story639.xml

story639.xml

born-digital

story

yes

no

2002-05-17

March 16, 2002

Almost Spring

Everyone is wearing green corsages and beads, buttons and hats. Tomorrow is St. Patrick?s Day, and today the parade is marching past at almost the moment we arrive in the city.

There is also green just starting to dot the trees in Central Park. Buds are swelling and the forsythias are already in full bloom. The yellow makes a splash in the midst of the gray. It?s cloudy but warm as we walk briskly to the American Museum of Natural History.

Maybe I?m just imagining, but it seems that when you head uptown you hear planes more. At home, I don?t immediately look up anymore at the first hint of an airplane sound. But here, I feel myself struggle not to. Just as we open the doors to the museum, a jet engine thunders nearby. I see heads swivel upwards, searching the clouds. Inside, I keep watching through the windows, secretly bracing for some sort of explosion. Nothing comes. I turn back to the dinosaurs.

We go to the much-talked about planetarium show. Sinking back in my seat, I let the sounds of thunder and crashing waves and baseball games wash over me. Then the sky becomes awash with stars. We travel to the depths of the ocean and then to other galaxies.

After that, the rest of the museum is anticlimactic. There is almost too much to see, so we wander rapidly through the rooms of precious gems and fossils and mammals, looking but not really seeing anything. In an hour or two, we?re finished, so we walk for awhile and then head underground.

?

The Bridge

Now we know it?s time. Dan and I have talked about this off and on for weeks. We?re going to walk the Brooklyn Bridge.

The sun is out but the day has grown much colder. I shove my hands in my pockets and try to stop shivering as we search for the walkway over the bridge.

I thought when I came here and did this I would remember so much of that day. Besides the obvious horrid images of planes crashing and buildings falling on September 11, the other visual that melded itself in my mind was from that afternoon, when hordes of people covered in dust crossed the bridge in a panic. Is this really New York? Is this actually real and not some B-movie? I remembered thinking.

But now I am here and that place I saw on television seems like a dream. Today the air is clear and the bridge is not lost in a cloud of dust. People dawdle, pushing strollers, and tourists pause to snap pictures.

I look up at the cables rising far above me on either side, squeezing me in. Cars rush below us and shake the wooden boardwalk on which we stand. To our left is the Manhattan Bridge; to our right the George Washington in the hazy distance, as the mouth of the river opens to the sea. Behind us is the skyline, but I don?t want to really look there yet.

Our walk to Brooklyn takes maybe a half-hour. We stand at a map arguing, unable to find Old Fulton Street. We want to try this pizza place, Grimaldi?s. Finally this older couple points us in the right direction.

Before stopping to eat we walk to the bottom of the street, which ends at the water. There is a pier and some sort of boat landing. It looks private. I see a white limousine parked but running, with one of the back doors opened. A bride, white dress and all, is stooping halfway out of the door. I can?t tell if she?s getting out or back in.

I look up at the bridge. Now it?s almost directly over my head, just a little to the right. I see its underbelly, secretly thrilled to glimpse the side not visible in posters but only if you?re actually there.

The bride slams the door and the limo roars away. Now we have this place to ourselves. For the first time I really take in the span of the city from this point. The sun has disappeared behind the buildings; the sky is golden. I turn around for just a moment and find myself staring through the window of a restaurant that looks out at the city. A waitress is standing, arms folded, gazing across the water. Her eyes look sad. But maybe she is just bored, waiting for customers. It?s difficult to tell.

The street is so quiet that when we open the doors to Grimaldi?s, the noise is a sort of pleasant shock. Every table is full and the air is steamy and full of oregano. We rest our elbows on the red-checkered tablecloth and order a large pizza with pepperoni and garlic, onions and mushrooms.

There is a stone oven right behind the counter, and the guys have this clockwork system for churning out pizzas. About every 30 seconds one opens the oven door and another shovels a steaming pizza out, then slides a new one in. The pies are whisked to tables immediately. Ours arrives within 10 minutes of ordering, and we quickly occupy ourselves with eating. It?s too loud to talk anyway.

Everything has changed when we walk back outside. Day has become night. The sky is blue-black and the city is lit up now. Then we see the towers, the Tribute in Light ? two blue beams stretching endlessly to the sky.

As we walk, I look and look at them, always in front of us, standing in that empty place that I can?t imagine full. Even though it?s dark now and windy I don?t feel cold anymore. I?d heard people say the lights, the tribute, is healing. Now I see why but don?t really understand why.

Later this night we will walk past the floodlights of Ground Zero, illuminating boarded up windows and gouged walls, casting strange shadows, like lightening in the middle of the night. We will make our way through the crowds, our hands numb with cold, to Battery Park and stare soberly at the bronze sphere that once stood in the World Trade Center plaza.

But now we are still walking on the bridge and watching the new city. Several small groups of men and women are walking toward us. As they draw near I see they are New York City police officers and firefighters. I think, but I?m not sure, that they have come to see the lights.

I try not to look at them. They must always have strangers watching them now, wondering what they have seen and how they are coping. I wonder too, but there is no way to know, as they pass by, some laughing and talking, some utterly silent. I am a stranger here. I am only an observer. I wish there was a way to tell them I am trying to understand and trying not to forget.

Looking out at Manhattan and at the thousands of lights that speak for millions of people, I ache to make a connection. To the north I see the Empire State Building, bathed in red, white and blue light. In the south I can just make out the Statue of Liberty, lighting the waters around her. But for a moment, it all seems so small. I feel as if I could stretch out my arms and touch the city from end to end, then draw it close to me, in an embrace.