Location, location, location.

According to this Times article, I live in the most famous and most desired ZIP code in Manhattan and come to it, in all of America. Who would have thought that when I came here a year ago, poor (and mind you, I am still poor) that I was going to find an apartment in the most desired area of the city, able to get bills (that I have a hard time paying) addressed to the 10021 zip code above which my very own name is displayed. With this new zip code-restructuring only eight streets will be able to remain a part of this coveted five-number-identity, and I’m part of the lucky few.

Not that being in an elite zip code fulfills me (though it doesn’t hurt) but it’s nice to feel like you’ve done something right - even if it was only by chance. Everything about New York is about getting what’s better than what the other guy has – the better apartment, the better boyfriend, the better job, the better reservation at the better restaurant, the better friend with the better connections – and I have to admit I’ve been so far outside the competitive loop since I’ve been here (okay job, okay friends, okay and cheap restaurants, no boyfriend) I’ve been starting to feel like an outsider, like a fraud, like a (gasp!) fake. However now (sigh) all is right with the world as I know that I’m currently sitting, sleeping, and spending in the not even better, but best block radius in the country.

However, like any true New Yorker the irony of this little “swish” moment isn’t entirely lost on me. Just like in New York, the 69th to 76th street range of income varies not only from street to street, building to building, but literally apartment door to apartment door. Dolores, across the hall from me, lives in lush conditions. I happened to knock on her door a few weeks ago to borrow some cinnamon for my apple spice cake (I know, how un-glamorous, do people in 10021 even bake? I’m sure they pay people do to that…) and caught a glimpse of her big screen television (she is old, perhaps she can’t see well), her two couches, (I barely have one) and the realization that she has the whole apartment to herself and her cat. I share my apartment with a roommate and barely have enough money left over after rent to buy traditional spices. So while she fumbled around in the kitchen I did the quick math, multiply by two, carry the one…Dolores is rich!

After her “here you go, dear,” I went back to my half-her-size home and felt a pang of sadness. Not only is the person across the hall from me making lots more money than me, (she could afford to give me the entire cinnamon container, insisting that I keep it), she doesn’t even have a job. Can I really live in 10021 under the guise of such affluence? Can everyone else in this zip code detect my lack of prosperity, possessions and cooking powders in my pied-á-terre?

Thirty minutes at 350 degrees later I decided that yes, I can live here, as I have been for a year and regardless of wealth its been working out OK for me. No one has to know I bake my own cakes, or borrow cinnamon from Dolores, or live on a shockingly low amount of money per month post rent (and taxes), or share my place with someone else.

It’s OK that in New York, and 10021, so many people are nouveau riche, and I am nouveau poor. Because any true New Yorker will tell you that no matter what zip code you happen to reside in, perception (over reality), is nine-tenths of the game anyway.