Nightmare On Park Street

And when quietly we will go back to minding just our businesses and sneak into Park Street for the snatches of good times it has stood for,will we come back without singeing bits of our emotional well-being? Will we be able to shut out the sight of Stephen Court and what it now stands for?

Roughly 24 hours after the blaze took the lives of over twenty people,Park Street is a chaotic little lesson on survival. Cars crawl down the street in hundreds,drivers cursing at sweaty scribes shuffling around road dividers used to cordon off Stephen Court. Except for the gigantic fire engines stationed before Peter Cat,there’s very little feel of the magnitude of the carnage. There’s a small crowd before Stephen Court. If the heat lets you,you can overhear people exchanging trivia about the fire. Some others staring at the blackened walls of the fourth and fifth floors with the concentration of an astronomer. Groups of hassled police personnel slouch against walls and police vans warily eyeing the people scrambling in and out of the little alley created by two fire engines. Just a few feet away,Park Street is back doing what it does best — indulge life. People rush past police cordons,other people,and sneak past cars and their owners looking out of the windows — irritation written large on their faces. It’s just that you can no more close your eyes and recollect the colours the street wore last Christmas. A few days back,we all could. Without the cold shudder running down the spine.