The Great Equalizer

Since 9/11 New York City has largely escaped the woes of the country at large. We had had our own monumental hurdles to overcome. It was a slow, committed struggle back to normalcy facilitated by New Yorker's determined to be unbowed by circumstances beyond their control.

Hurricane Katrina touched us not, the housing bubble burst, (though did not make it possible for me to afford a home in my neighborhood). The economic downturn was barely a blip on the economic radar of New York other than to say the rich slowed on their getting richer. However, Hurricane Irene was a harbinger of things to come because Sandy delivered a punch that leveled the playing field and let New Yorkers in on the dirty little secret of what suffering, true suffering is all about. I dare say that 100 percent of all the affected people are of middle and lower income status.

Despite how my home was relatively untouched by the storm, no one is smiling on the streets here. We are all stressed out with coping. Today I came across two young kids sitting out front of Starbucks on Court and Dean. They claimed to be homeless and in need of cash. I denied them, thinking they were able bodied and young and should be out helping those displaced by Sandy, but as I went into the store to get my first cup of Starbucks for the day at 4:30 pm because I had been up all night manning a post at the Office of Emergency Management, I got angry with myself. I left and went home and had some two day old coffee from my coffee pot.

The rampant expansion of New York that has taken place over the last century had a big wake call, a thrashing at the hands of Mother Nature that will affect the area for years to come. The physical aspect is one thing, the social another. How will our fabric knit itself back into a cohesive whole after Sandy? That is the the question and the monumental task we as New Yorkers face today. After 9/11 our focus was clear. An enemy with a name and an agenda had attacked us from afar and we had to respond. Now, we have been made the victims of a natural disaster. How will we perform and stay true to our values? Who are we as new Yorkers?