A Question From One Of My Readers!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                       Not just ANY reader, but one  of the more fabulous,  who is Victoria.  Her question is, "What do you imagine your life would have been like, had you not moved to New York City?

                                         Picture this, before going any further.

                                          OK, here goes!

                                           Victoria, and Everyone,

                                            I can honestly say this is something I ask, periodically still, to this day.  Moving to New York City was always a dream of mine,  but I never thought of achieving it. I somehow had the feeling I would be working in NYC, because my father did, but that  I would be residing in either my hometown of Highland Park,  NJ, or across the river,  in an apartment in New Brunswick, from where I would have commuted to NYC via bus or train.  I would return home an night.  And,  of course, I would be a spinster, because, back then, I had no imagining of  how my life possibly could have been like it is today.  I might have withdrawn, become a BIG Closet Case,  and steered myself  into Sylvia Plath  territory.  Not suicide; just acute depression.

                                              I imagined I would spend  my weekend days in the city,  using that time to do what I wanted.  Yet, always returning to NJ.

                                                Puberty changed all that.  My hormones pointed me to men, not women, which did not make for the happy, carefree adolescence I was anticipating--though I forced myself into  HS activities, in order  to prove  myself, a goal that still pushes me today.  By the time I was  out of college, life  was soon altered--1979--by my mother's death.  Some relations said unforgivable things  about me, and  how I was holding my father back, and I knew  I had to get  out of there.  

                                                    But how?

                                                     It happened.  I enrolled in NYU, got a Master's, a full time job at the Library Of The Performing Arts,  where I worked  for 35 years, then retired.  I was part of the social scene and theater community for that  period,  with no regrets.  I also ventured into stage managing and performing during these years.

                                                         And,  in 2010 I met my life's dream--my darling, David.

                                                         Would any of this have happened, had  I stayed in my home town?

Absolutely not!

                                                           By now,  I would have been  in a mental institution!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!