Angels in the Architecture

 

Find Eileen's books here...

Happy New Year, dear readers.

I love New York City. Since I was a child, it has always been a place of mystery and wonder. On our way to visit my grandparents’ apartment, I would stare in wonder at the tall buildings, vast avenues, steam coming out of worksites. My parents would point out the West Side tenements where each had been born. My father would give us a nickel so we could ride the Staten Island Ferry and get a close look at the waters around and Miss Liberty shining her light from the harbor. Free Shakespeare performances in Central Park and my first Broadway show made me a lifelong lover of theater.

Angel in the architecture, New York City

The last time I was there was Valentine’s Day, 2020.  My husband and I traveled down by train from our home in Vermont to see our son performing in an off-Broadway play. The play was about love in all its forms and complexity and was the perfect date. Afterward, we walked to Greenwich Village and had a lovely late night meal together. We should do this more often, I thought.

Back in out tiny hotel, I looked across the street from our 8th floor window and noticed a building had been converted from its previous incarnation as a church. Some of the details remained intact, including a beautiful concrete angel, recently sand blasted clean. There are wonderful surprises like that, even in this city that is forever re-inventing itself.

I’ve thought about that angel often over this year that’s followed, here in our quarantined Vermont. That angel has looked over a city crippled by a deadly virus (which our son suffered with and survived) a shut down, and political mayhem. 

I hope she will guide us all to follow the better angels of our nature.