A typically New York nightmare?

I woke up the other night from a terrifying nightmare, that I think I can only blame on the real-estate-obsessed nature of my city.

I dreamt that two girls moved into a two bedroom apartment in my building. Approximately my age, they invited me upstairs to hang out. I walked in and was faced with the most gorgeous, huge apartment I have ever laid eyes on. I got lost in the lush interiors, marveled at the sun-soaked perfectly painted walls, and ached to sleep in their bedrooms, perfectly appointed and jealousy-inducing in their design. Of course, this being New York, the conversation turned to rent. How much were they paying? $450 dollars less, total, than I was. I woke up in a state of panic.

Of course, considering that no New Yorker is ever not thinking about real estate, this made perfect sense. S and I walk around the village pointing at beautifully redone carriage houses and saying in front of each door, "fuck you." Jealousy over real estate is what keeps this city moving, I'm convinced. The only reason people work as hard as they do is so that they can live in something marginally larger than their bedroom closet in their parents' homes (full disclosure: my apartment is in fact 3x larger than my closet in New Rochelle).

And just to make matters worse, the dream I described above actually did happen to me recently. I met a very nice late-30's aged man who just moved into a one bedroom upstairs last week. He's new to the city from Arizona and was more than willing to chat and talk about his experiences here so far. And, of course, the conversation came to rent. His one-bedroom is 200 square feet larger than my studio, and he's paying $45 dollars more than me a month. Even typing this out a week after the conversation makes my blood boil, my heart thump, and makes me exert huge amounts of self-control to not throw myself onto the floor and have a temper tantrum.