I’m moving next Saturday! Petr and I have booked one-way tickets to San Francisco.

What does one do on their last weekend in a city they have lived in for more than ten years? I have packed up 80% of my belongings, and looking around my living room, it doesn’t look so different from what it looked like over the past year that I’ve lived here. Our plants are still here, waiting to be picked up by friends. The desk needs to be disassembled, and the keyboard wrapped in bubble wrap. Petr is having dinner with a friend in Williamsburg. I have just tried on my wedding dress to make sure it still fits and that I still like it. As I looked at myself in the mirror, I realized I hadn’t looked at myself in a mirror in a while. I have been so busy lately.

The last time I booked a one-way ticket somewhere was when I moved to New York City from San Diego. I only lasted in San Diego for one year. I worked at my entry-level 9-to-5 marketing job on the weekdays, lived with roommates, and spent my free time on the weekends aimlessly. Nights downtown dancing, evenings at trivia or dinner with coworkers, countless days at the beach soaking up the sun—it all felt too easy and stagnant. I began exploring different things: reselling show tickets as a side hustle and learning to code. The job market in San Diego didn’t have anything exciting. I felt that time was slipping away from me and I felt an urge to do more.

After some time, the idea of moving to New York City began to form. A visit to the SF Museum of Modern Art and the Garry Winogrand retrospective planted a seed in my mind. The faces in his photos captured the vitality and personality of the humans on the streets of New York in the 1960s. I felt drawn to his work, and my mind lingered on each photo, wanting to understand the people in the photo. What were they feeling? What were their lives like? It seemed like they lived more interesting lives than mine.

Back in San Diego, I started wanting to become a film connoisseur. I had taken some film classes in college and felt interested in movies, but I didn’t know much about them and wanted to cultivate it as a new hobby. Movies offered interesting stories and allowed me to experience a wider range of emotions and feelings. I diligently went to see international movies at the local arthouse theatre on my own and began borrowing DVDs from the library of the Criterion Collection, going down the list of critically acclaimed movies of all time. As I watched these films, I found myself captivated by the characters’ lives, which seemed far more exciting and authentic than my own. “Taxi Driver” (despite its dark portrayal) continued to fuel my curiosity about New York. The city was a strong character in the movie, with a personality that fascinated me. I wanted to absorb some of its personality and become a more interesting person myself.

When I realized I could simply quit my job and move, it didn’t take long for me to pull the trigger. I felt bad moving so far away from my family in Los Angeles, but the overwhelming thought was that staying in California felt depressing; moving to New York felt promising. I had to go. When my coworker asked me what I was looking forward to most in New York, I told them I wanted to try halal cart. I didn’t really have a good answer to her question and defaulted to mentioning the most reviewed thing on Yelp for places to eat at the time, which was Halal Guys. At my goodbye karaoke party in San Diego, I remember feeling surprised by the number of friends who showed up. I wouldn’t realize until later on that I had a community in San Diego I hadn’t fully appreciated.

I had visited New York two times before. The first visit was with my family when I was eight years old, part of a whirlwind bus tour that also included stops in DC, Philly, and Niagara Falls. I don’t remember much from that trip, but I occasionally look at photos of us at the Statue of Liberty and the Empire State Building. Eight year old Nisha would probably feel so excited to know I was moving there. My second visit was a long layover. With no real knowledge of the city, I spent my limited time in NYC going to White Castle simply because I’d heard of it from “Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle.” I hadn’t even watched the movie. Looking back on it now, it seems so silly. But I was seeking guidance from movies, artists, my family, Yelp—anywhere except for where the answers actually are, within myself.

In October of 2013, I traveled with two suitcases my parents had given me, filled mostly with clothes. The plane flew over Manhattan, and the city looked like something from a movie. Seeing those buildings from above with the twinkling lights, I felt that if this were a movie (a girl moving by herself to the big city!), I would feel inspired and awe-stricken. Instead, I remember feeling nothing and even feeling confused about why I felt nothing.

A friend of mine had asked his friend to pick me up from JFK and give me a ride to St. Mark’s Place in East Village. The air was crisp. It was a Saturday night, and people were out. I remember they wore leather jackets, illuminated by the streetlights, and it felt so ominous and mysterious. I didn’t know anything about the neighborhood or the city. All I knew was that I was to sublet a room from my friend Jarita’s friend Hannah in their three-bedroom apartment. When Hannah gave me the tour, I was confused that my room was separate from the rest of the unit, and I had to go into the public hallway to access the kitchen and bathroom. But I didn’t mind at all. That night, I slept alone on a borrowed air mattress. I cracked the window open and felt soothed by the city’s lively energy right outside the door.

I fell in love right away with the simple pleasures of living in New York—walking to take class at Yoga to the People, taking the bus to work on Water Street in Financial District, grabbing a bite to eat at Tompkins Square Bagels, and exploring all of the city’s neighborhoods on foot. In San Diego, my exploration was limited by my dislike of driving. In NYC, it felt vast and infinite, confined only by time and money. There were so many restaurants to try, so many nearby cities to travel to. I used every weekend to explore.

It took me a while to get used to some things. I took the wrong train many times and I remember feeling confused why Jamaica was a stop on the subway. Wasn’t that a country? My first winter here, I often forgot to zip up my coat. I had often worn jackets in California, but I never zipped them up. I remember using my hands to hold it together. My first summer in New York, I kept getting stuck in the rain. It took me a while to learn that I needed to check the weather forecast in the summer.

