River Views

When you hunt for an apartment in New York, one of the prime selling points can be a view. "Skyline view," "bridge view," and "river view" will all bump up your rent by a few hundred bucks a month.

Given that you can also find yourself with a view of the air shaft or brick wall or some other grim sight, I guess that a river view is a big step up. But I am a New York anomaly in that I am not a fan of the sweeping vista of skyline or bridge. In fact, I am a view hater.

When we first moved to New York, we lived in my med school's student housing which had panoramic views of the Hudson River and the GW bridge (albeit through grimy windows that had not been cleaned since the 1970s and could not be washed from inside the apartment).

There were definitely days when an incoming rainstorm made for a spectacular sight like this one:


But those days were few and far between. Most of the time, I hated the view of the Hudson. Why? Well, my view also included the unrelenting traffic of the West Side Highway. With the highway and its never ending thrum of traffic came a fine layer of pollution that wafted through my not-so-weather proof window, aggravated my asthma, and inked itself onto my walls in the outline of my furniture like some sort of murder-victim-in-chalk rendering.

But I also hated the blinding, setting sun every day as it reflected off the river and slowly baked our front room and faded all our furniture and CDs. And I hated the lumpen, architecturally uninteresting apartment buildings across the river in New Jersey.

Most of all, the wide expanse out my window made me feel lonely: All that concrete and steel and water and highway.

I have a theory that people who like a daily dose of skyscrapers and bridges like to envision themselves masters of the universe, and the view helps support that fantasy. Personally, I have no need to be a master of the universe. Don't get me wrong, I like to look clever and sharp and all, but I don't need to feel like the lord and master of all I survey.

The views we have now from our second story apartment in Brooklyn are much, much more to my taste. Out the front windows you can see a few trees, some grass, and the apartment building across the street. Sometimes, at night, I will look out my kitchen window and see the couple across the street also preparing a meal. I can see kids on bikes and people walking dogs and the West Indian ladies in my building taking a van to church on Sunday.

And the best is the view of the middle school and its basketball court out my son's window in the back of the apartment. Monday through Friday the kids play hoops and shout and scream and create a general ruckus. Thankfully, Emmett can nap right through it and loves to watch the "kis" and "bahba" (kids, basketball) when he is awake.

Better than being master of the universe, in my view, is being part of a community. And the view from my windows remind me everyday that I live in a community that I love.