Tag Archives: nyc

164. Poetry: On Leaves

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My last year working in the school system before retiring, was a year of transition; I actually didn’t know what I was coming back to.  I had been out of the classroom for 16 years testing children for special education services and writing educational prescriptions.  But suddenly 1,100 of us in that capacity lost our positions when the budget was cut and the education system went under a business model.  It was a nightmare.  We had to return to the classroom.  I lost my office, my balance, my grip.  But it ended up being a delightful year as things began … Continue reading →

450. NYC Photo Journal: In search of culinary perfection: From arepas to donuts

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The other day I treated myself to a manicure in a place where there is a small high def television at every nail drying station. In addition, the salon has a huge screen; all televisions are tuned to The Food Network. There are a  dozen or so lovely ladies with wet nails drooling over Paula Dean’s presentations, or Bobby Flay’s. I happened to hit Bobby on a good day: he was challenging the owner of Caracas Arepa Bar to a “Throwdown” challenge. Who can make the better arepas? Caracas won. Sorry, Mr. Bobby the Foodie Ego. You can’t beat this … Continue reading →

[586.] NYC Photo Journal: A visit to the WTC site: Part a: The Guide

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On July 11, 2012 I visited the site of the World Trade Center; I had visited before when one could only peer through the fence and shudder, when foreigners would line up and take photos of one another against the background of devastation and restriction. I watched over the years as the debris was cleared. I watched every memorial, listened to every name. I cried for people I never met and for the families that will forever miss them. But visiting at this point, with the dust gone along with the shards and blood stains, was a surreal experience. One … Continue reading →

587. New York City Photo Journal: Part 2: Observations and Photographs

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In the preceding post, I replicated the guide to the World Trade Center Site. It contains a lot of fascinating information about what was, is and will be. The story of the survivor tree is one to be remembered. Just so you understand the sequence of the photographs there are three groups: A: a walk around Battery Park City and a visit to the atrium that has been reconstructed B: the visit to the WTC site: as you view the photos, just keep reminding ourself of the scale of the people against the buildings and the pools C: and Zucotti … Continue reading →

583. NYC Photo Journal: 5-5-12 Brooklyn, NY

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Part 1: The New York Times review made me do it. If you click on the review and give a read you will learn what is typically New York City. To wit: David’s Brisket House and Deli is in the Bedford-Stuyvesant section of Brooklyn. Once majestic it became blighted and crestfallen and was in no way a place you’d care to visit. But, like most areas of New York City in marginal areas, it is becoming–drumroll, cymbals–gentrified, which means the rents and prices of the old staid brownstones will be unaffordable. But this isn’t why I find this eatery so … Continue reading →

194. Poetry reading: (Part 2) Soldier Boy

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    It’s the summer of 1960, and your new transistor radio is in your hand. ***** **** It would be helpful to read the  introduction in the preceding blog before reading the poem. Part 1 Soldier Boy ©2/4/08 by the author, all rights reserved   **** The transistor radio was ready with fresh batteries; I got it in 1960 when I graduated from P.S. 61. My dad brought it home; it was red and had a brown leather case, there was a cut out on the side to access the knob to tune the dial.  Then the stick marker … Continue reading →

193. Poetry Wednesday: Introduction: Part 1

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Introduction to my memories A typical photo. This is the corner of First Avenue and 14th street. In the series, Sex and the City, the scene where Miranda [Cynthia Nixon] is going to work and is greeted by the guy in the hot dog suit; it was filmed across the street and in the lower left foreground.     Several of my poems refer to the place where I grew up, in New York City.  I felt that it would help the reader better visualize what I was referring to when I mentioned “Stuyvesant Town.” Stuyvesant Town is a housing development … Continue reading →

143. Poetry: Series: Harlem On My Mind: 5. Flaws

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A special “thank you,” to Tyler, who was the impetus for me to write this poem. I had thought I completed this series in 2002, but when he said he anticipated the 5th poem, I thought, “uh oh!” I better get out of my “dry spell” and get to work. I  highly recommend him if you are suffering from “writer’s block.”       The poems in this series are: 1. Skin 2. Take The “A” Train 3. Hail Mary 4. Theft 5. Flaws It was 1966, I was a freshman in college, Harlem was one of many suffering parts … Continue reading →

136. Poetry Series: Harlem On My Mind: 4. Theft

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Shepard Hall, The City College of New York 4th in the series, Harlem On My Mind It was spring, it was warm, the weather was kind; events were not. Theft April 1968 Someone stole the gold Cross pen from atop my notebook.  It was the beginning of a period of suffering and transition.   Soon after, it was announced that The Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King had been killed; we filled the mazes of corridors of Shepard Hall; it crowns the North Campus, the building that looks like a huge, regal, fortress of dark-bricked, chocolate cake, adorned with drips of … Continue reading →

