The Flower District

My time is almost up in New York, and all of a sudden, everything feels more real. I can attribute the perspective shift to my new responsibilities that more closely resemble my ambitions of a future in radio journalism, or living constantly submerged in the news world, or maybe it’s the sobering headlines that comprise that world.

I feel less motivated to explore the city, and find myself watching Al Jazeera with religious observance and listening to hours of radio news commentary every day. My New York Times email alert just popped to my desktop, informing me that a third explosion has rocked the weakest Japanese nuclear plant, and emergency workers have evacuated the site.

I have stayed in the newsroom since International Working Women’s day, and I’m honored with the caliber of projects on which I get to work. One of my proudest moments here was rushing off the 2 express train and up the stairs to my FM radio, and tuning in with my housemates just in time for the distinguished British news director to introduce “Elaine Eze-kell’s” news hour contribution. I’ve produced everything from a St. Patrick’s Day piece about green beer to an interview with a seismologist, just hours after the Japanese earthquake struck. Now I’m working on a one-hour news special that will air the day I leave.

Last Friday, I accompanied by boss to a panel discussion at Alwan for the Arts with Amy Goodman, host of Democracy Now!, and Ahdaf Soueif, an Egyptian novelist fresh from Tahrir Square. About one hundred people crammed into the room that only had capacity for half that. For the next two hours, Amy teased delicate vignettes out of Ms. Soueif about the makeshift protest camp in Egypt’s capitol. She spoke about strangers teaching one another how to combat the sear of tear gas by breathing through cloths dipped in vinegar and rinsing their eyes in Pepsi. After the talk, my boss introduced me to Amy, in his exuberant manner, telling her that I wanted to take her job someday. Amy and I both cringed and shook hands.

Although I’ve been working diligently at the station from the beginning, I viewed my internship as a sort of goofy experiment. In January and February, I would go work my butt off on Wall Street, then come back to Chelsea in the evenings and forget the internship until my alarm dragged me out of bed the next morning.Now I feel consumed by the politics, news, responsibilities and upcoming events of the station. I don’t consider myself an emotional person, but grief for the suffering finds its way into my consciousness at all times. It’s a glimpse of an exciting and dynamic life, but perhaps it’s a life that I can’t stomach.

There are many moments of relief. I just finished a two-hour phone conversation with my mother, an Ann Arbor teacher, about the future of education. She reminded me that America has faced moments of crisis before and they always pass as the pendulum swings, and instructed me to go literally smell the hyacinths in 28^th Street’s flower district. I take pleasure in the four mile walk home from work along the Battery Park, The Hudson River and The Chelsea Piers. Corny as it sounds, the statue of liberty shrouded in the evening’s atmosphere gives me goose bumps.