Tag Archives: New York City

New York

Visiting Roosevelt Island

Leave a comment

Getting to Roosevelt Island requires nothing more than a MetroCard swipe. Just another New York neighborhood, right?

Wrong!

Roosevelt Island feels like a completely different world. It’s located in the East River between Manhattan and Queens and you can get there either by taking the F train or by taking the Roosevelt Island tram, which was a quick little ride. It’s a lot of fun to see New York’s streets from a couple hundred feet in the air.

DSC00294
You can access the Roosevelt Island tramway from its only station on 59th and 2nd.

The first thing I noticed is that Roosevelt Island is quiet. You can see all of Manhattan’s traffic on FDR Drive but can’t hear any of it. Roosevelt Island is only two miles long and you can walk the entire thing without needing to stop for a car to pass. About 12,000 people live in this strange little city of its own, with the helpful amenities of Duane Reade, a fruitcart seller, three restaurants, and a library and school.

What Roosevelt Island also has in abundance, however, is a lot of outdoor recreation space. This also made it feel like a completely different world. Manhattan does an excellent job of creating these spaces, but the number of parks, athletic fields, playgrounds, and pools on the island was really surprising. It even has a community garden with separate plots so you can have your own garden within a garden!

 

Once on Roosevelt Island, my friend and I stopped first at The Octagon, a fancy apartment building that used to be the main entrance to the New York City Lunatic Asylum:

People were taking wedding photos in front of it, which I can understand because the stone is beautiful. But I couldn’t help but think of Shutter Island and the sorrow of that story. What lives were lived here? What lives were lost? What stories were never told, or told and disbelieved?

The spooky, eerie feeling of Roosevelt Island remained with me despite the heat and bright sunlight. Our conversation turned to other psychological thrillers and horror movies as we walked to the lighthouse at the northern tip of the island.

DSC00264DSC00267DSC00265

There’s clearly a legacy of advocacy on Roosevelt Island. The island is currently home to a K-12 school for students with disabilities, as well, so it was nice to see activism as a continuing conversation. Likewise, it was disturbing to think that such a calm, quiet oasis had been used as a place to remove individuals from society. (Kind of like Australia’s history as a British penal colony.)

From the lighthouse, we walked south, passing by a modern art commentary on what Roosevelt Island and New York City often represent:

DSC00271DSC00274

Clever, right?

As we walked south, we also passed Blackwell House, which dates from 1796. It changed hands a number of times and often housed the administrators of several Roosevelt Island institutions. You can read about it (and about Roosevelt Island’s five other Landmark buildings) here.

On the southern tip of Roosevelt Island lies perhaps its most interesting attraction: an abandoned smallpox hospital! The building was protected by a fence but the shell that remained, slicing straight through the sky, gave me chills:

At one time, those rooms were full. The walls closed in on the patients and on themselves. The ivy covering the building, blowing gently in the light wind, gave it a lifelike quality that juxtaposed sharply with the empty tree branches. Something’s wrong here.

People were quiet as they approached, looked around, took photos, and continued walking south to the park, concert venue, and memorial to President Franklin D. Roosevelt that occupies the remainder of the island. I won’t say that I believe in ghosts but if I did, I’d be certain that this island is haunted.

And that’s reason in itself to go visit! Happy exploring!

DSC00262

 

New York

Finding a Secret

1 Comment

It’s been a while since I’ve gone hiking. It was last year, in fact, when I visited friends in Southern California over December break. I love hiking and exploring nature and breathing clear air, so I immediately said yes when a coworker suggested a walk through Silver Lake Preserve in Westchester County last week. We had a heat wave, too, so it really was summer for about three days, which is as good a time as any to seek shade and relief from humidity by wandering through trails and trees.

The vast majority of the trail was deserted and I’m not sure many people actually know Silver Lake Preserve exists. It’s beautiful, so I’m not quite sure why that is, though parking was a challenge so maybe that’s a deterrent.

Every so often, however, we came across signs that others had been there. And we felt strangely like we were documenting our own version of the The Blair Witch Project.

We did our best to follow the Heritage Trail around the lake but were not very successful following the trail markers, which also contributed to an uncanny Blair Witch sensation. We were pretty sure we wanted the blue trail, but saw an equal number of yellow, red, and white squares and groupings of circles painted on trees. But we must have done something right because here I am telling you about it!

It is not an exaggeration to say that we couldn’t hear or see any cars or any signs of civilization for most of our time in the woods. I felt a sense of peace and quiet that surprised me; I didn’t realize how much I missed places like Mendon Ponds Park back home in Rochester. I felt light and free and enjoyed myself without thinking too hard about it, jumping on rocks and logs and smiling at the sound of mud squishing underfoot. My new Tevas did not disappoint!

