I am looking to rediscover the initial joy and rush I felt when first introduced to New York. Lately, I find myself lost in the grind and push of it. I'm not running the same race as everyone else around me seems to be running and I'm afraid I'll get trampled in their wake.
When I moved to New York at the age of 17 to start undergrad at New York University, I was terrified of this city. Terrified at the possibility it presented. Everywhere I turned there seemed to be something to do or see and I wanted to take part in all of it. When I needed to slow down, I would leave my dorm on 10th and Broadway and walk. I would walk the streets for hours, usually at night.
My first stop out of the dorm was at 10th Street and 5th Ave. I would wait for the light directing the downtown traffic to go red and I would stand in the middle of 5th Ave. First I would look uptown. The building got taller. The lights sparkled in the night. Why were lights on in office building at 10pm? Who worked that late? I would then turn my back on the traffic and look downtown. My favorite view of the city. There was the Washington Square Arch. Lit from below and surrounded by fencing so that people didn't break more the crumbling facade. Then the fountain so beautiful and asymmetrical in its placement (please don't get me started on the re-positioning of it) and there in the distance the Twin Towers rising high and mighty in the night, alive and shining.
The city has changed more than I can say since that fateful day in 2001. And we have changed with it. Although we go on, I don't think any of us have truly recovered and I think some of us are on edge waiting for the next attack. In these uncertain economic times we do everything we can to get by, day-to-day.
That view down 5th Ave is gone now. Forever changed. I am not 17, wide-eyed and awestruck anymore. But whenever I'm near 10th Street and 5th Ave I look longingly downtown, hoping for a glimpse of that old view and a glimpse of the old me.
I need to reclaim my island.
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