Good-Bye, New York City – In A Brooklyn Minute (Week 196) from Luci Westphal on Vimeo.
The day finally arrived this week: Scott and I (with more fun
distraction than help from Whiskey) packed up our apartment in Brooklyn
and said our good-byes to our NYC friends and totally and officially
moved out of New York City after 15 years of calling the Big Apple our
home (even while spending long periods of time in Berlin and Colorado).
Even though our official homes are now in Colorado and in Berlin (where
we still have an apartment), in my heart I think I’ll always be a New
Yorker.
So you can imagine that it was quite sad to say good-bye
to my big city love New York. While I had good intentions to make some
pilgrimages and film my favorite spots or focus on one significant place
I hadn’t featured in my In A Brooklyn Minute videos yet, in
the end there wasn’t really time to spend a whole day or afternoon
filming. Instead, I decided to cut together a 1-minute video from some
of my favorite places and footage collected over the 3 years of making
this web series. This also allowed Scott, Whiskey and me to just roam
around our city one more time without worrying about getting good
footage. That last afternoon was especially lovely. Also, we recorded
one special “saying bye-bye” shot for the end of this video on that last
day in Brooklyn.
My first cut of the “Best of 3 Years of NYC” was
over 9 minutes long… too many great places, too many meaningful
shots. Consequently, I had to chop a lot – kind of with one eye closed. I
can’t say that this is my best material or that these are the most
significant place of NY – it’s just what ended up on top while making
lots of Sophie’s choices. To see more of Brooklyn, Manhattan and even
Queens (sorry, Staten Island and The Bronx, I never got around to film
you for this series) and to make up your own mind as to what you like
best, please check out all the In A Brooklyn Minute videos here: http://movingpostcard.com/category/in-a-brooklyn-minute
I’d
like to send a special thank you, a big hug and much love to all my
friends, whom I met during my 15 years in New York City. You have all
made such a difference in my life and you will always be my family. It
was so wonderful to see so many of you again this week and to talk to so
many others, who had already moved out of the city prior, on the phone,
Skype and chat during the last few weeks. It really does feel as if
surviving and thriving in a city like New York, with all the challenges
(and the fun) it provides, makes friendships even warmer, deeper and
stronger. I love you all and can’t wait to see you in Colorado, Oakland,
Atlanta, Vermont, Tokyo or wherever we meet next. Until then we have
Skype, FaceTime, SMS, all kinds of chat apps, Google Hangouts and just
plain ol’ phone calls.
Oh, and if anyone gets the idea that posting this video means that it’s the last in my Moving Postcard
web series, then I can assure you: it’s not. The series will continue
as it has since May 2010: a weekly 1-minute video from wherever I am.
For the coming week I’ll be shooting in Colorado again. And for the 200th week, which is coming up in 3 weeks, I have no clue yet where I’ll be…
The
song featured in this video is the instrumental version of “Hell Came
For Breakfast” by Jason Matherne, who has been my friend for just under
20 years and who has provided most of the music in this series. Please
check out his Soundcloud page for lots of free music downloads: https://soundcloud.com/goonygoogoo-productions
Thank you for watching and sharing my videos!
xx Luci