Over time, I did get used to these things. And I continued to search and seek. I didn’t have the answers to the questions I had when I moved here, and I’m not sure I knew what the questions were either. New York certainly gave me a lot to do though. I learned and experienced so much here. I took improv classes, pottery classes, started a company, rock climbed, ran a marathon. I learned that all these things take effort, but if I wanted to, I could do them.

The city search this time around was with Petr. We started seriously talking about moving a year ago. We considered many places—London, Seattle, Vancouver, Los Angeles, Calgary, Denver, Upstate New York, San Diego. None felt right, even as we filled in the matrix we had created with our detailed criteria for our new city. But we trusted in the process and felt we could stay in Brooklyn until we found the right place. Then San Francisco came from under our noses. When we visited the city together a few months ago, it was Petr’s first time there. Earlier in my life, I had lived in San Francisco for a short stint of six months, and I had visited many times over the years.

We met my family in SF for a weekend of sightseeing, and then on the first day by ourselves, we walked from our hotel in Russian Hill to Arsicault Bakery on a recommendation from a friend. We took selfies with our delicious almond croissant and discussed how amazing it tasted. When it began to rain, we used it as an excuse to stop into some of the shops on Clement Street and browse the creative items on sale. After the rain cleared, we made our way to Golden Gate Park. It was lush with greenery, a refreshing change from our daily walks in Bushwick, where there are no large parks nearby. We saw dogs off leash and people relaxing, going for a run. Then we stumbled upon a tennis facility with beautiful new courts. We watched the players and imagined our life there together—maybe getting a dog, having a family. Petr could see himself playing tennis regularly, something he hasn’t been able to do in New York. I could see myself going for runs in the park and visiting my family more often. We looked up apartment prices in the neighborhood on Zillow and found it was within our budget. It felt like the pieces had finally fallen into place and we didn’t need our matrices to make our decision.

San Francisco it was!

Moving this time, I am not seeking answers. I am seeking to create a life in which I could spend my time doing what would bring me contentment.

You know that saying, “Wherever you go, there you are” — I guess I have learned one big thing which is that cities will change your environment, but you cannot escape from yourself. The only way to resolve things is to look at them dead in the eye, however uncomfortable that may be. It’s a truth that I don’t remember all the time, but it’s become clearer to me over the years.

I oscillate between being stressed out about everything that is going on and being so grateful for all the changes that are happening in my life. After all, I am moving in the direction that I want to go! We are getting married soon, and we are going to be moving to a city we both are excited about together. All the little details are just that—little details.

Yesterday, as we lay down to take a break between all the packing, I shared with Petr how stressed out I felt about everything we needed to do. We don’t have an apartment yet in San Francisco, and our wedding planning is very much a work in progress.

“What are you stressed out about?” he asked.
“We have a lot to do,” I answered.
“What do we need to do?” he asked.
“We need to take apart the bed, move the sofa downstairs, coordinate key drop-off to the next renter, email our wedding photographer,” I listed.
“Sure, but we will always have a lot to do. It never ends.”
“But if I don’t worry about it, will all these things get done?” I asked.
“Maybe, maybe not, but worrying doesn’t help with anything,” he said.

And he’s right. It doesn’t. I calmed down and here I am writing an essay and reflecting on our move instead.

One other important thing I have learned is the value of being present. Not just intellectually, like how I used to read the benefits of it in an article. But I have experienced that feeling of deep focus on the current moment in my body. The first time I felt this was in New York.

A few years ago, as I was working to heal myself and find happiness after a big breakup, I was taking the subway to work. I was walking in the long corridor from the World Trade Center subway platform to our office when something within me clicked. Suddenly, everything became so clear. I don’t know what triggered this switch to a state of presence, but I found myself experiencing and absorbing everything around me effortlessly. I realized I didn’t need to worry so much; I could just focus on what was happening around me and soak it all in. The world seemed so wonderful, and I questioned why I would ever watch a movie when I could just observe life around me. Have you ever felt this kind of presence? I don’t spend much of my days being present, but I try to remind myself as often as I can. I think it is not a coincident that one of my biggest life insights came in a moment when I was doing something so ordinary and un-exciting. When I am present, I lose that nagging feeling that time is slipping away.

Now, as I prepare to leave, I realize that the city didn’t solve my problems, but it has taught me that the answers are inside me. The restlessness that drove me to move here is no longer driving my move to San Francisco. Moving to New York, I sought adventure and change. I often think about a green notebook cover I once saw in a gift shop that said, “Do one thing you love each day,” in cursive golden text. That feels like the younger New York version of me—frenetic and always seeking a little more. Now, moving to San Francisco, I prefer the comfort of a regular Tuesday—a day filled with simple, ordinary pleasures and peace.

I want to spend my days doing many things that content me, not just one. The answer seems to lie not so much in the city itself but in how I choose to interpret what I experience there.

I am ready to embrace the new experiences and challenges that await us in San Francisco. I know it won’t be perfect, and I know I might get anxious about things, but I trust it will be okay. The interesting personality and fulfilling life I had been searching for has been here all along.

I feel grateful for all my experiences in New York City, for the next chapter of our lives in San Francisco, and for this moment right here in between.