crying on the N

featured in The Open Letters | by y. h. ames

From y. h. ames💌

september 2025

It was a Friday night around 9pm. A time when the subway is at its most crowded as two kinds of people collide on public transit - the ones who want to be in bed at a reasonable hour, whose social batteries have been

spent and needs satisfied, and those zealous for a night of stimulation and just en route for the pre-game. I got on the N train and sat down between two strangers on a three-seater, shameless about filling the middle seat when plenty of New Yorkers decided it was too violating of one’s personal space and stood around instead.

I had to sit because a relationship I was excited about and spent months nurturing had died earlier that evening. A book of poetry about cats I had lent him and a tupperware that once contained the food I made for him sat uncomfortably in my tote bag.

I held onto what was left after eight months, feeling sorry for myself, vacantly staring at the floor in front of me. Tears swelled up in my eyes and began to drop heavily one after another.

For a moment, I had an out of body experience where I was watching myself cry, watching other New Yorkers towered over me, with two literally inches away, went on business as usual. Thank God, I thought. A tiny part of me was embarrassed about crying amongst such a crowd. (must I experience heartbreak on a Friday night of all nights, universe?) But mostly I was fine with exercising my right as a New Yorker and

embraced our city’s unspoken agreement that everyone is all due for a public emotional breakdown every now and then.

So I cried. A little harder, then less, and a little more. Got home, washed up my face, and took my big girl self to bed.

a quick backstory

I turned 31 this year. In 2023, I ended a two and a half year relationship with a man I thought I was going to be together with for a long time.

We were coming up to one year of cohabitation. With nothing more than a credit card, and a handful of shared furniture and appliances tying us together, the separation still felt like a massive undertaking.

On Sunday evening we were broken up, for good this time. By the next Monday, I was signing a lease to, what would become my home and oasis, a one-bedroom apartment in Astoria.

One step at a time I poured my love back into myself, advancing in the last year of my twenties. Instead of going through an existential crisis with unfulfilled internalized societal expectations, I felt the most content, grateful, and loving towards myself and my life than ever as I anticipated the new decade.

As my relationship with myself enrichened, I felt an increased longing to share my life with an intimate someone. So I returned to the dating scene. In service of the family I want to create as my own.

that brings us back to this past year

In the span of a year, there were three guys I went out with exclusively for varied lengths of time.

The first guy was a guitarist with a cat he was (and I’m 150% positive still is) head over heels with. We had great conversations discussing psychology, philosophy, and creative arts. He was working vehemently on his own musical and saving up to buy a property in New York. We dissolved in a month and a half when we realized we did not connect emotionally the way we had intellectually.

We maintained contact for a while afterwards; I cat-sat for him a couple times and he paid. Apparently he bought a house this summer and likely has moved away.

I can’t help but wonder if he has more emotional availability for somebody else now that he has checked off a big goal of his.

The second guy was a serious dater. I could tell by the way he prioritized discussing important topics like our respective financial situation, non-negotiables, and long term relationship goals.

We dated steadily, built our relationship in the ambience of a speakeasy, the comfort of his couch, a day trip to Ellis Island, and the mundaneness of grocery stores. He shared his thoughts and feelings with me, inquired my opinions on things important to him, and talked about me to his

mother and sister whom he adored.

But as mysterious as feelings work, he just wasn’t (and I quote) “falling in love” with me three months in. He still wasn’t sure he wanted to stop seeing me on our last date. Nonetheless, like leaves in the autumn air

slowly losing vitality, our relationship fell to its delicate end when summer passed. I took a break recovering from that ending when the holiday festivities saturated the city.

As winter hardened everything weeks into 2025, I unfroze my dating profile and met someone I grew to adore deeply, and him to me. I daydreamed that our story would be the tale of our lives. And yet, as the year unfolded, we became a mere chapter before another winter arrived.

These dating experiences had me feeling elated, alive, young, hopeful. But also anxious, insecure, doubtful, and inadequate.

I shed more tears in the past year than I had after the end of my last long-term relationship. But the pain of being in a miserable relationship when both people are committed to finding a way forward, and the pain of wishing someone to hold off their judgments and take a leap of faith with you when you put your heart out is incomparable.

A week after my public breakdown on the N, I sat in my usual window seat to work, looking out to the skyscrapers, periodically blinded by the reflection of the afternoon sunbeam. Tears quietly dripped out of my eyes as we curved into the underground tunnel and roared into Manhattan.

The car was suddenly dimmed and I could see my own teary reflection on the darkened window. I frowned and wondered, where has that girl who loves her own company gone? How did she give these men so much power to knock over her balance?

As I lamented the loss of my equilibrium, a small voice reminded me that nothing is guaranteed, I took a risk and it was courageous and this is what could happen. I should not criticize or blame myself for my attempts and the process in which I search for romantic love.

In the pursuit of long term romance and partnership, disappointment and hurt are part of the course. Besides, have I not been here before and always recovered?

So in the following weeks, I took myself to my weekly fitness classes as usual. Cooked nice meals, cleaned and did laundry. I spent time with friends who graciously listened to me and my wounded heart. I asked a dear friend to visit me, and she did. I also left town to see another.

I did it all with some impenetrable degree of sadness and lethargy. But my life did not stop on account of someone who wasn’t ready to take me on in their life.

I have been tremendously grateful that my 29 and 30 year-old selves did the work to set up a good foundation for present-day me. So I do not have to scramble to maintain a functional living routine in a period of grief and heartache.

As in my spare time… I cried and cried and cried (and cursed vehemently).

I let myself cry on the train, cry on my couch, cry in my single office room, cry in bed.

I cried not for the guys I am fortunately no longer involved with. I cried because the path to a stable love and partnership is exhausting, painful, disheartening, and feels endless. I cried because I don’t know if any of

these men will cherish the best parts of me they got to experience and own as memories. Or would they only remember what was missing, the increasing gap between us, and the ugliness of what we could bring out in each other.

I cried because each time I let someone in I seem to kick myself out. And I don’t know yet how to not abandon myself in a party of two but I’ve been trying my hardest.

So I felt and grieved. And felt and grieved.

Then one Friday afternoon, I was excited for a night of no commitments. As I got off the N and walked home, sunset was pouring out on the ground before me, golden. And I felt joyfully sad for this beautiful fleeting moment. A sense of I’m okay showering down on me… or rather, awakening in me.

I went back to my oasis and thoroughly enjoyed my own company. And she was home again…

I will not say onwards and upwards now. Healing is not linear. But I know I’ve found that girl again. The girl who’s got her own back, who’s beloved by those that know her and a badass with a whole lot of heart.

When I sit on the N these days, the afternoon sunbeam is still blinding in the warmest way before the train goes underground. And I can feel that girl whose heart beats a little faster when the Manhattan skyline appears in her eyesight. A smile at the corner of her mouth.

She’s filled with gratitude just how lucky she is to be here, with all the unknown this city houses, patiently awaits her to brave it all, one risk at a time.

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About the Author:

y. h. ames is a psychotherapist based in New York City. She paints and writes in her spare time to allow her many feelings to exist more calmly outside of her. She writes with a commitment to practice vulnerability and courage, to transform broken pieces into a mosaic, and undo aloneness of being a human.

Substack ID: y. h. ames

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