Today is my last day at The Denver Post. I know. So sudden. It surprised me, as well.
About a year ago, I began thinking about moving. I thought perhaps I’d head back to New York or to one of my favorite cities: Boston, Chicago, Philadelphia. I looked around but decided to wait for a good opportunity.
Then I fell in love. It was like, wham!
We both knew, pretty quickly, that we wanted to be together. He’s in Detroit. So that’s where I’m headed, though way sooner than I had expected.
This is how quickly – rashly, some might say – it happened:
I met Erik in November when the two of us traveled to Barcelona to help our close friend, Louis, celebrate his birthday.
I knew Erik and I would get along, but neither one of us expected an intense connection. It was strong, on so many levels. It stands to reason, considering we have similar backgrounds.
He grew up in southwest Detroit, a gritty, working-class neighborhood of mostly immigrants and African-Americans. I grew up in similar surroundings in Harlem. He’s second-generation Latino; I’m first. We share many of the same loves: art, history, politics, world music, theater, biking.
We have the same core values, similar life goals, and when we’re together we play like little kids. He’s my favorite person in the world. During our nine-day vacation we’d stay up till dawn talking in the living room of our rented flat, long after Louis had gone to bed. Nothing happened romantically, but as soon as we got back to our respective cities, it took off.
Erik visited me in Denver the weekend after we returned from Europe.
Two weeks later, he was with me in Puerto Rico during the Christmas holiday. He met my mom. She has never thought any man was good enough for me, but she liked Erik immediately.
About a week later, during a visit to Detroit, Erik asked me to live with him.
Talk about a relationship on high speed. I said yes and then – once I was back in Denver – panicked. What was I committing to? At that point, we’d only known each other two months.
It didn’t help that people I know kept making disparaging remarks about Detroit. Stats don’t lie: It has a high crime rate, a depressed economy, and thousands of people leave the city each year.
But I decided to listen to my heart.
When I’m with Erik I feel like I’m home. And in his world I see promise. The neighborhood he lives in is a funky, eclectic place just a short walk away from booming businesses started by Latino and Arab immigrants. His friends are compassionate, politically savvy, fun people.
He bought his house – a huge turn-of-the-century brick duplex – four years ago from a slumlord who didn’t care that it had turned into a crack house. He gutted the house and remade it into the kind of place you’d see in House & Garden magazine. In two months, it’ll be done. Saturday we picked a color for the kitchen, and I painted as he repaired the oak floors in the dining room.
We may end up moving elsewhere in the future. We’ve talked about Chicago, New York, or living abroad in Mexico or in Barcelona. But that’ll be down the road. For now, I’m committed to his city and my new job covering race relations and cultural affairs for The Detroit News. (I thought the job search would take months, as it usually does. This one took weeks.)
My new bosses are an impressive group, though I’ll miss the ones I’m leaving behind here, especially The Post’s editor, Greg Moore, who has been wonderful to me during the 10 years I’ve known him.
There are a lot of people I’ll miss, too many to name, but they know who they are.
My last day is today, but my last column will run Sunday. By then I’ll be in my new city, perhaps missing some aspects of the old one, but looking forward to an adventure of my new life.
