If You're Going To San Francisco

CHAPTER 1: Welcome To New York
Entry #10: "If You're Going To San Francisco"

Dear readers,
Where do you come from? Where did you plant the seeds to become who you are? A lot of the reasons I am the way I am is because of the last few years I spent living in San Francisco. I moved to New York from SF because I felt my story there was completed. I still feel that way. I feel like there are so many more blank pages ahead of me since I said goodbye to a city that grew into a safety net of some sort. I grew up in a small town called Fairfield, then in my late teens, I grew up in LA. My story in Fairfield has been over for so many years now. That place is a thing of my past. My story in LA, that's not done yet. I'm not here to talk about that though, that will most definitely come down the line. LA is very important to this current story, but it's not time to talk about my city of angels. It's time to talk about my life in SF. I haven't really looked back at it with this whole new perspective I have gained, as a new New Yorker. Now that I have been living in New York for 2 months, it's time to return to the city that I once called home. 

SF came into my life after I got sick. I grew up not too far from the city. I just never went in. I never embraced it. My family always went down to SoCal or Washington state. We never really went to SF, even though my dad's company has painted some of SF's most famous landmarks. Growing up, SF was always the place we went to every once in a while. When I got sick I needed a place that could fill the void I was missing from my life in LA. That place became SF. At first, I loathed it. I locked myself away and refused to go out because of how my illness was affecting my life and state of mind. I was closed off and just saw it as a placeholder. Eventually, life went on and 2016 came around. Little by little, I started taking baby steps and learned how the city worked. I fell in love, started going out more. Even as I got more sick, I still had a desire to create some sort of life in the city by the bay. By 2018 I let my guard down. I took it to the next level and my whole world shifted into something so much more. 2018 was the first time I ever felt like SF was home. My career as a social influencer grew into something larger. I was finally learning how to live a life after being locked in a tower for the last few years. From every new thing that I experienced, it became crystal clear that SF was planting the seeds for my inner tree to grow into something more, something beyond the Golden Gate bridge. When I got sick, I felt like SF embraced me. Fairfield talked hella shit. Let's be real, I think most of the people that knew me probably rooted for me to go completely blind. Not SF. They gravitated towards me and made me feel so safe. Some of the best memories of my life have come from the last 2 years I spent living there. Some of the most important lessons I learned, I learned in that city. The relationships and the bonds that I made, helped me and continues to help me to create the relationships and the bonds I am now creating here in New York. The delicate kindness and warmth that filled my soul, gave me the courage to move forward, to move here, to New York. I know some people would say it is too soon for me to return to the city I just moved my whole life away from. Not my choice. I'm still sick, I still have this disease, and I need to be treated so I can continue making a life here in New York. I have no problem returning to SF. I think it will be good to return there, now as a New Yorker. In many ways both cities are similar, but they are both vastly different. I said goodbye in December. For the last 2 months, New York has opened and shut doors on my face. But, every sudden change has hardened me, to make me better. With the last 2 months documented in-depth, I now say, see you next month, New York. I have to return to my former home for a second. The other part of my life needs me, so that way this new depth I have gained here in New York, can continue to grow when I return. Now, tomorrow morning, I will say hello to SF, for the first time in 71 days. My family and loved ones knew me as something and someone very different from the man I am now becoming. Now they get to see me in a whole new light. How that will go? I don't know. How I will handle it? I don't know. Will it feel different going back to a place where I once called home? I don't know. I'm about to find out though. It's time to return to my former thrown. I left California as one person, and now I return as someone vastly different. 

​Love, Roydom Lucian 

END OF CHAPTER 1: Welcome To New York ​​​

Photographer: Alex Chavez

What I'm Wearing - Coat - Alfani, Beanie and Socks - Vans, Shoes - Madewell, Jeans - levis