And then, of course, there was the lake itself. Water is my happy place. No doubt about it. I love the way it looks, sounds, and smells. I love throwing my head back and opening my whole body to absorb as much of its energy as I can. It makes me feel alive, each and every time.

I’ve been remiss in not really venturing anywhere in Westchester County aside from school. I’m glad to know that places like Silver Lake Preserve exist, especially when I spend so much time in the noise, crowds, and concrete of the city. The good company and very welcome change of scenery left me with a feeling of relaxation that carried me through the rest of the week. I’ve learned that there are other parks in Westchester and I’m looking forward to exploring them, too!

In nature nothing exists alone. – Rachel Carson

On My Mind

On Being You

2 Comments

Heard:

Teenage girl screaming.

Seen:

Boy holding girl’s backpack over the railing protecting pedestrians from the East River. Boy has a backpack of his own.

Heard:

-Stop, stop it! Stop!
Crying.
-Say you’re sorry. Say you’re sorry!
Screaming.
-I’m sorry! I’M SORRY!

Seen:

Boy dangles backpack closer to the water.

Heard:

Screaming.
-I’M SORRY!!!

A conversation. Student begins:

-I think I’m going to make you a card at the end of the school year.
-Thank you, but that’s completely unnecessary.
-I know, but I think I will. Doing things to make people happy makes me happy!

Seen:

Man holding woman against a brick wall, yelling, hands waving.
Woman trying to move away.
Man blocking woman with his body.

Heard:

A slap.

A conversation. Young woman begins:

-Should we call the police?
-Shit, he grabbed her bag again.
-Call. We’re definitely calling.
-Calling.

A conversation. Student begins:

-How’s your day going?
-Oh it’s great, thanks, how’s yours?
-Mine’s good. I’m glad yours is good. As long as you’re smiling!

Seen:

Teenage boy and girl in a headlock. Both are spinning around, out of breath.
Passerby slows down, offers a long look.
Boy lets go of girl and girl responds in turn. Both laughing.
“She’s looking at us!”
Both run off, still laughing.

Some of these interactions are months old, burned into my memory like a muscle that grows stiff in the rain. Unwelcome. Uncomfortable. Troubling.

Others are newer, fresher, still turning over in my mind. Still trying to process what I’ve seen and heard, said or done.

“Doing things to make people happy makes me happy!” I smiled. I waved goodbye. Wished him a good afternoon. Realized my heart rate had gone up. Realized I was afraid.

Because such a sincere statement delivered with such obvious joy had brought me right back to the boy threatening to drop the girl’s backpack into the water, months earlier. I’m sure everything was in that backpack. Her schoolwork, her wallet, likely her phone. Would he have done it? In a moment of raging hormones, a crying girl, and feeling a surge of power . . . would he have done it?

And, just as pressing, how would the girl have responded? How did she respond to the threat once her bag was safely recovered? Did she walk away, never to speak to him again? Did she express her anger that he’d take advantage of her trust? Or did she let him back into her good graces because being with someone is better than no one?

The man yelling at the woman tell us that no, someone is not always better than no one.

The teenagers laughing as they play-wrestled tell us that affection can come in many forms.

But the fight between the man and woman tell us that affection, or what we perceive as affection, can sometimes be dangerous and even deadly.

Seeking first to make others happy sometimes comes at the expense of oneself and one’s own best interests. For this reason, I’m concerned about the student described above. He’s what we label “vulnerable”, which can have many meanings. He does fine academically but remains on the periphery of his grade’s social circles. He relates better to adults than to his peers, usually staying after class to chat, often walking down the hallway in conversation with an adult. He doesn’t seem to mind being alone and often spends recess indoors when everyone else is outside.

His comments remind me of myself in a lot of ways. Doing for others is a salient part of my identity, but I also know that it’s okay to say no. Over time, I’ve learned that sometimes putting others first can be detrimental to personal happiness and growth if engaging with others’ interests comes before acknowledging my own hopes, dreams, and desires. Coming to that realization has been a bumpy road and while a little bruising is okay, I’d like to spare my student (and anyone else) some of the scars that have resulted along the way.

Not too long ago, in a dark time of self-doubt and uncertainty, a friend reassured me that I was doing fine. “You do the best you that you’re capable of and if you make a mistake, you learn.” That message has played on loop in the back of my mind for months now. It has become a mental rallying cry, a checkpoint before making decisions, responding to others, or trying to challenge the status quo.

And that’s what I want that man and woman, those teenagers, and all of my students to know. That’s what I would have liked to say. Do the best you that you’re capable of and learn from your mistakes. Keep track of who you are and who you want to become. Everyone else can wait.