A CALIFORNIAN LIVING IN NEW YORK DURING COVID-19

(My essay from 2021 which my completed "fictional memoir" is largely based on)

Here is an essay I had published in Litro Lit in 2021 about living in East Harlem during Covid. To finish reading click on the link at bottom. It’s free.

Photo by Triston Dunn on Unsplash

During the coronavirus pandemic, the everyday becomes the absurd.

I was born and raised in Southern California, and moved to the San Francisco Bay Area in 2008. Last year—after a tough breakup—I moved to New York City (a long-held dream) in late March, 2019. A writer (stories, novels) from a writing family—my mom is an author, and my uncle a novelist—I came like so many relatively “young” writers from the West (I’m thirty-seven) to The Holy Land, the universe of major publishing, literary agents, and connections.

Once here I stayed in two different Air BnBs for about five months before snagging a small two-bedroom apartment in a third-floor walkup in Harlem. The price was right. I use one bedroom for my writing/editing office—I make a living as a book editor—and the other for my bed. I moved into the apartment in early August.

I have conflicted feelings about Harlem, and about New York City as a whole. It seems common to feel this way about The Big Apple. On one hand there are so many things to do: Opera; theatre; film; literary readings; museums; art galleries; etc. You can walk around Central Park or any of the other parks all over the city. If you get bored of Manhattan—hard to do—you can just swing over to Brooklyn or Queens on the subway. There is always something.

On the flipside, and this is something I noticed immediately: People here rarely smile. I quickly learned—especially in Harlem—to lower my gaze when I walked past. Most seem to be constantly irritated and in a rush to get from A to B. There appears to be severe Tunnel Vision. I understand it to be a logical survival mechanism living in a frenzied, anarchic city.  

Fast-forward to late March, 2020. I have now lived in Manhattan for over a year. I like it. I detest it. I have grown to respect it. I plan to be here at least a few more years. I joined a writing group. I have pumped out an incredible amount of prose in the past year. I understand the zombie-like gazes of people on the subway. I can even read on the subway, with all its rocking and metallic screeching.

The virus has hit us all globally, of course. But New York City has become the national epicenter. Cuomo has been telling us for weeks that we don’t have enough hospitals, enough healthcare workers, enough supplies. He’s been telling us to self-quarantine, to stay inside as much as possible, even if you are young and healthy.

In Harlem, many seem to be ignoring this. I live on West 130th Street, at the corner of 5th Avenue. Until about two weeks ago there were still teen and early-twenties people gathered together playing basketball. Each time they did I squirmed, sitting at my desk writing, watching them out my window. I thought about that orange ball, all the potential for contracting the virus. Finally, the city sent people to take down the hoops and lock the black iron gate putting up red COVID-19 WARNING signs.

One night when I was in bed—reading the 700-page behemoth, East of Eden, by John Steinbeck—I heard young voices in big groups, and loud noises; shouts, screams, laughs. I ignored it for a while and then gazed out my window: Groups of teens walked around in gaggles of 8-12, talking, laughing, not social-distancing, arms round each other’s shoulders, no masks, no gloves, as if it were just another Wednesday. Different groups shouted at each other. They carried bottles. It seemed like a Harlem-version’s scene from Westside Story, only this wasn’t a performance; this was, most certainly, real life. I thought of how Cuomo was being cautious with his choices and his language; he wasn’t going to force New Yorkers to stay inside. Clearly he was worried about social unrest. All those kids out of school. All those young people unemployed. The dissipating economy. It’s a bad mix.

The next morning I walked down 5th Avenue in the late March sunlight. It was a seemingly perfect spring day, ironic given the global pandemic ravaging our nation, killing people in the tens of thousands. I’d been avoiding the news but it didn’t matter: Everyone I knew told me all about it. And I saw my New Yorker news headings which were emailed each day.

My routine was becoming regular during the pandemic: Wake up, drink Irish Breakfast tea (with milk), read whatever book I happened to be plowing through, text a few close friends, avoid the news and social media, write—I’d started writing Book 2 in my autobiographical literary trilogy—and then go for a mid-afternoon walk. I’d go down 5th Ave to 125th Street, and then cross over to Marcus Garvey Park. I’d then walk either around the park to the west and trudge down Mount Morris Park Ave, to 120th, or else I’d zigzag through the park. Often as I walked down 5th I’d hear sirens going off; but I’d noticed, recently, that the sirens were becoming more and more frequent. The sirens also varied; there were different speeds and beats to the sirens, and they were significantly louder.

That morning at Marcus Garvey Park I saw a massive circle of maybe forty kids—pre-teens and teens—surrounding two kids engaged in a wild, rugged fist fight. I stopped, and, from across the street, I watched. No masks. No gloves. And besides…they were all standing side by side, touching each other…and two kids were fighting physically. An African American man next to me filmed it on his iPhone. He glanced at me and we shook our heads. It made me realize that, no matter what might be happening in the world, when you’re that age, and you’re male, it doesn’t really matter…because it’s not directly happening to you. (TO FINISH READING CLICK HERE)