Ruby Washington/The New York Times The International Ladies Garment Workers Union mural on the Lower East Side.Dear Diary:
I returned to New York City to spend time with my sick father in October of my junior year of college. He died less than a week later.
My family sat Shiva for a week. One brutal afternoon I took a break from the grieving and embarked upon my favorite urban hike, down Grand Street in Manhattan. Grand Street is one of those special places that show a history of New York. A place where Jews, Italians, the Irish and Chinese have immigrated in waves, clamoring for places in crowded tenement apartments, hoping to get their starts in a new world. Many have, and the city has moved on, integrating their legacies into its fabric.
My mom tells me that her grandfather was a founding member of the International Ladies Garment Workers Union. Although I never met the man, I see his legacy every time I walk by the prominent I.L.G.W.U. mural painted on the side of a building on East Broadway. The city has preserved his legacy for generations of people to enjoy. This city has a habit of doing that.
I returned from my walk soothed. For a lifelong New Yorker, there is strange comfort in knowing that the city itself is less fleeting than its inhabitants’ lives are. Perhaps in 100 years, another big-haired girl will walk down Grand Street. As she passes the faded signs still labeling the long-defunct designer stores in SoHo, she’ll try to imagine our New York City. The city will carry on the legacy of its former inhabitants, and in a way, we will all live on.
Ruby Washington/The New York Times The mural is painted on East Broadway building.Read all recent entries and our updated submissions guidelines. Reach us via e-mail diary@nytimes.com or follow @NYTMetro on Twitter using the hashtag #MetDiary.
