All of the photographs in this book were taken during the fifteen years from 1985 to the end of the twentieth century. The first decade of the new millennium seems to have passed quickly, but now when I look at these photographs I feel they are about a place different than, and distant from, the one I inhabit now. But New York, which pulsates with life twentyfourseven, is a city that seems to keep its soul intact as time moves on. Perhaps all that has changed is me; having lived in this wondrous metropolis a quarter of a century, I feel totally at home here now, which means I don't walk around with the eye of a newcomer which sees everything in awe and with a sense of wonder. The comfort I have come to feel here may have come at a price after all. But I have another kind of wonder now: what was it like when I first arrived in New York and how did I see the city during my first years here? I feel fortunate to have these pictures to take me back to that lost time of my life when, following a dream, I found myself in what to me has become not only my home but also the most interesting city in the world.