|
Make Some Noise
I've lived on my block for 10 years now. It gets noisy sometimes, with music from the neighbors or construction on the corner, the scream of ambulances heading to one of the two nearby hospitals. But the din was particularly heavy this week from Wednesday night into Thursday afternoon.
In the evening, a large group of teenagers shot fireworks at one another and passing cars. They screeched, shouted unprintable phrases at one another and ran about, many of them filming themselves as they went (Kids these days!). Interestingly, on a block that sees its share of police activity, no one called the cops. Luckily, it seems no one got hurt by the pyrotechnics.
The next day, younger kids lined the street, some wearing graduation robes, as car after car filled with teachers and school staff drove by, with a police escort, to congratulate them on the end of the school year. The teachers had decorated their rides with signs and balloons. They shouted and honked, and the police sirens whooped sporadically. It went on for an hour as the caravan circled the neighborhood.
Both sets of sounds reflect the fact that New York's children—yes, even the teenage variety—have been through a lot over the past four months. Their lives have been upended, their friendships temporarily severed, and they were thrown into a huge educational experiment. Sports seasons have been cancelled, proms scrapped. Many parents lost jobs. There was illness and death all around them.
And now comes summer. Playgrounds are open but summer youth programming faces massive budget cuts. The typical teenage summer jobs will likely be claimed by older workers thrown out of their regular gigs by the economic upheaval. And the fall is fraught with uncertainty over what school will look like.
Each of us remembers that One Magical Summer of childhood, or maybe more than one. New York City's kids deserve one of those this summer like never before. What can we grown-ups do – as individuals, families, blocks or neighborhoods – do to give it to them? Send your ideas to [email protected].
Sincerely,
Jarrett Murphy
Executive Editor
|
