commentary on my trip to NYC
Feb. 5th, 2002 06:17 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mangosteenI went to Manhattan this past weekend. All told, it was good to get out of Boston, and hang out with friends down where home used to be. I try to make it down on a semi-regular basis, as the fares are cheap, and I really do miss the place, if only in some semi-idealized "humans have a short memory for pain" kind of way.
The plane flight down was really harsh. Three holding loops, one aborted landing, 40mph crosswinds; nasty stuff. I never get airsick. I was verging on a first.
As always, life goes on when you're not looking, so the little things change. A deli closes, a bank is running under a new name, a particular drugstore chain spreads its red-and-blue painted iron grasp just a little more, a whole bunch of buildings are being simultaneously constructed on 7th avenue in the mid-20s, etc. In the same vein, it was amusing to see that J&R Music world has taken over all of Park Row. It's huge!
Just a few blocks down on Broadway (near B'way and Fulton) was where I used to work, and I had to see the building. Old stomping grounds and all that.
Then I looked one block west.
No.
NO.
NO NO NO NO NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!
HOLYSHITTHERESNOTHINGTHERETHERESNOTHINGTHERETHERESNOTHINGTHERE!!!!!!
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!
For ten minutes. Backed up against a wall. Mumbling to myself, tears streaming down my face. I'd never been confronted with so much.....Nothing.
When I worked on lower B'way, I never actually looked at it, but I always knew it was there. Something that huge has a presence you can feel, and now it's Just Not There. There's a small part of me that is ashamed for not heading down to Manhattan and see it sooner than four and a half months afterward. I've been in Manhattan several times after what happened, but I've never had the balls to take the trip downtown.
You want to see what a grieving city looks like?
Go to Broadway and Fulton.
and look one block west.
At some point after that, I headed back to Boston. That's usually the way it works.
The plane flight down was really harsh. Three holding loops, one aborted landing, 40mph crosswinds; nasty stuff. I never get airsick. I was verging on a first.
As always, life goes on when you're not looking, so the little things change. A deli closes, a bank is running under a new name, a particular drugstore chain spreads its red-and-blue painted iron grasp just a little more, a whole bunch of buildings are being simultaneously constructed on 7th avenue in the mid-20s, etc. In the same vein, it was amusing to see that J&R Music world has taken over all of Park Row. It's huge!
Just a few blocks down on Broadway (near B'way and Fulton) was where I used to work, and I had to see the building. Old stomping grounds and all that.
Then I looked one block west.
No.
NO.
NO NO NO NO NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!
HOLYSHITTHERESNOTHINGTHERETHERESNOTHINGTHERETHERESNOTHINGTHERE!!!!!!
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!
For ten minutes. Backed up against a wall. Mumbling to myself, tears streaming down my face. I'd never been confronted with so much.....Nothing.
When I worked on lower B'way, I never actually looked at it, but I always knew it was there. Something that huge has a presence you can feel, and now it's Just Not There. There's a small part of me that is ashamed for not heading down to Manhattan and see it sooner than four and a half months afterward. I've been in Manhattan several times after what happened, but I've never had the balls to take the trip downtown.
You want to see what a grieving city looks like?
Go to Broadway and Fulton.
and look one block west.
At some point after that, I headed back to Boston. That's usually the way it works.
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no subject
Date: 2002-02-06 11:55 am (UTC)When I was in NYC for New Year's, we'd gone to the Empire State Building to see the view. I'd never actually been up there before, that was my first thought -- that whole "It's always there, you never visit, you never look, you never even think about it" feeling.
Anyway, I looked south, and saw BuildingHenge. Literally, you could see skyscrapers that seemed to form a circle where the Big Nothing Emptiness now is.
The pain stabbed me in the stomach. All that metal, all those people.