Snow drifts down over the city, encasing it in a dirty white blanket. A January winter storm has blown in, slowing life, bringing it one level down from the normal hustle and bustle of day to day life. The streets are quieter, as if the soft white flurries deaden the acoustics. Cars and buses crowd the streets, bumper to bumper in the wet gray slush, as the skies fight to turn the roads white again.

Competing phalanxes of rush-hour businessmen and women make their way home to the tick tock of the five o’clock bell, shuffling along at a slower pace tonight. Heads and hands are bundled, but the biting cold of the morning is gone. The white flurries seemingly warming the sky even as they come down to announce that winter has come. Winter has come.

Looking over the Hudson, the water is serene and softly flowing as white ferries move silently over the smooth rippleless waves. Fuzzy lights push yellows and whites through the white cloud of snow, as the red flashing lights for warning planes, no doubt in patterns, silently above the encased city night, cut through the night.