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New York is a city known for certain things, but it is especially known for Broadway theatre. Talented people from all over the country come to New York in hopes of becoming part of the magic.  Few are lucky enough to actually make it.  

Waking up at 7:30 every morning and getting on a packed subway wears down even the most resilient people. It is very easy to get caught up in the pace of the city and become oblivious to all that is around. Commuting to work is like getting thrown into fast moving rapids. You just move with the flow and try to keep your head above water. I have come to realize that the best way to appreciate New York City is to remove yourself from it and look at it in a new light.

The brilliance of the daytime fades to the view of the night. Orange streetlights contrast with blinking lights of ferries and airplanes and the blue lights that trace the graceful lines of the bridge. From here, it appears to have sails. The waters are black and just a little foreboding. I close my eyes to examine the mental picture. I hope I don't forget this anytime soon.

In his 1925 article "The Port of New York," author Paul Rosenfeld describes a New Yorker's connection to his city.  "We know it here, our relationship with this place in which we live…For they [the buildings] and we have suddenly commenced growing together.  A state of relation has timidly commenced-between the objects, and between the objects and ourselves."

This past Friday, my workday was anything but typical.  As an intern in the Law and Justice Unit of ABC News, I have been helping to cover celebrity court cases.  Friday was a big day for the unit, because rumor had it that the jury assigned to the Martha Stewart trial would reach a verdict.  On Thursday, I was told that I would be helping out at the courthouse. 

Recently, our group was fortunate enough to be allowed to view the New York Stock Exchange trading floor. I say "fortunate enough" because just getting into the building was an experience. Given that it is among the top terrorist targets in the world, Wall and Broad has very tight security.

Having been a "resident" of New York City for a grand total of a month and a half, I have noticed myself slipping into the rhythm of the city much more than I ever thought I would.  Taking the subway, going to work, the gym, and back home to my apartment has become a comfortable, familiar existence. 

Professor and Chair of Chemistry George Shields and three Hamilton students attended the 44th Sanibel Symposium on Atomic, Molecular, Biophysical, and Condensed Matter Theory, March 1 - March 6 in St. Augustine, Fla.  Shields chaired the plenary session on metals in biology and conducted a workshop for graduate students and undergraduates on combined quantum mechanical/molecular mechanical (QM/MM) hybrid methods. The students presented their research focused on anti-cancer drug design, based on their previous summer work. Frank Pickard '05 won the award for the top undergraduate student poster presentation at the conference for his poster, "The Enediyne Anticancer Antibiotics: A Study of the Bergman Cyclization Energy Barriers of Esperamicin A1 Using ONIOM DFT/MM Methods."

This week our program considered Mayor Bloomberg, first in class and then on a field trip to City Hall. Comparing Bloomberg and Giuliani was interesting for me as a New Yorker. For me, Giuliani saved the city, while Bloomberg made New York City move from September 11 inertia to economic prosperity. Both had goals and accomplished them, but with very different styles. Our visit to City Hall enabled me to understand Bloomberg’s position more than simply reading about him in The New York Times. I was especially interested in his initiative to coordinate after-school education programs.

This afternoon, one of the first really warm days of the year,  I took a walk through Central Park along with what seemed like most of New York. As Colson Whitehead puts it in  The Colossus of New York, "On the first day of spring in search of antidote they seek the park, hardly aware of biological imperative.  Everybody has the same idea."