southie and Dorchester, but while Boston's neighborhoods were split, at least at the time I was there, into relatively homogeneous populations, Queens had every kind of everyone, and it was me, the English-speaking white man from Texas, who was the odd outsider whose accent no one could understand. It's good to be the outsider now and then.

I wish I'd taken more pictures. My favorite aspects of Queens were the bodegas with almost everything you could want, including breakfast and coffee, and the large and ornate fences and gates surrounding the tiny yards. Some were chrome. Some were wrought iron. Some were marble. There were lions and elephants topping the posts. The pride of ownership they suggest contrasted in a wonderful way with the amount of trash that filled the yards and gutters. Ah, here's to urban environments!

The coolest, though, was Jackson Heights. One of our hosts mentioned that it is the most diverse place in the United States, and possibly the world. I hope that's true. It felt true. The number of languages heard on the street and seen in the signage was impressive. The varieties of clothing, both in the stores and on the people walking by, was beautiful. And I've never seen so many jewelry stores, one after the other, that cater specifically to the needs of engaged Indian and Bengali and Sri Lankan immigrants. You don't see that in Austin. Or I don't, anyway.

So the journey was a joy. The 2 of us and our kids lived together for the first time in harmony. We saw new places, met new people, and ate new food. We were welcomed with genuine warmth and kindness and love by her circle of friends and family, and none of them laughed at the old white man trying to keep up with the dancing in the living room at Thanksgiving: salsa, merengue, and even '80s New Wave. There was so much talking, and so much laughter, and so much food. My deepest thanks and love to all of them who took us in, and to the city and the borough that did the same.

I hope your holiday season began with as much love as ours did, and I hope it only continues to get better and better.