IP: Saturday in Manhattan

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

> From: "Janos Gereben" <janos451 () earthlink net>
> To: "jg" <janos451 () earthlink net>
> Subject: Saturday in Manhattan
> Date: Sat, 15 Sep 2001 19:49:32 -0700
> X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.50.4522.1200
>
> [From a friend]
>
> <<I drove I drove in to NYC today, my first venture in since
> Tuesday's attacks.  There were many semblances of normality,
> but it was really only that, mere semblances.
>
> I felt disspirited, as many seemed to be.
>
> On the other hand, people seemed to be looking out for
> and reaching out for each other, expressing hope for no
> losses, unburdening.
>
> I walked from Academy Records and CDs to the Union
> Square farmer's market, a couple of blocks away,
> passing a small fire station with a huge cluster of flowers
> and many votive candles on the sidewalk in front.
>
> The city was quiet.  Lighter than usual traffic to and in
> the City.  Plenty of parking in non-metered spaces.
>
> Police all around, and of all varities, including Sanitation
> Dep't police and "Cadet Corps" trainees on traffic duty.
> Saw only one small group of military, guarding a staging
> area at West Street (along the Hudson River) and the
> meat market, these carrying machine gun-like weapons.
>
> A long row of NYC dumptrucks lined up on West Street
> below 23rd, facing downtown, waiting to carry away debris
> (500 million tons, estimated).  Trailers (I assume
> refrigerated) lined up on the uptown side in the same area,
> awaiting bodies of which there seem to be precious few
> beyond those already recovered.  Police and emergency
> vehicles from outlying departments, communities in
> Westchester, Long Island and NJ.  Many NYS Troopers,
> who are not usually deployed in NYC.  A tractor-trailer
> on West Street heading downtown, below 14th Street
> (just arriving, it seemed), with the logo: "Disaster Relief,
> Knox County, Tennessee."
>
> I exited by coming across Christopher Street to West Street,
> the usual route.  At West Street there were many people
> lining the roadway with flags and "thank you" signs cheering
> every police and fire and emergency and debris-carrying
> vehicle that drove past.  Very moving sight.
>
> And, of course, the great void in the cityscape as one
> looked south from just about any point on the West Side.
> In its place, still a plume of white smoke over the
> downtown area.
>
> We will get accustomed to seeing the void in place of what
> had been there.  We will see the clean-up effort for some
> time, and the security for some time longer.  We will see
> rebuilding on the site, eventually.  And we have begun to
> see the beginnings of a long succession of funerals, and
> memorial services for the thousands whose remains will
> never be recovered.
>
> Unhappily, the reality is that these are likely to be only the
> first such event, not the last, although it will be difficult to
> surpass the catastrophic magnitude of these.
>
> Mayor Guiliani and Governor Pataki have been terrific
> (I say that as a fan of neither), and have done a great
> job of getting information out and rallying the City.  Dubya
> was something else, saying yesterday that he had come
> to "comforate" people.  My daughter told me that Pataki,
> standing behind him, had a look on his face that said: "I
> don't have a chance to be President and I can't believe
> this guy is there."  She wants Dubya impeached for
> stupidity and inarticulate babble.  I had to explain it
> don't work that way.
>
> I am not visibly patriotic (nor visibly much of anything
> else).  But driving out of the office parking garage last
> evening, as I made a left turn into a divided roadway,
> I saw on the pavement in the other roadway a small
> American Flag that must have blown off a car to which
> it had been fastened.  Well, after the week's events,
> and the Queen's grand gesture to The Star-Spangled
> Banner, I was not going to leave one laying in the street,
> to be run over by passing cars.  So I made a U-turn at
> the earliest possible moment, stopped my car and
> picked it up.  The dowel (piece of bamboo, more
> accurately, I suppose) to which the flag was attached
> had been run over, but the flag seems not to have been.
> It is on my desk now.  A small thing, but it made me
> feel a bit better.>>
>
>
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> Janos Gereben/SF
> janos451 () earthlink net



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