Though the threat of COVID-19 has diminished, I have still not attended any films, visited any museums, or explored other city neighborhoods. Many days, I spend close to an hour in Washington Square Park. It’s not the way I would like to spend what’s left of my life, but it’s less passive than sealing myself in our apartment and watching Amazon Prime or Netflix for hours. When I am in the park I sometimes I read a book or The Times, other times I take a short, often stumbling walk with my wife, and sometimes I meet friends and we talk for an hour or so. There are also incidental encounters with strangers that can open up some fresh insight about the nature of the city and the lives of other people.
Washington Square Park is teeming on warm weekends, and at times too noisy to hold a lengthy, intelligible conversation. But it still works relatively well as a communal oasis, despite a tendency to turn at moments into a discordant, anarchic place where quiet reflection becomes impossible.
On weekends, the park’s lawns are filled with predominantly upper-middle-class people sitting on blankets — some with children. They picnic, have birthday parties for their children with folk singers and puppeteers, and, from my vantage point, seem to be enjoying themselves. The park barely provides sufficient space to hold those who want to use it on sunny days in the late spring.
Still, the cramped lawns are idyllic when contrasted with the northwest quadrant of the park, which is filled mostly with men quietly eyeing passersby and soliciting in low voices, “Smoke, smoke” and “Weed, weed.” Other more jittery, broken men are bent over, nodding and dealing with crack pipe-induced highs, and still others with matted hair and dirt-streaked sweatshirts are yelling incoherently or talking to themselves. It’s a vision of damnation that reminds me of American films like “Panic in Needle Park” or “Jungle Fever” — a nightmare enacted in the light of day. Except for customers, many of them NYU students who have their favorite pot dealers, most people avoid the area, including the NYPD and Park Rangers. After neighborhood complaints, the situation may change and more police may be added to the park to control the drug dealing. Though that decision may only be for show during an election year, and have no lasting effect.
I sense when I walk near this area that there is an invisible fence that keeps this section of the park separated from the rest of WSP’s daily life. And I simultaneously feel both compassion for and profound alienation from these men, the majority of whom will never escape the personal hell they inhabit. There was a period before the Park’s grand renovation in 2007 (when, among other mostly enhancing changes, lawns and plantings were added) that junkies and dealers seemed to dominate the park. And I for one rarely ventured into it, feeling I would be swallowed up by the darkness and despair that permeated its paths.
There’s much more to write about in the daily park experience. That includes descriptions of the sometimes surreal and often fascinating variety of people who walk past or sit nearby while I read my newspaper, including a hip hop group carefully working out their performance. And though I find the park generally pleasurable — despite its cacophony — a friend has a very different take on the Park. He finds the early mornings serene, but as the day progresses he feels besieged by “thumping” music, aggressive skateboarders, and mentally disturbed beggars. I understand how he feels, but given that I move around much less, this imperfect park has turned into a kind of haven.
