Perhaps a city is a living thing. Each city has its own personality, after all.
Los Angeles is not Vienna. London is not Moscow. Chicago is not Paris. Each city is a collection of lives and buildings and it has its own personality.
So, if a city has a personality, maybe it also has a soul. Maybe it dreams.
-Old Man from "The Sandman" by Neil Gaiman
New Haven Diaries Introduction
Published Friday, October 21, 2005 by Starry Saltwater Rose.
When I first arrived in New Haven, CT, it fascinated me and I am still caught up in her seduction. I created this blog to record the intricacies that connect people, places, and things in this town. Some of the entries are about people I have met, some are about locations in the city and a little bit of their history, and then there's the myriad details that make New Haven a very unique place. I will note, though, that the New Haven I present to you is the New Haven I see and love. I am completely biased, but I still think you'll find my New Haven to be very interesting and extremely lovely.
Come discover...
New Haven, Connecticut is marked by the I-95 and I-91 intersection. From here you can easily go to New York City, Hartford, Boston, or Rhode Island. It puts itself on the map for being the home of one of the eight Ivy League schools, Yale University.
I came to New Haven in ’99 to go to school and then, when I graduated, I did the odd thing—I stayed. She seduces you, this city. I found my home along Howe Street and my neighborhood stretches to Elm Street and Broadway, down past the Green. Then it moved to Science Park, off Prospect. Now I live almost in North Haven, on Quinnipiac Avenue. But downtown is still my center.
I grew up in the mountains of Puerto Rico on a no-name dead-end street in a house that had no number. Next door was my grandmother. Farther down, the junkie/alcoholic and his family, then Pagan’s second wife, first wife and mother. Up the hill, a family has piled houses up the mountainside like Lego blocks. At Christmas, we could see the lights and hear the music of their parties from our porch.
We never really spoke to our neighbors, besides my grandmother. I wasn’t allowed alone into the corner store until I was eighteen. People made fun of my Spanish, so I refused to speak it for several years and never made any great local friends. I never learned to drive; my mom was the official chauffer of the family. My life from birth until I moved out pretty much consisted of my house, my family, and school.
Then I moved to New Haven. It was a hot, sticky day in August. I was fascinated that I could walk around, buy a sandwich, read a book almost anywhere, rent a movie, have a drink without anyone bugging me.
See, when I came to New Haven, I found freedom. How can I not love her for that?
About me
- I'm Starry Saltwater Rose
- From New Haven, Connecticut, United States
- My profile