I've had a love affair with New York since I was 13. Maybe even before, watching An Affair to Remember and all those Astaire & Rogers movies as a kid and having this romantic vision of THE city. The city of all cities. The city where you can fall down a different rabbit hole around any given block and will when you're least expecting it. The city where anything you want to be, do and see opens its arms (with some blood, sweat & tears) to you. And if you work hard and keep your head up and keep pushing you see the magic, you get caught up in the giant wave of magnetic energy that gets into every single one of your cells and keeps lifting you when you feel you can't go on another second. It humbles you, it comforts you and when you need it it will give you the power to rule your world, but only when you're good and ready. This city is not for the weak, the faint of heart or the easily shaken. This isn't a city for the complacent, no sir, stay in your hometown for that. This city is for those who want to push, they want to fight for what matters in life, they want the best of everything: the whole world in one city. This is a city for people with depth & dynamo, gumption & grit. It is a life force, it is contagious. It is a drug that once you taste it you will never be the same and you can never get it out of your system.
New York, I love you.
If my cliche testimony doesn't convey the spirit, Woody Allen nails it in what is the best opening sequence in the history of film:
