In the last week, any doubts about the safety of New York City were tested in two major news stories. First, a homemade bomb constructed of a pressure cooker and duct tape went off in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan, injuring around thirty people. Then, it was reported that an NYU student was sexually assaulted after she got in a vehicle she believed to be a cab early Saturday morning.
It is safe to say that most people believe that there are safer places in the world than New York City, to which most of us New Yorkers reply that the things that happen in the Big Apple happen all over the country, you just hear about them more here. I don't think about them anymore.
Of course I'm not ignorant to the dangers of Manhattan. I refuse to use Uber because I've read too many stories about the dangers and don't want to take the risk of it happening to me. If I'm walking home or taking the subway at a certain hour, I make sure I have a male friend of mine with me because as much as my feminist principles wishes it weren't true, I still live in a sexist society where I know I look less vulnerable with a man by my side than I do alone. My faith in the goodness lying beyond New York's pretty face was unwavering.
Until, of course, something bad directly affected me.
A couple weeks ago, my mother was in town visiting me and being my buddy to see a taping of "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert." We waited outside all day to see my dad and comedy crush, and were happy but exhausted from such. I placed my mom in a cab as I took the N train back to campus. Normally it's my overprotective mother asking me if I've arrived at my destination, but instead, it was me questioning why I hadn't heard about her return to my apartment long after I'd gotten down to the Village.
When my mother did acknowledge my message, she said she'd had a horrible experience in her taxi. The driver had been extremely aggressive on the road to the point where he and another driver got in an argument that took them off the road and had them calling the police following the altercation. Scared, my mother tried to get out of the cab, only to find the driver had locked her in the backseat so that she could speak to the police when they arrived. It wasn't until she was able to yell to a nearby construction worker once she rolled her window down that help came, convincing the driver to let her out after a lengthy, scary experience.
The taxi my mother got into could've been the taxi she always encourages me to take home when I leave work late at night. The driver could've been worse, could've tried something similar to what allegedly happened to my fellow NYU student this past week. And the drive could've been crossing town on 27th Street, just blocks away from my apartment, in the place where another homemade bomb was found before it had a chance to further terrify a city.
I'm not afraid of New York. I still love it and thoughtfully wear the sentiment on a pin. But I can't be ignorant to the mark it has on its back for all of the wonderful things it offers, as well, for how easy of a target it can be. All of us New Yorkers have to be aware of that going forward. We have to remember how these news stories are just outside our windows and we can't handle it by closing our blinds.
Stay safe out there, fellow New Yorkers. Live your life, but don't live ignorantly.
