I recently spent twelve days in New York, the city where I was born, attending a family memorial and doing research for several writing projects. This is the first of several essays I am writing to help me understand what those days meant to me.

LOUD

The loudness hits you the moment you step off the plane at 
     Newark Airport
It continues until you pull up in front of your hotel, 
get out, and then you hear it

Familiar siren sounds include a "wail," which is a long, drawn-out, rising and falling tone; a "yelp," which is a rapid, repetitive sequence of rising and falling tones; and a "hi-lo," which switches between two distinct high and low tones

Incessant. Constant. Forever. Whirring. Piercing. Never letting up. Blocking out. Silence.

WELCOME TO THE CITY THAT NEVER SLEEPS

The chat chat chattering of people screeching across streets, alleyways, highways, and byways.
It never stops. You swear you can hear it crashing through the windshield into the car as you deflect, refuse to acknowledge its existence, and pray (whenever you can) that it stop, if only for a moment, so that you can catch your breath. 

WELCOME TO THE BIG APPLE

In the hotel lobby. Where guests line up for the daily check-in, check-out ritual, and the luggage is clanking and clicking and smashing, and you wonder where you’re going, and everyone is shouting to be heard above the shouting that can’t be heard. 

In the breakfast lounge. Where businesspeople conduct their work on Zoom calls, speaking in high tones so that no one misses that they are discussing money and serious business. We can all decide for ourselves whether they are important and serious. Meanwhile, I’m just trying to smear a little cream cheese on my everything bagel, which I’ve paid a small king’s ransom for. I’m important too. 

In the elevator. Where adults in vacation gear mingle with adults in black tie gear and everyone talks like everyone needs to hear their high-pitched voices on their phones. With their partners. And nowhere feels safe. Trapped for thirty-two floors.

WELCOME TO THE CAPITAL OF THE WORLD

In the room with a view of Central Park. In all its majesty before you. Looking over the park from Central Park South to Central Park North. 843 acres. An urban oasis, stretching 2.5 miles long between 59th and 110th streets, and 0.5 miles wide between 5th Avenue and Central Park West.

Even it screams peace from thirty-two floors up. But I know better. 

WELCOME TO THE CENTER OF THE UNIVERSE

You know better the moment you hit the hot, humid, steaming, burning sidewalk. 101 degrees. What the…heat, plus humidity, plus honking horns, plus ambulances screeching behind them, racing and crawling to an accident or a hospital, and no one moves because, well, they’re complaining about the noise too as they stand on their horns… they've got somewhere to go. 

The police car and its sirens are signaling an emergency, and no one seems to care as they all sit at 57th and 5th Avenue. Staring ahead and shouting into the ether. Swearing if that bus, truck, pedestrian, bike, don’t move, they will assassinate the dream of a city that has grown too colossal, mammoth, monstrous, and yet they keep coming, in waves, in trances, hypnotized by an illusion. 

Nothing will happen because screaming loudly is part of the charm. The language of the street. The rhythm of the city. The flow of human existence in a city that refuses to sleep, be quiet, or take a break or a breather. Oh man, I’ve been gone too long. 

WELCOME TO THE CITY SO NICE THEY NAMED IT TWICE

I haven’t even left south of Central Park, and I’m already ready for a way out. A way back. Where your heart is beating louder than your suburban quiet. Oh man, I’ve been gone too long.

WELCOME TO THE EMPIRE CITY

Loud vibrations pulsating through canyons of glass and concrete structures that scrape the sky. Echoes bouncing off a New York daze on Billionaire Row on 57th Street, where they can’t hear a pin drop from their heavenly Olympus. Olympus. Olympus. The class struggle contributes its own loudness to the power of a city that swims, thrives, on hyper energy. Where the higher you are in the sky, the louder your dinero, money, currency, dough, loot, coin, moolah, legal tender. No one can quiet you. This is your city. Where you can speak as loudly as you can. No one can stop you. You own this city. We just pay rent or visit for your blessing.

WELCOME TO THE GREATEST CITY IN THE WORLD

Where the streets and highways and bridges and tunnels are loud with the sound of tires screeching, drivers cursing, horns honking, sirens blaring, no one is safe from the drowning vibrations on the Brooklyn Bridge, Manhattan Bridge, Williamsburg Bridge, Ed Koch Queensboro Bridge, Robert F. Kennedy Bridge, Throgs Neck Bridge, Henry Hudson Bridge, Verrazano-Narrows Bridge, Bronx-Whitestone Bridge, Cross Bay Veterans Memorial Bridge, Marine Parkway-Gil Hodges Memorial Bridge, George Washington Bridge, and the Hugh L. Carey Tunnel. Highways include the Bruckner Expressway, Cross Bronx Expressway, Jackie Robinson Parkway, Long Island Expressway, Major Deegan Expressway, Parkway, Staten Island Expressway, and West Side Highway from Manhattan into Da Bronx or Brooklyn or Queens where there are no lanes anywhere and everywhere there is a target on your car. Smash that mofo. It’s a rental. Obviously, a tourist from out of town. 

WELCOME TO THE MELTING POT

Even the food is loud. In your face. The smells. The taste. The cuisine of the world. Of my people. Of a kaleidoscopic palette. Must-eats when landing in New York. New York Pizza. New York Kosher Hebrew National dog. New York Knish. New York Chinese. New York Puerto Rican. New York Dominican. New York Italian. New York New York’s version of world eats. The restaurants may be loud. The customers may be loud. But who cares? A universe of cultures on a densely populated island, 1,694,250 souls on 22.66 square miles [72,918 residents per square mile], not counting the tourists with their loud presence.

Somehow, anyhow, it is what it is—the energy, the fire, the vivacity, the forcefulness, the power.

The beauty of it all. 

WELCOME TO NEW YORK NEW YORK

It’s what makes this island so loudly charming. 

And I’ve been gone too long