Busload of People

Casey Stengel Depot

"New York is such a romantic place in the sense that anything can happen at any moment. But there’s also a specialness about New York. New York is like: 'Bitch, I don’t need you. If you don’t like it here, you can leave. I’ll be fine. There’s another busload of people coming in.'"
Phoebe Robinson, The Washington Post

New York Dream

East Village

"That kind of toughness that New York has, people who live here have that toughness, too. Where it’s, like, I’m going to make it no matter what. I know to the outside it looks as if I’m struggling or that this is a fool’s errand, but to me, I know this is all going to happen. It’s this unbreakable spirit that New York has. We’re all in this struggle together, and one day, I’m going to have an apartment with a washer-dryer in the apartment. That was my dream for so long, and I made it happen. I was like, I’ve made it!"
Phoebe Robinson, The Washington Post

Running Behind

"Getting pissed that someone is slowing me down—don't they know I have somewhere to be?!—instead of getting mad at myself for not leaving home ten minutes earlier is not only ridiculous but also very New York. We're always running behind, overbooked, and missing the train all because some idiot (not us) made us late."
Phoebe Robinson, You Can't Touch My Hair

New York Jobs

"New York is the city of the multihyphenate. What do I mean by that? Everyone I know here is a nanny—singer–WebMD doctor-cat whisperer-actor–paralegalbartender hybrid. To make it in New York, you need seventeen jobs."
Phoebe Robinson, You Can't Touch My Hair

Time to Leave New York

Grand Central Terminal

"This is how you know you've lived in New York City for too long. When you casually sweep away a cockroach with the flick of your hand the way a fey king dismisses a court jester from his presence, it's time to leave New York City for a second and realize you shouldn't be so grizzled that it doesn't bother you  that half the cast of A Bug's Life is straight up AirBNB'ing in your cupboards."
Phoebe Robinson, Everything's Trash, But It's Okay