Do People Actually Live Like That?

I watched Barbara Walters interview bohemians on TV and knew, right then, I was in the wrong house.

Twirling my long golden hair, sitting on my mother’s dull, brown Naugahyde couch, in the den of our home deep in Cajun country, when Barbara Walters ruined me for an ordinary life. My young mind was cracked open in that moment. It wasn’t anything spectacular that she did — it was who she was with that caught my attention.

She was interviewing some bohemian types on a New York City street, and I could not look away.

Wait. Do people actually live like that?

That question, asked by an eight-year-old on a couch every reader my age will recognize on sight, is where a dream I still carry was born — a dream, as it turns out, to live in the West Village of Manhattan. Not Brooklyn. Not the Upper East Side. The West Village, thank you very much.

To say I was enthralled would be an understatement — I could hardly contain my excitement, but I did. ‘Cause, well, the family would never understand such a betrayal. After all, being Cajun and being family were the only two things that actually counted according to Mom.

At the time, I didn’t know I wanted to make art. I just knew the people on my TV screen seemed fun, interesting, and, as we said back then, “outta sight!” It was 1968—a year of upheaval, Vietnam protests, flower power, and hippies. While the adults around me were consumed by unrest, those bohemian folks on TV seemed to have the whole joyous-life thing figured out, unrest be damned.

Even as a little girl, I knew this would be part of my future. I was only 8 or 9, but the spark was lit.

As the youngest in a large family, born much later than my siblings, I was often relegated to watching and not speaking. So I watched, silently judging, as the youngest children do. And what I saw didn’t impress me.

The rhythm seemed to be: go to the job, go to church, go to the family gathering, repeat — a real greatest-hits album of obligation. Our family gatherings, filled with dozens of relatives, were our equivalent of the country club. But none of the adults around me seemed truly happy or joyous — not one, not even the ones with good hair.

To my little girl’s spirit, this seemed… off. I never spoke about it to anyone. Instead, I let my inner knowing agree with what I felt: there has to be more than this.

I’d retreat to my favorite closet in my big sister’s bedroom with my crayons and coloring books, doing my best impression of a beatnik from inside a closet in Cajun country, and I’d try to feel the energy of those bohemian creators I saw on TV. I did this for years. No one questioned it. Possibly because no one noticed.

Fast forward to my mid-30s. After two failed attempts to ask for a divorce from the preacher — third time’s the charm, apparently — I finally got my wish. Free of the ridiculous expectations placed on the wife of a man of the cloth, it was my turn.

I was going to NYC.

I landed on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, eventually married a classical pianist. I threw myself into his career. Together, we accomplished some pretty incredible projects. But I wasn’t living like a bohemian, making art, or hanging out in street cafes. That was the dream. I was still living like a “good wife”, not a women living her dream.

But I was close — geographically, if nothing else.

My time in Manhattan left me with priceless memories and connections. It wasn’t the exact dream, but it taught me something: the essence of a dream can transcend the details.

Now, I live in a small high-rise in the heart of a mid-sized city nestled among the Blue Ridge Mountains. And guess what? Turns out you don’t actually need a Manhattan zip code to feel like yourself.

The essence of that dream is the framework of my life, now.

To live each day in bold, living color, to make art, to create communities of like-minded people for the sheer joy of connection and conversation.

No, I’m not in NYC, but I’m living my dream, and golly, it feels terrific — turns out the West Village was never really the point.

More dream stories to come, no doubt. It’s been a wild roller coaster ride these past 40 years — more upside down than I’d like to admit, but I lived to tell about it, and I’m thrilled to share it with you. My hope is that these words uplift, inspire, and encourage you to pause and consider your own dreams.

Warmly,

Monica

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