Brooklyn Expats Come Home

This week's New York Times Hate Read brings us the afflicted and wandering souls of those yuppies not quite rich enough to afford a helicopter or a five-story townhouse who later regret decamping to less prosperous shores. Forced to move to New Jersey for that illusive chance at an upper-middle-class life, they struggle to adapt to the relative dearth of carefully curated offerings for the consumption that is so crucial for self-styling their egos:

Before life in New Jersey, the couple did a gut renovation on a home in Park Slope South, which they purchased in 2008 for just under $1 million. But Mr. Hogan’s job made for a difficult commute. “My husband works in health care and it’s all out in New Jersey,” Ms. Hogan said. “He was leaving at 6 a.m. to beat the traffic. He was supposed to be able to get home early, but that never happened. We were spending $1,000 a month in tolls and we never saw him.”

[...]

Finding ingredients for recipes out of “Jerusalem: A Cookbook” is a challenge in the suburbs, she said. “It’s not like I can run over to Sahadi’s or D’Vine Taste,” she said, referring to her favorite shops, where she stocks up on spices such as sumac and za’atar. “In New Jersey, I find myself going to 8,000 different stores to replicate the experience of going to Sahadi’s.”

Spice is the variety of life, isn't it after all? Some people leave good jobs, great communities, or passionate relationships behind for new opportunities. Others turn a new leaf and start again. And others leave Brooklyn for...New Jersey. You wouldn't understand the horror. Leaving Brooklyn for New Jersey is like becoming a displaced person in a refugee camp in Kosovo or South Sudan, losing all you knew and being unable to ever go back. Truly, your kids grow up without moorings or a sense of place:

“It kind of kills me that they won’t have that inherent knowledge of the city like I do,” Ms. Hogan said. “For instance, they won’t know without looking at a subway map how to get from Brooklyn to TriBeCa. I don’t know why that makes me sad. I guess it just feels like street cred or something.”

It kills poor Ms. Hogan. The rich truly are unlike you and me: they have to make hard choices sometimes. Can you imagine the choice between street cred and a spacious house and streets to play on? A veritable real estate Sophie's choice to cap this Weekly Hate Read:

“I had to acknowledge that I love her more than New York City,” Mr. Kim said. The couple’s daughter, Ruby Kim, now 13, was initially against the move. “She was 7 years old at the time, and her wails were as sorrowful as I’d ever heard,” he said.

A family in matching Ray Bans enjoys the benefits of structural racism and financial capitalism