Don’t tell anyone, but I grew up in the suburbs of Long Island. I remember thinking that if I lived there long enough, I would shrivel up and die from boredom.  Fast forward to the year 2016, living in Jersey City for 13 years with, dare I say, 2 kids.  Granted my kids are too young to know the difference between the burbs or the city, but I am convinced they will thank me later. There will be more opportunity to see differences, better food options and of course the occasional gunshot.  Nothing like a gunshot or two to keep you humble!

Many of my friends jumped ship, traded in their fancy strollers and moved to burbs.  They probably outgrew their space, and we all know how expensive Jersey City is, but if we think outside the box and learn to maneuver the schools, it’s well worth the crazy.

This is why I decided that this too-busy-to chat, always-on-my-phone, crazy-but-fun, could-never -walk-fast-enough city Mom is never leaving her city. I may be driving around looking for a parking spot with screaming children blasting The Beastie Boys to cover up the noise, living in a constant state of overstimulation, but I am so happy here. Jersey City is for everyone including families and kids and it just keeps getting better and better.

So I decided to compile a list of reasons why I would never jump ship, and move to the suburbs.

1. Unless you have 14 kids, there is no reason to have a huge ass minivan with annoying stick figures on the back windshield. We have Uber with car seats, buses, fresh direct and Path trains. There are too few parking spaces as it is for you to take 10 hrs to park, ain’t nobody got time for that!
2. With JC blowing up and the constant jack hammering all the time, my kids can be as loud as they want. I don’t care what people think, kids scream that’s what they do.  This is the year 2016, it is the year I get over myself and what people think of my parenting.  At the end of the day, I keep my kids alive.
3. We have parks instead of yards:  No maintenance means free.  Even though it may be frowned upon, my kids can pee by a tree.  Come on you know your kid has done it!
4. No news is big news in JC.   Frankly, no one cares about your kids poop or if they are eating solids. We have bigger fish to fry in JC.
5. Every kid looks the same in the burbs.  I like diversity and totally dig the fact that my kids can pronounce the name of every kid in their class. God help us if we turn into the Bokenos, aka Hoboken.
6. My kids will never have the word Juicy written across their asses.
7. And now for the piece de resistance:  I can walk into a tattoo parlor in broad daylight and ask for a tattoo of a vagina on my inner thigh without raising eyebrows.  True story.  I did it yesterday.  I didn’t really want the tattoo.  I just have a twisted sense of humor.

This last point is really what it’s all about for me.  In JC, I am free to be me in all my twisted, bad-ass, unique glory.  If I really had gotten that tattoo, nobody would care.  It would be passe in comparison to the Pimp clad from head to toe in pink fur walking down the street.  And that’s what I want my kids to learn about life.