Still in Step With Holiday

Ellis Henican: October 9, 2001

Lockdown?

What lockdown?

The American bombers were pummeling Afghanistan. Round two of the counterattack had begun.

But that didn't mean that the Chettas of Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, were going to miss the Columbus Day Mass at St. Patrick's Cathedral. Why should they?

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"Look around for yourself - everybody's here!" Gino Chetta was saying yesterday as he stood in the glorious sunshine on Fifth Avenue with his wife, Antoinette; his sons, Bobby, C.J. and Gino Jr.; his three daughters-in-law and more children than anyone outside the family could possibly keep track of.

The sidewalk was packed. Despite all that's been happening, the crowd was in an undeniably celebratory mood.

"What?" Gino said. "Some religious zealot halfway around the world is gonna scare us so we won't come out of the house? I don't think so."

After an early breakfast at C.J. and Cindy's in Brooklyn, assorted Chettas piled into two minivans and an SUV. No problem with the city's two-to-a-car rule for this caravan. Parking, they paid for. They got to the cathedral good and early, dressed in wools and corduroys and scarves for the Mass and the parade. And they didn't duck out until the cardinal was done.

"No terrorist is ruining our day," said Anne Marie, Gino Jr.'s wife.

The newspapers all did the front pages you'd expect them to. Newsday had "AMERICA STRIKES," without an exclamation point. The Daily News had the time-tested "WAR!" - with one. The Times was pretty sure this whole thing was a big story, but couldn't quite decide what the lead was supposed to be.

The television news channels were busy with maps and dioramas of the region around Afghanistan, which looked like they'd come out of the Museum of Natural History. The anchors spoke in somber tones about the unknown attacks on America to come.

Certainly, they could be coming.

But Rudy Giuliani got the tone exactly right on Sunday when he said New Yorkers will be vigilant for terror attacks. But we won't be hiding at home.

"The city is not being locked down," the mayor emphasized. "I don't know where even that term came from."

The parade went off beautifully. The only difference was the bands all played from a patriotic songbook. And the firefighters and the National Guard troops drew bigger cheers than they would have in a normal year.

About the biggest change all day was that no-solo-drivers rule for the bridges and tunnels south of 63rd Street. Instead of running 'til noon, it was lifted at 11 a.m.

The signs of quasi-normalcy were everywhere yesterday, despite the distant war roar.

At 49th and Fifth, a man and a woman stood side by side, each handing leaflets to the parade-goers.

"The Way to Heaven Is Jesus," the woman's leaflets announced.

"FlashDancers NYC: 100 Topless Showgirls Daily," the man's leaflets said.

Hey, it's New York. Salvation is where you can find it - in the sacred or the profane.

There were other reasons to smile.

The city is teeming with Oregonians, 900 of them altogether, including the mayor of Portland. They're staying at the Waldorf, eating in fancy restaurants, going to Broadway shows. They've come here to make us feel better and to leave a lot of money behind.

Thank you, Oregon.

"I urge you to take a trip to New York City and see for yourself," KPAM talk-show host Sheila Hamilton said to the folks back home from her remote broadcast at the ABC Radio studio on West End Avenue. New York couldn't ask for a better tourism spokeswoman.

"It is staggering," she said.

It was true, George Pataki said he would send National Guard troops to Grand Central Terminal, Penn Station and New York City's bridges and tunnels in time for this morning's rush hour.

The police commissioner, Bernard Kerik, was still using the spy-novel term "Omega status" to describe the overall level of security alert.

But more and more New Yorkers were beginning to see: All these measures are not what will protect us in the dicey days ahead.

They are the terror equivalent of a husband boiling water when a baby is about to be born.

It can't hurt. And it's giving people something to do.

As always, the real protection will come from the only place it ever does - from our confidence, from our optimism, from deep inside ourselves.

Like Gino Chetta said in the bright sunshine on Fifth Avenue: "We're not the kind of people who don't come out."