Old maps show what the city was like before man got to work on it. The islands on which it rests were ringed with coves, marshes, beaches, and the mouths of meandering streams. Then we made it a port; then cars displaced ships. Highways lined the shore, buildings blocked the view, landfill made space for new buildings. It takes a ride on a ferry or a day trip to one of the last few retro-nautical holdouts to remember where we are.
The hurricane was preceded by a lot of talk, but talk had been cheapened by past hurricanes that fizzled and by the so-what attitude that ubiquitous weather reporting perversely fosters. People’s attitude on the Monday the storm was to arrive was insouciance, tinged with anxiety, as if waiting for a party (will it be a good one?). Nature’s harbinger was long and steady gusts of wind, not heavy yet but much more sustained than normal, as if a vocalist had switched from jingles to lieder.
Comments