What’s left when all of the city’s pleasures have been taken away? SeanWoods12 writes about being face-to-face with New York City in crisis
The intersection of Broadway Avenue and Flushing Avenue, which runs next to Woodhull Hospital in Brooklyn, NY.City is silent. Fear is palpable in the air. You see it in the eyes of the workers in the grocery store, the pharmacy, and the corner deli. These are almost all people of color. They tell you they are thankful for the work but also know they are risking their lives and the lives of their loved ones by working. It’s a terrible calculus.
The financial district, normally one of the busiest sections of the island, is a barren zone. Not one person was in the Occupy Wall Street park as I rolled by. The South Street Seaport’s plaza sits shuttered. Down by Battery Park there was a trickle of people heading toward the Staten Island Ferry to make the commute home. There are small hints of normal routine. A few parents were out with children. Seeing a dad playing soccer with his young sons sparks unexpected emotion.
Leaving the house for a ride one afternoon, I see a man exiting Abingdon Square Park and spitting toward the half-dozen people sitting on benches enjoying the spring flowers. He’s screaming about the plague and white devils. It’s a horrifying act of violence during the pandemic. No one reacts to him. They just stare. This feels like a familiar New York response. He wanders uptown, ranting and unhinged. I keep riding.
The writer Colson Whitehead, remarking on the constant churn of the city, said that you know you’re a New Yorker when you remember places for what they used to be, not what they are now. After this pandemic, there will be too much relegated to the past to bear. NYU and Bellevue hospitals were surprisingly quiet both times I rode by them. I remember a doctor friend telling me that on 9/11 they waited to treat patients, but they never came. You either made it out of the towers alive or died. We know the hospitals in Brooklyn and Queens are bearing the brunt of the virus. I ride by the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center, remade as an emergency medical center. The National Guard troops outside look impossibly young.
There’s life in Central Park, with joggers and cyclists getting in their miles around the loop and the reservoir. It’s a fraction of the usual crowds, however. Everything is diminished.
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