Recent History

I'm sure I've mentioned this before in a post, but I'm still captivated by the density of history in New York--Manhattan especially. And even though New York has a reputation for razing the historical urban landscape in the name of Progress, that is itself a legacy of the development of this city. New Yorkers, whether they recognize it or not, encounter their history anytime they venture above 14th Street. Designed 200 years ago, the grid is still at the heart of Manhattan's structure, still defining public spaces, residences, traffic patterns, businesses, and socializing. Like any rigid format, it inspires as much as it hinders.

Sometimes, it may take a bit of deliberation--imagination, if you will--to conjure the past from the present city. Like trying to picture the peddlers and tenements of the 19th Century Lower East Side amidst the hip kids, clubs, and cafes there now.

Sometimes, the city's history surprises you with a hidden plaque. Or else, you actually walk up to a statue just to see who it really is you've been walking by this whole time. Why do they have a statue?

Sometimes an iconic bridge carries you to the era of its creation, and you sense what it meant those who built it, to their society, and why it's still there for us.

And sometimes, you exit a PATH station on a sunny September morning, and you're struck by an uncanny sensation that you can't shake. And you stop, actually stop, and think about what it was like to be in that exact spot exactly twelve years earlier. But many people you pass on the street, or share a subway car with, already know. For them it's not recent history--it's part of their life. Lives that continue despite those lost. Or rather, for those lost.   

And that's all I have to say about that.