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Published on 7/4/08
Published on 7/2/08
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It’s easy to forget that nearly every New Yorker you ride the subway with—even that self-important asshole with the Wall Street Journal and the fancy shoes—has (or had) a mom and a dad. We’re hardened people, stalking this town efficiently and unsmilingly, working our butts off and acting adult (until nighttime, when we let loose). A real New Yorker, we think to ourselves, needs no coddling! But the truth is that no other city can make you feel so in need of support—emotional, financial, sartorial, whatever. So what’s the deal? Does New York push us closer to the ’rents or inspire us to grow apart from them?
“It’s only in the last few years that I’ve started feeling independent from my parents, and I’ll be 35 next month,” says Elizabeth Michaelson, a writer and native New Yorker. “I might be more inclined to consider myself an adult—as would my parents—if I had a mortgage, but instead I have a roommate.” Indeed, the notion that New Yorkers mature more slowly than people in the burbs is clearly related to the fact that it takes the average person here much longer to reach the standard benchmarks of adulthood. While your cousin is off buying his third Maytag, you’re lugging your laundry across the street in a mesh bag.
On the other hand, living here earns one an air of superiority. “I make a lot of frickin’ money,” says Jason Berger, a 34-year-old trader who lives in Soho. “But my mom still sends care packages. I mean, really? Canned soup and recipe clippings? I live in New York with a million good restaurants outside my large loft. Does she really think I’m heating up Campbell’s?”
This seeming contradiction—New Yorkers are immature, but also proudly self-sufficient—can’t help but involve your parents. “Baby boomers had it easier than their children do, and there’s quite a stress in hearing that you’re never going to have the same lifestyle that your parents did,” says Richard Rosner, M.D., clinical professor of psychiatry at NYU Medical Center. Meanwhile, he adds, there’s also a population of parents who feel woefully outdone by their high-rolling New Yorker offspring.
Some accept the financial involvement of Mom and Dad. “I think it’s really necessary, when your career isn’t the most rewarding moneywise, to have a support system like your parents,” says Anne Williams, 26, a blog editor. “Otherwise, I’d probably be working at a more stable, more boring job.”
For others, NYC living only serves to alienate the family. “My parents want me to move back to Iowa—or at least out of this city,” says Chris Carter, a 28-year-old from Bushwick. “They think New York made me gay. It’s so ass-backwards it’s almost cute.”
In the following pages, you’ll read first-person accounts of New Yorkers experiencing parental support or familial struggle. You’ll also read city picks, straight from the mouths of TONY staff’s parents— places where you can take your own folks when they’re visiting you (um, if they visit). And as for that Wall Street dude with the shoes? We’re guessing he calls Mama every night for advice on his taxes and his dating life. Or maybe that’s just us.
—Kate Lowenstein
Some names have been changed to protect people from their moms.
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