Belated Valentine

New York Is Not Exactly America
This phrase, which I had read in all the books on New York, is repeated to us ten times a day, and it's true, but what does it matter? It's New York, a place which is neither exactly America nor exactly Europe, which gives you a burst of extraordinary energy, which you immediately feel you know like the back of your hand, as though you had always lived here, and at certain times, especially uptown where you can feel the busy life of the big offices and factories of ready-made clothes, it lands on top of you as though to crush you. Naturally, the minute you land here, you think of anything except turning back. --Italo Calvino, Hermit in Paris

((In other words: I like you very much, New York, and I hope you like me, too, because I think we make a very good couple.))