Didion enjoyed walks through the city, around the village and down to the river, and through uptown on summer evenings. Soon she begins to realize that even all the excitement and all the parties could not keep her attention forever, she felt as if she had stayed at the "Fair" too long. .
Just as the landscape of New York began to fade so did its social landscape. While Didion was young she enjoyed meeting people, and even felt she could meet anyone and do whatever she wanted. Still, she was young and had many years ahead of her. Whereas people say New York is only for the "Very rich and the very poor" (Didion 227) she also believed that it was a place for the very young. She refers to it as "Xanadu" a type of pleasure garden and again as "Babylon". A place to stay and visit but not to live, she could not understand how other young women were making lives there, a place where "Nothing was irrevocable; everything in reach," (Didion 229). Didion's life in New York was nothing more than a game to her, with no consequences that could not be fixed in her later years. Unfortunately all her hopes of escaping responsibility would not come true. Didion, just like the man who "had been around too long" was beginning to feel the effects of time. No longer did she go out to parties, and soon she began to despise her life, hurting those people who had been her friends and offending others who had not. She began to realize that all the time she spent procrastinating, living her fairy tale life, had been time she wasted and could never get back. She had realized that she had stayed "too long at the Fair," (Didion 236).
The state of mind that Didion held throughout the essay changed dramatically from when she first arrived in New York until she left for Los Angeles. Upon entering New York she was a young girl, overwhelmed by the sights and sounds of the city, and she knew that her life would never be the same.