99. Poetry: The Lake

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Ainsi, toujours poussés vers de nouveaux rivages, Dans la nuit eternelle emporté sans retour… ~from Le Lac, by Lamartine     photograph: Roger Williams Park, Providence Rhode Island 11/23/07   The inspiration: Oakland Lake on April 3, 2002 The Lake ©srk 4/02 The day before this day of bright sun, the water was the broken glass of a Perrier bottle; a sullen, yet rich green, refractive along the edges, heavy from the co-mingling of clouds above. Now it leans to blue then gray like the eyes of a flirtatious fickle female. On the promenade, a goose approaches, his broad breast … Continue reading →

11. Poetry: 1959

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A retreat back to the late ’50’s where life was simple and safe. original post 4/20/07 I wrote a large collection of poetry after 9/11 while on a teaching sabbatical. This is one of them. When the world gets to be a little too much, I retreat to happy, innocent years. Enjoy the music; it is not all from 1959, but thereabout. I should write a poem about Richard Panik; in 6th grade he was the first boy I ever danced with. The song was Richie Valens’ “Oh Donna.”  The place was the school gym.  I was giddy.  It was … Continue reading →

8. Poetry: Tina, Tina, Proud and Free

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I worked in a school located in a city housing project for 17 of the years I worked for the Board of Education in New York City. During this time I evaluated children for special education programs and interviewed parents to update social histories. I was privy to the most personal information; disturbing information from people who were suffering and in need. I was a vessel into which people dumped their pain. All I could do with what was given to me was write about it. When a parent of six children came in one day in a panic after … Continue reading →

7. Poetry: The Horrible End of Roseann Quinn

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original post 4/16/07 This morning Roseann Quinn popped into my head, another friend I failed to mention on my list of losses. Maybe it’s because the weather has been so lousy, raining in torrents. Or maybe the sky is still crying for Rosie. I do. Her sensational murder in 1973 led the way to Judith Rossner’s book, “Looking For Mr. Goodbar.” A movie followed after. I just remember Rosie’s laugh and humor, her post-polio limp, and her great sense of fun. Rest in Peace, sweet girl.     For Roseann Quinn ©2002 by the author, all rights reserved I can … Continue reading →

2. Poetry: Dim Sum Paradise: Soul Food

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In Flushing, Queens, where reality transcends  time and place.  It is Asia. Easily. How could I ever leave New York? art and poetry©by the author, all rights reserved original entry: 3/28/07 Walk into the Kam-Sen Supermarket and you are in China.  People even use Chinese currency. There is a sea of scaly glistening fresh fish, hot sizzling delicacies, lacquered ducks hang in the window.  Every Asian sauce imaginable is in one of the maybe 10 aisles, every tea, soup, bags of little dried silver fish and shrimp, dessicated chestnuts, frozen confections with ridiculous translated names.  Happy Mouth. You Taste.  Rice … Continue reading →

146 b. How and why: The story behind the vintage ice cream wagon charm: Why I write in silver

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Memories translate to words and charms.           And here is why. See the little ice cream cart? I’ll take you on a journey to 1959.   8 CommentsChronological Reverse Threaded reply aladybug wrote on Jan 27, ’08, edited on Jan 27, ’08 I don’t see the ice cream cart… I see pans, one open, one closed, then something else I can’t identify, then a woman in an exercise machine (perhaps just my perception?), then a round object, a hot dog, and then… something else I can’t identify either… Am I crazy? reply aladybug wrote on Jan … Continue reading →

[61.] The WTC Blogs: 4. Personal Response: The Aftermath

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. . . . . . . . . . . . The Falling Man No one is sure who he is, but it is believed he was a worker from Windows on the World; he was one of many who fell or chose to jump to avoid the inferno I The morning of September 11 I awoke from a dream, a strange dream. It was later than I would normally rise; I was on a teaching sabbatical and taking courses during the ’01 and ’02 school year. It was wonderful not having to get up at the usual 5:15 … Continue reading →

49. Freddy Osborn, Kansas City, 1936 Part II

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Yesterday I mentioned that something caught me at that exhibit and didn’t let me go; there were several front pages of  The New York Times   from 1936.  The first grabbed me, the second one hit me.  Here is the previous post. The pages both had large articles about Robert Moses opening a new swimming pool. However, on the first, in the lower left corner, was the following news: Hitler had decided that his army should no longer wear blue, the color of past oppression; hence, the Nazi regime decided to switch to green. And then I thought: if I could … Continue reading →

48. Robert Moses, My New York, and 1936: Part 1

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Last week my son and I went to the Queens Museum in Flushing, New York, to see a part of an exhibit in various museums in the city on Robert Moses.  If you are not familiar with Robert Moses, suffice it to say he changed the face and infrastructure of New York City and its environs.  He was referred to as the “master builder” of the city.  He was a visionary, who was born in 1888; he was a participant in the construction of the 1939 and 1964 World’s Fairs, he was influential in getting the United Nations established in … Continue reading →

6. What’s Left Of Me

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I am a righty. Have always been. There is nothing I can do with my left hand that is anywhere near what I can do with my right. So it was strange when my left elbow locked, just barely noticeably angled from where it should be. It wouldn’t release. This happened maybe 5 years ago. A visit to the chiropractor; he took me by the hand and jolted my arm, and me, like he was pumping water to the desert. After I put my eyes back into my head, I looked at my arm. It hadn’t budged. (My shoulder approached … Continue reading →