Long Island is an enigma to those who have never set foot there.
“Oh, you’re from Long Island? Damn, that’s far!” said with an air of pity and disgust almost.
“Doesn’t it take you an hour to get from your apartment to your job in Midtown?” I retort.
“Yeah, but I live in Brooklyn, it’s a lot closer.”
“That’s funny,” I’d nonchalantly reply. “My commute is only 30 minutes on the train.”
I grew up one town away from Queens. I am more of an urbanite than most of the transplants who resided in New York City were. I memorized the subway system. I could tell you a good place to eat or party or pick up wing-tip shoes anywhere between Battery Park and 207th street. In the past I was there every Saturday, doing dinner and a Broadway show, when most people were sneaking cans of Natty Lights into their parents’ basements. I’ve taken art lessons at The Met, I’ve watched Swedish cinema at the Scandinavian House. What did you do this weekend? Spend exorbitant amounts of money on watered-down drinks at Sutton Place? Or did you have douchebags pay for them at McFadden’s?
Sometimes, I wonder if people know how to read maps and judge distance. There is a huge expanse of land between where Queens ends and where the Hamptons begin. Sure, we live by the mercy of the Long Island Railroad’s sometimes stringent schedule, and the drunk train feels a lot longer than the fourteen minutes it takes you to walk from the subway to your sublet. But do me the courtesy of Google Mapping my location before you sneer at the mention of a place that you technically live (sorry, but there is no magical line separating Brooklyn and Queens from Nassau County).
This is not a cause supporting “Strong Island” in any way, shape or form. This is a plea that people brush up on basic geography. You may live in Manhattan, but you are, and always will be, a country.fucking.bumpkin.
