I have always liked the way New York City smells in the morning. Coffee from carts and delis and McDonald's and Starbucks wafts in the air. People are in ridiculous rushes to get to work, only to complain about being there once they arrive. Yet, as the sun comes up and subways pour worker bees onto the sidewalks, there is this strange sense of optimism in the air, as if, with that little jolt of java, anything really is possible. Usually by noon this feeling passes, but nevertheless it’s there, morning after morning as the coffee leads us all to our desks.

I may soon be leaving a job that I’ve had for seven years. Yes, seven years. It’s the only job I’ve ever had. At 28, I am the only one of all my college friends who still has the same job they started with. I out lasted the dot-com boom, the bust, Quarter-Life Crises, and moving to other cities for lovers or just adventure. I have a pension and a big fat 401K that I’m obsessed with. I’m like the armadillo of employees.

So why leave? Why now? The simplest reason would be to quote Davie Bowie, Ch-ch-changes. The company that I work for now is not, in spirit, the same one I worked for seven years ago when I needed a job that would pay my rent and work around a graduate program I was in. Management also changes. Managers don’t always appreciate employees who cross-pollinate with other departments, or ones that are too popular in a beat-to-your-own-drummer kind of way. Managers don’t like employees who sass them. In case you didn’t know, I have a masters degree in Being Mouthy.

My parents have told me over and over again that I am crazy, that stability is underrated. What about health insurance? Dental? A purpose in life? What did I really do to bring all this on? What could they blame me for?

I once saw a postcard that read, “Jump and the Net Will Appear” and that is the only logic I can offer to anyone who is shaking his head in bewilderment at me. No uncomfortable situation lasts forever, not child birth or passing a kidney stone or ironing out the details of closing one chapter of your life and moving on to the next. In the seven years since I started this job, I outgrew clothes and apartments and friends and hobbies. The job was sure to go sooner or later.

And let’s not forget September of 1999. I was a 22-year-old Syracuse graduate with so little direction in life that I spent my first few days back at home sitting on my deck reading fashion magazines and talking to my cats. Eventually I was thrust into a temp gig just to get me showered and out of the house. When that got old I agreed to take a friend’s spot in an apartment on E. 94th  Street in Manhattan. I had no job and the rent was $550 a month. After I paid for the first month, I had $400 left in my checking account. I went on 13 job interviews at magazines before landing the gig I currently have. I took it because they offered, and I needed to make rent.

That’s the only blueprint that I have for living and achieving any kind of success in New York, a place where people come to be just that. If I wanted to be lame I’d move back to the suburbs in Connecticut and start driving to work. But I barely know how to drive. I’m an N train gal who has hit the reset button on her life. And when I wake up at noon, the air still has that hopeful smell of coffee.