In 2020, at the start of the Lockdown in NYC, people took to applauding our essential workers at 7pm. This entailed people playing their trumpets, or hitting pots and pans, or just clapping outside their windows or on their balconies. We’d all seen similar images coming first from Italy — people singing to each other across the air, but the alleys below were empty. And now, we were doing this in New York, where the crawls at the bottom of our TV screens were dire amidst images of refrigerated trucks parked outside hospitals.

I live at Manhattan Plaza at 43rd Street, which is two high buildings, one on 9th Avenue and the other on 10th with a plaza in-between. Our residents are mostly actors, musicians, playwrights, seniors, etc. As the pandemic took hold, our buildings took part in the ritual. It was great to “connect” with my neighbors, many of whom I didn’t know, from 7-7:15pm every night.

Often our banging became music …

As time passed, less and less people continued the 7pm ritual, but I noticed that there were still people doing it outside, not just from windows, out on the Plaza. I decided to go down and join this group. We kept our distance, wore our masks, and banged away outside, come rain or shine.

Sometimes it was freezing and snowing but still we showed up. We called ourselves ‘The Social Distancenaires’ and ‘We Clap Because We Care’. We soon started to get to know each other and even began to party afterwards, celebrating each other’s birthdays and other milestones, etc. Most importantly, we got to know each other and keep tabs on one another. When one of us was in hospital (not for Covid) we took turns visiting and calling. When I did a show way downtown, most of them came to it!

It’s February 2022 now, two years later, but we persist, we show up. The building is doing construction on the Plaza so we’re constricted to one walkway yet we make it work. We’re all triple-vaxxed but still Omicron got me between Xmas and New Year’s and recently several of our group members also got it. Thankfully, none had to go to the hospital.

Because things like Broadway are opening up, it’s often hard for all of us to be there at 7 every night yet there’s somehow always a “minion” or close to one! Every night at 7 until 7:05 pm we bang and chant and sing and shout THANK YOU to all our Essential Workers.

Why we’re still clapping together is hard to say. Early on in the pandemic, I did lose two friends to Covid-19 and another is still with us but was terribly compromised, so, like many New Yorkers, this is personal for me. I feel like I’m clapping for the people who may have helped my friends. I think we are so thankful to all those around who never stopped working and sacrificed their own safety during the pandemic, whether they’re doctors or nurses or food delivery or maintenance … Where would we all be without them? Where would we be?