The pandemic across the street: A window into my New York experience.
By Sam Marchetta
April 18, 2020
I’ve been sitting in my apartment now for over a month. The day all of this began for me was March 11th. That was the day that life, as I knew it abruptly ended and this craziness began.
Just a month ago New York had that exciting spring feeling in the air. You could feel the excitement, the days were getting warmer and longer, and the trees were beginning to bloom. For me the beginning of spring feels like the end of hibernation. The 8.5 million people of this bustling city were becoming more visible than ever. The streets, parks, bars, restaurants and rooftops began to fill to capacity. The city that never sleeps was suddenly wide-awake. Yet today, the city streets are virtually empty, and the bars and restaurants are closed for business. The city was now like an apocalyptic ghost town with most New Yorks either hunkering down in their apartments or leaving the city all together. The city that never sleeps has gone unnervingly silent, but NOT for me.
New York City in Lockdown – March/April 2020
You see I live across the street from a major hospital. Over the last month, the city for me has gotten louder and louder and even LOUDER. It started seemingly inconspicuously, when I woke up one morning with the sound of bulldozing going on across the street. Peering out the window it looked as though they were widening the street that leads into the main hospital entrance. A few hours later the workers were gone leaving behind roadwork barriers that I would later discover were used regularly to block part of the street from thru traffic.
A few days later, I noticed trucks unloading large white tent like structures, that would later become a makeshift extension of the emergency department. The new emergency department was now being run by nurses and doctors in full hazmat suits.
Suddenly, the severity of this situation became very real, and I began to experience exponentially greater levels of anxiety. I had been out and about on the streets of New York, on the crowded subway and in the busy bars and restaurants. So it stood to reason that I was at risk of infection. My symptoms were typical of anxiety, specifically my thinking became somewhat distorted, it didn’t matter what I felt, my mind was interpreting it as a sign that I was infected with coronavirus. Moments where I felt a little hot sent me reaching for the thermometer; a little cough had me pondering whether I should race across the street to one of those emergency tents. I then started counting the days since I had been in isolation and comparing this to the maximum incubation period of the virus. Every morning when I woke up I noted how I was feeling. If I felt okay, I would follow up with mental calculations of how many days until the incubation period of the virus would be over. Finally, after the 14th day I breathed a sigh of relief. I had not been sick yet and hoped I had escaped infection. Ironically though, it was at this time that the situation across the street started shifting dramatically.
Even though the city streets had gotten quieter, the activity across the street was not, in fact it was just starting to reach a fevered pitch. The sounds of emergency vehicle sirens were getting progressively louder and more frequent. Anyone that has been to New York knows that you can expect to hear the deafening sound of sirens, and if you are living across from a hospital it is expected. On a typical pre-coronavirus day, the frequency of hearing a siren was once every 3-4 hours. Yet what was now occurring was something else entirely, and it left me feeling quite anxious.
One afternoon things got particularly awful. The sounds of sirens flooded my ears every 20 minutes. Occasionally I would peer out the window as the ambulances would race towards the hospital entrance. It was on one of these occasions that I first noticed a refrigerated truck parked across the street. I had seen these makeshift morgues on television, but now there was one on my very own block. A hideous reminder that this virus was deadly and large numbers of people were dying across the street, despite the gallant efforts of the brave healthcare workers inside.
Unfortunately things continued to get progressively worse. On the afternoon of April 1st, the sirens seemed as though they were getting louder, and they were certainly more frequent then before. At times ambulances were arriving one right after the other with the sounds of their sirens overlapping. On the evening of Saturday April 4, the sirens were relentless. It was a non-stop ear-piercing symphony of sirens, coming down the block every few minutes. New York for me had never been so loud and I had never felt so helpless. It was as though a war was happening right across the street and I had a front row seat to the crossfire. At this point it was no longer just the sound of sirens; screams and cries were also clearly audible. To say that I was feeling distressed would be an understatement, I wasn’t sure if I could cope much longer. You see there was absolutely no switching off from it, not even for a moment. The sirens felt like a pulsating migraine that there was no escape from. Here is a message I had sent a friend that very evening.
April 4, 7.39pm ET
“Things here are really crazy and am just trying my best to remain calm… taking it a day at a time. I live across the street from a hospital so unfortunately it’s right in front of me, and there’s a refrigerated truck on the side street as a make shift morgue and ambulances coming about every 8 minutes. The sirens just don’t stop. Hoping this doesn’t last much longer.”
I didn’t get a wink of sleep that night. My earplugs and sleep sound machine together were no match for the pandemic across the street, and they couldn’t certainly silence the thoughts running through my mind.
A few days later I happened to be looking out the kitchen window and noticed a police motorcade approaching the hospital. I later learned that this motorcade was delivering much needed ‘Personal Protective Equipment’ or PPE to the hospital. Like many hospitals, the one across the street was in dire need of medical supplies. Sadly, on this same day a second refrigerated truck arrived at the hospital. There were now two makeshift morgues across the street, positioned within eyesight of my bedroom window. It was now clear why the roadwork barriers had been positioned there a couple of weeks earlier.
Although the sounds of the sirens had become less frequent the devastation they left behind was quite apparent. Today the emergency tents and makeshift morgues remain, yet there is a certain level of quiet that hasn’t existed for weeks. The numbers of people around the hospital have subsided, and by comparisons the sounds of sirens seemed to have significantly eased. In fact, there have been times over the last few days that I haven’t heard a siren for a full hour.
After an intense month, I can now hear my own thoughts again and I remain hopeful that perhaps the worst is behind us. Yet, I am now thinking more and more about the lasting psychological impact this will have, not only on myself but also on the health care workers. This pandemic has been traumatic enough from across the street, I can’t imagine what it must be like for those in the epicentre of all epicentres.
Tonight at 7pm I will join my fellow New Yorkers, as I have done every night for the last few weeks, to cheer and celebrate our healthcare workers. I am forever grateful to those on the frontlines risking their lives to save others. These brave men and woman are real heroes.
Thanks to all my family, friends and followers from around the world who have reached out and checked in. Interestingly, many have asked if the images they see on television are real. I want you to know that they are devastatingly real, and the situation as I see it from across the street is not ‘fake news’. If you don’t believe me, ask the families that have loved ones in refrigerated trucks on my street. Finally, I ask that you stay home and social distance to help stop the spread, we are all in this together. Stay safe and healthy everyone!
the psych view by SAM MARCHETTA 