Sitting in the dark — and no, that isn’t a Jewish mother joke.<\/p>\n
It’s been eerily quiet and lightless in the West Village since Monday night. Which is when, while watching TV, I lost power. I was figuring that we never lose power for\u00a0more than, hey, one night and two partial days. And the subways are (almost) never inoperable. For a day or so after Septembert 11, 2011, yes. For more than a day or so during transit workers’ strikes, yes. But storms? No.<\/p>\n
Not this time, though. The subways are silent and without the subliminal\u00a0rumbling, the city is so quiet.<\/p>\n
And I got the word directly today from a trio of Con Ed guys, standing outside their truck on Seventh Avenue and 17th Street. Maybe a week. Maybe less. That’s how long we are going to be dark. Dark with telephones, dark with TV, dark with the internet. Dark in the fridge, dark on my couch.<\/p>\n
I didn’t do badly with the emergency management advice. Although I didn’t get extra cash, I had two flashlights (one of them, an LED, got me through at least four New Yorkers), and managed to locate a couple of candles. I have a gas stove so, with the remarkable innovation of\u00a0matches (remember them?), I was able to make coffee in the morning, and oatmeal later. But no heat, no hot water and no news. And the absence of news\u00a0was driving me particularly antsy.<\/p>\n
So today, after I walked up to the New York Times building on 40th and Eighth and acquired a real newspaper, after buying a Daily News at the sort-of opened PA Terminal, I found a pay phone and called my brother. “Can you come get me?” He lives in Washington Heights. Has power. Has a car.<\/p>\n
Oh, and by the way, the emergency cell phone I bought a few months ago precisely for such times as these didn’t work. ATT’s network was non-functioning in Lower Manhattan.<\/p>\n
So nothing much is going to happen here for a few days. Maybe Saturday I’ll be able to get home.<\/p>\n
The mighty lesson that the polar ice caps are melting and that the melt has just drowned parts of my city is wasted on New Yorkers. We believe<\/em> in global warming,believe that we\u00a0should try to do something to arrest it.<\/p>\n So what about the rest of the country, all those people who deny science because\u00a0it’s too difficult to think about.<\/p>\n Well, think about it. Or the next time you try to visit my city, I’ll be standing at the exit to the tunnel and blocking your entry.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Sitting in the dark — and no, that isn’t a Jewish mother joke. It’s been eerily quiet and lightless in the West Village since Monday night. Which is when, while watching TV, I lost power. I was figuring that we … Continue reading