- Real breakfast foods: pancakes, scrambled eggs, NY bagels, etc.
- The college experience.
- The right to have an opinion.
- Four beautiful seasons, in the Northeast at least.
- Thanksgiving.
- Non-smoking restaurants, bars, pools.
- Broadway. Off-broadway, too.
- Real fudge brownies.
- The ability to vote.
- Crisp local apples. And apple pie.
- Work ethic.
- The childhood belief that you can be anyone you want to be.
- Winter sleigh rides and autumn hayrides.
- American literature, and poetry, and art.
- Disneyland.
- Watching the ball drop in Times Square on New Year's Eve.
- Oreos, now more than ever.
- Free and unlimited water at bars and restaurants.
- Independent films.
- 24-hours anything (and usually everything).
- Innovators: Nora Ephron, Julias Schmid, Elizabeth Blackwell, Martin Luther King, Jr., Amelia Earhart, Steve Jobs, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, etc.
- Hugs.
- Road Trip USA.
- Clean streets and sidewalks.
- Authentic Mexican food, if you know where to look.
- Music of all kinds.
- T-shirts, blue jeans, flip-flops.
- City parks with WiFi.
- Real pizza--outside of Italy, that is.
- Quality mattresses and water pressure.
- Fireworks on the Fourth of July.
- Immigrants, especially the ones who have produced the countless number of multicultural friends and family members I adore.
As much as I'm thrilled for the next international adventure, I already know I'll miss New York and the entirety of the U.S.A., like, a whole lot. I kind of love this perfectly imperfect country, and I am so, so happy and grateful to call it home.