A Journey of Hope
When I was a kid, my family would sometimes drive into Manhattan and take what is now called the Hugh L. Carey Tunnel, but which I stubbornly continue to refer to as the Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel. I hated taking the Tunnel. I still do. It is dark and scary, and looks wet. The trip across the East River required me putting a lot of faith in bedrock.
The Tunnel is made up of twin tubes, deep in the bedrock, that run under the East River and carry traffic between Brooklyn and Manhattan. I prayed that the Tunnel wouldn’t cave under the pressure and weight of the East River. I remember trying to hold my breath for the almost two-mile car ride. Because holding my breath would keep me safe, or so I thought.
Our car would start to enter the Tunnel, and you couldn’t see a thing. You stayed in your lane, slow and steady. As we got further into the darkness, and the entrance was well out of sight, you could begin to see in the shadows. The low flood lights would be on, ushering you through to the end. If there was traffic, my knuckles would go white; I wanted to see the light on the other side.
When the light from Manhattan began to appear and get bigger and brighter, I felt like I could finally breathe again, and the entire 5-minute ordeal was forgotten. Now, we just had to contend with traffic on the West Side Highway, or West Village, or China Town, depending on where we were headed. The fear of the Tunnel was behind us.
The last eighteen months have been like driving through that tunnel, holding my breath in the dark, putting faith in the bedrock. And then, the light at the end of the tunnel began to creep in slow and steady. It is as if a light switch was turned on last week. Living in the Tristate area, we went from living behind a mask, and taking every precaution, to being able to venture out mask-less, albeit cautiously.
While Covid-19 and the Pandemic are not over, we are beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel. Most importantly, I am beginning to feel hopeful again. It was this realization; the switch from feeling hopeless and trudging through the dark, step by dutiful step, and then seeing the light at the end of the tunnel, that really gave me food for thought.
Hope. Is. Powerful.
I am not going to lie. There were times over the last eighteen months that I felt hopeless and in a dark place. My rational brain kept on telling me that there would be an end to the Pandemic and that normalcy would return. But I would be lying if I didn’t admit that there were many days where I was stuck in the darkness and afraid that the whole world would come crashing down and wash me away.
I have lived an amazing life and have tried to live a life of gratitude. I am hyper aware that my blessings have been born from fear, from pain, from sacrifice, and the blood, sweat and tears of family who came before me. Emerging from the darkness, I started to think of my grandparents and their struggles, born of both time and circumstance: famine and natural disaster, poverty, emigration, the Great Depression, World War II… I kept on thinking about whether they carried a seed of hope. I wondered if they trudged in darkness searching for the light.
My grandfather passed away during the frenzy of Covid. He was the last of his generation for my family. I didn’t have a chance to ask him about hope. But over the years, we did have many conversations about life in general. And I would marvel at how many lives he lived; how many mountains he climbed. I listened to his stories and kept them in my heart. I am ashamed that I did not see the hope he carried on his journey.
It is often said that youth is wasted on the young. This is mostly so because wisdom is only gained by living life and falling down. If only you could go back and relive your life taking the lessons of your life with you. Keeping hope alive to keep away the darkness.
My ruminations commingled with a project I heard about in my town. We have an historical society that is collecting letters from neighbors about their experiences during Covid. The Historical Society intends to keep these letters for posterity and for future generations. It’s comical because in this day in age, the internet captures so much information for posterity. But I think that all this digital information is just noise. I don’t think it will connect with future generations. Learning about the Holocaust is a different experience than reading Anne Frank’s diary, for instance. The personal connection with Anne Frank, her hopes and fears resonate to this day. It’s all about making a personal connection.
I think everyone should take a moment before we enjoy our new freedoms and mask-less sunshine to sit down and pen a letter to our grandchildren, telling them about our experiences during Covid, or any dark time in our lives- being honest about our fears and writing about our triumphs. We need to bring the light, the hope to our descendants; so that when they too find themselves in the middle of a dark tunnel, they have faith in the bedrock and know that there is a light at the end of the tunnel.
Will you take up pen and paper and light the way?
