My dad visited me in NYC- this is how it went
My dad is 67 years old, and he has flown 3 times in his life. This was the first time he had traveled alone, and he was worried because he didn’t speak any language other than Hungarian. He was also anxious about the transition, as there is no direct flight from Budapest to New York, so he had to change planes in Warsaw. Everything seems complicated for him, the roaming, eSIM, translation programmes, currencies, flights, but as usual, he did just fine, and he arrived safely in NYC. Come pick him up with me at JFK.
Now I’m realizing how much I use the word “ worried and all the synonyms, so I have a guess where all my anxiety is coming from, but still, I have to continue like this: he was also worried that my dog might have forgotten him.
Come and see how Eliott, my pup, greets his favorite person in the world after months of missing him. The sound was removed for your comfort — I’m crying, my dad is baby-talking, and Eliott is squealing, so you can imagine the mess.
He already spent some days in NYC last summer, so we did the basic tourist stuff already, so this time, we went all in on trains because it’s his favorite hobby, and I wanted him to have a wonderful time here.
OK, of course, I had to show him the iconic NYC view one more time, but afterward, it was the Oculus, the New York Botanical Garden for the Holiday Train Show – I have to admit, it was magical, and totally worth the 1.5-hour ride there – and the New York Transit Museum. I was prepared to be bored, but I actually enjoyed it too. The history of railway construction was fascinating, the farewell session for the Metrocard was touching, and I even got inspired to draw my own with a mantra for the new year. We went to Grand Central and the Winter Village in Bryant Park, and we met some of my Hungarian friends here. He got to taste different dark beers, and we listened to jazz. I presented a version of New York that resonated with him.
Since he’d never seen the ocean but always wanted to, I took him to the beach as well. It was freezing, bone–deep cold, but he only said, “Well, it is not hot here, right?” I promise he was happy to be here, and he enjoyed it, even if he looks like I kidnapped him. This is the, some would say, Eastern European way of smiling, but we Hungarians would roll our eyes and correct it to Central European. We are so f@cking proud to be in the very heart of it—until our prime minister decides we are not even part of it. ( I was expecting a bit of complaining about the vegan restaurant where I made him eat plant-based food — another first-in-his-lifetime experience, but he seemed to like it too.
It was shocking to see my dad age so much in just 6 months since I last saw him. He lost most of his hair, had many more wrinkles, and overall, I felt he was more vulnerable, starting to walk like he had joint pain, and adopting oldish, unfamiliar routines he never had before. Not being there for him as he gets older weighs heavily on me, even though he encourages me to stay on the other side of the ocean and is happy and proud to see me slowly succeeding after a more than challenging first year. The worst part was hearing his complaints about how unhappy he is with my mother and how he feels stuck, unable to change a thing.
Moving here cost me so much more than money.
It cost me certainty, language, sleep, the slow and painful work of unlearning fear after abuse, trying to relearn how to trust, and not give up on hope that one day I will be able to do so. I wish I had arrived to my new apartment untouched, but I came carrying survival in my body, hypervigilance in my bones, and the grief of a life I had back in Hungary, the mourning of a life I thought I would have here, and the unbearable void that my baby dog left after she passed away.
It also cost me birthdays missed, friendships stretched thin by distance, the ache of homesickness, and the tenderness of watching my parents grow old from afar.
New York asks for everything upfront: my nervous system, my silence, my courage, my ability to keep going when nobody claps. The price of this life is paid daily — I pay it in loneliness, fear, in reinvention, in learning how to belong without disappearing. I pay it in tears, in doubts, in medical bills, in my first grey hairs. I pay it in nights when the city feels louder than my own heartbeat. I pay it in unanswered messages and time zones that swallow voices. I pay for it by becoming strong in ways I never asked for. I pay it in standing up after every fall, in watching the bruises on my soul grow deeper after each disappointment, and in the constant wondering how much more this soul can bear.
Somehow, I chose it every single day. I keep paying for a dream, a dream I cannot abandon. A dream that keeps me awake at night, even after long days of work, no matter how exhausted I am. A dream that troubles me with visions, visions of a future, a better world for the ones who come after.
It is what lifts me back onto my feet when I feel there is nothing left to lean on. It carries me forward even when I see no road ahead, no clear direction to follow — only the certainty that stopping is not an option.
So I keep telling myself, like a mantra: I am allowed to build a life and grieve what it costs.
I am allowed to love my parents fiercely and live far away. I am allowed to carry them in my heart and still walk my path.
So why is it SO F@CKING HARD?
Behind the paywall for my dearest The Lab members, this time, I’m not offering more written words, I’m offering my voice — to walk you through a practice for the nights when the vision feels heavier than your body.
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