Last week my daughter got tickets to the 9/11 memorial. Since my husband couldn't go there was enough room for me in my daughters car. ….and just to get this out of the way, YES I am the worst passenger in the world. In the drivers seat I will drive any where including cross country and taxi polluted mid town Manhattan...but as a passenger, forget about it. So for the sake of all involved, I positioned myself in the backseat behind my daughter so that I could not see out the front window. I could NOT see that my daughter was not braking when there were so many red lights up ahead....I could NOT see the kamikaze drivers weaving in and out in front of us and I definitely could NOT see the 18 wheeler mis-judging the turn ratio he needed. All things considered we arrived safely in Manhattan and in search of a parking lot. We asked the first uniformed person we saw directing traffic for directions to a parking garage in relationship to the memorial site. He babbled something, pointed somewhere and dismissed us somehow. My daughter turned and continued up West Street which used to be the West Side Highway until they, well ….removed the highway. Up Williams, down Greenwich, across Vesey and onto Warren and there it was a parking garage just off the corner. The sign said $12.75 from 4pm to 2am. Perfect! Too perfect! $12.75?? It costs more for a bottled water in Manhattan but the car was parked and with cameras ready we started toward the memorial.
It was just after work hours so the streets were bustling with parents scooping up their kids from after school programs and the multitudes trying to get to the trains for their trip home with cell phones ready, to photographer the gropers. At every corner people navigated the intersections by basically walking in front of the cars, who like us moments ago, looked lost and determined to find their destinations. We followed the blue signs that directed us toward the memorial site. 9/11 MEMORIAL --> In the distance, and I do mean distance, we could see the Freedom Tower surrounded by cranes and hoists as we made our way downtown. We came across a little park nestled in the middle of all the chaos with a sculpture that looked like something a clown could twist and maneuver into a flower or sword. Except this one probably weighed about a ton. After taking way too many pictures of my grandsons posing with the sculpture, pointing at the sculpture and running around the sculpture we made our way passed the park and down West Broadway. It was becoming apparent why the parking lot was so cheap...it was in another borough.
We continued to follow the blue signs North toward our destination elbowing our way through the masses who were anxious to get home and as would have it, were traveling in the opposite direction. My son in law and I took pictures of everything New York and everything American, and well....everything my grandsons could stand in front of. As we turned down Barclay and then Vesey and onto Church Street we happened upon Zuccotti Park with its protest signs and tents. The sight was overwhelming. The smell was worse! My throbbing knee pain was replaced with the eye-tearing sting of urine stench! There were signs, lots of signs…GOD HATES BANKS….. WE ARE THE 99%…..FREE HUGS. Yes we had encountered Woodstock in lower Manhattan. I coerced my grandsons into coming into the park with me for a picture. We walked around the woman offering FREE HUGS….(not enough penicillin on the planet for that one)…around some dude in a blue sleeping bag that looked like it had been slept in since the original Woodstock (circa 1969)…and stopped in front of a statue of a seated businessman where we posed and smiled. Click. The hugging lady looked pissed off, or maybe she just had to pee. We continued past the garbage piled higher than my ten year old grandson and down four more blocks following blue 9/11 MEMORIAL --> signs and arrived at the entrance to the Memorial. The view already breathtaking as the Freedom Tower towered above us. The line snaked right and left passed check points where we had to show our tickets. We arrived at what looked like the boarding gate at Kennedy where buckets accepted our change, metal objects and bags. We were scanned and wanded but unfortunately no pat down as at this point any kind of massage of my legs would have been appreciated. There is no way to aptly describe the feeling of being there at the site so I wont try, lets just say it is the closest thing to feeling like you are walking on hallowed ground.
The day sky turned into a night sky and the thought of hiking trudging walking back to the car in that shadowy environment loomed large. But hunger became the sentiment of choice…and we were off to find food. I pointed out a Panini place, a diner, and a nice Irish pub that I was sure had the most amazing burgers possible….but the kids eyed a Burger King and the choice was made. Across from Zuccotti park and the pissed off FREE HUGS lady. Of course this Burger King had upstairs seating. Twenty two (I counted) metal steps up to the dining area which had a lovely view of the park and its dirty denizens. Unfortunately our seats were feet from the bathrooms. I was too tired and hungry to move…so we found a booth and sat. There were signs that the bathrooms were for customers only, but of course a steady stream of dread-locked hippies from across the street came in to relieve themselves. I made my grandsons promise they wouldn’t pee until Brooklyn. Before we finished eating an even bigger stream of cops came in for the same reason. We continued eating and someone debated how a cop can sit on the toilet with his gun not hitting the floor. Our bellies full, my legs rested (sort of) and the consensus that a cop keeps his gun strapped on while he shits sits….we left Burger King, twenty two steps down.
En route to the car I noticed what looked like two large canisters marked Nitrogen which I only just found out are not flammable. Since I had yet to Google Nitrogen and assumed they were, I commented when a homeless lunatic (who probably got chucked out of Zuccotti) put a cigarette out on one of them. He immediately started waving his hands and asking me if I was the captain and in charge of the tanks. The kids were afraid and so my normal confrontational response was squelched. We walked faster (sorry, knees) as he continued to follow us babbling on an on about how I was not in charge. He definitely was not hugged enough as a kid…gee, where’s that FREE HUG lady when you need her.
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