The night after Hurricane Sandy made landfall, New York City Mayor Mike
Bloomberg tweeted that it was "maybe the worst #NYC has experienced."
The November 12 cover of New York magazine
told the story: Most of the lower part of Manhattan, shaped like a bent
elbow in a sling, looked like it had been dipped in ink; the upper part
of the island still had light. Suddenly, the global center had become a
place of haves and have-nots. Those of us who still had electricity,
cell power, and internet connectivity gawked at photos online of cars in
the East Village, submerged from a 14-foot surge from New York Harbor.
"Wait a minute!" we told ourselves, "This is New York!" While
9/11 shocked and devastated us, some of us could interpret that act of
spectacular terror as legitimizing the City's exceptionalism. Hurricane
Sandy, on the other hand, made us realize we were just another target of
a mindless weather pattern.
That night, a little past midnight, as the storm swished its lizard's tail along the Jersey Shore and around greater New York, Trinity Grace East Village pastor Guy Wasko e-mailed colleagues and friends on Manhattan's Lower East Side:
No comments:
Post a Comment