Reviews

I Miss My Home Town

8/22/2020

The city shimmers in the night sky.
I take my walk after the sun goes down, and sometimes a magnetic force pulls me to the crest of a hill facing west.
My home town is out there, but at the moment I cannot construct any excuse to visit, much as I miss it, blessed to live in a lovely close suburb, as far from the city as I can stand.

Sometimes I think of the great walks I have taken in recent years.
Last winter, just before the plague struck leaderless America, I took the A train, thinking of Billy Strayhorn's immortal song, saxophones racing uptown, and got off at 125th St. and strolled east to Third Ave. and then south to 80th St. for my monthly lunch with some baseball/writer pals. Every block was an adventure, now a distant memory of a lost city, Atlantis on the Hudson.
* * *
How is New York? Fortunately, The New York Times had one of its very best writers, Dan Barry, write the text for a section of photos by the equally artistic Todd Heisler, in Saturday's paper, also available online:
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/08/20/nyregion/nyc-sights-sounds-coronavirus.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage&contentCollection=AtHome&package_index=0
* * *
Their artwork in the NYT makes me miss New York even more.
Some losses are irreparable, including the fabled Irish baseball pub, Foley's, run by Shaun Clancy. When the plague hit, Shaun realized he could not recover the losses in the foreseeable future, so he put his memorabilia in a warehouse, and retreated to his home in Queens, my home borough.
As it happens, his home is -- that is to say, was -- exactly two miles north of my family home, both on 188th St -- his in Auburndale, mine in Holliswood.

Last week, as Shaun sold his house, we finally arranged our long-discussed socially-distanced meeting. I picked Cunningham Park, the park of my childhood, where my family had corn-and-hot-dog picnics and I played sandlot baseball and kept an eye out for a girl who lived a few doors from the park.
For our long-delayed meeting, Shaun and his companion, Kristie Ackert, baseball writer for the Daily News, and I sat at a picnic table in the shade and drank iced coffees and talked about Ireland and Queens and how Kristie covers the Yankees without access to the players. I told Shaun again how much Foley's has meant to my jock pals from Hofstra who are mourning our decade of occasional lunches at the back table. He's got a place in Florida, and Kristie will be there a lot when she is not watching the Yankees in empty ballparks.
I miss my friends...and I miss Foley's...and I miss the magic place that glitters off to the west on a summer evening.
* * *
I see your silver shining town
But I know I can't go there
Your streets run deep with poisoned wine
Your doorways crawl with fear*
*The Pride of Cucamonga, Philip Lesh and Robert Peterson. Sung by Lesh with the Grateful Dead.

Shaun Clancy and Kristie Ackert, Cunningham Park, Queens.

George with Celia and Altenir, visit to Foley's. Yes, Foley's also was host to fans of other sports. GV

Tom Schwarz

8/22/2020 02:13:08 pm

Oh man Two class acts, George and Shaun.. Good luck Shaun!

Gene Palumbo

8/22/2020 03:41:55 pm

Now hear this! All of you, please, hear this: George is so right to recommend the Dan Barry/Todd Heisler piece in today's Times. Don't miss it.
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2 020/08/20/nyregion/nyc-sights-sounds-coronavirus.html

Curt Block

8/22/2020 04:03:01 pm

Two of New York’s all time best,
Vecsey and Clancy. Miss them both.

George Vecsey

8/24/2020 08:02:47 am

Tom from St. Louis....been to Foley's on the day he saw "Hamilton."
Gene from NY and for decades in El Salvador.
Curt from NYC (inherited Cal Ramsey's over-size uniform at Commerce High) -- a regular in Foley's despite now living in Philadelphia.
Thanks to all three.

Altenir Silva

8/23/2020 04:16:23 am

Dear George:

I wish all the best to Shaun Clancy and Kristie Acker.

When we had a meeting in your pub, I felt something sweet in my heart, however, as I'm a new baseball fan, inside the pub, I was like a child in a candy store, an actor on stage, a conductor in front of his orchestra, a ballplayer with his new jersey. It was a magical place. This pub will forever be stuck in my mind.

Thanks, George, for showing me Foley's pub.

Best to you all,
Altenir

George

8/24/2020 08:19:28 am

Dear Altenir from Rio, now Lisbon: Yes, visitors felt part of Foley's right away, just walking in the narrow aisle and hearing New York and Irish voices, construction workers and students and staff....Shaun was the MC but so were the people who waited tables -- notably Kathy, who always admonished Curt in NY tones to skip the shepherd's pie to eat something healthier. He never obeyed her.

Alan link

8/23/2020 07:20:23 pm

NYC’s subways, buses and highways are its necessary arteries, but it is really a city for walking.

I was born in Harlem (August 1935) and lived at 620 West 141st Street between Broadway and Riverside Drive until we moved to 820 West 190th Street just off Fort Washington Avenue in the Heights in the summer of 1942. We left the City in December 1947 for Teaneck, NJ, which was only six miles down Route 4 from the George Washington Bridge.

When my wife Sandi and retired to Pittsfield, MA in Berkshire County fifteen years ago, we never expected to be walking less than when we lived in the Upper West Side (26 years) and then Brooklyn Heights (2 years).

Unless we were pressed for time, we would walk 30-60+ blocks to go places. Here, in Western MA we need to drive to walk anywhere other then the immediate neighborhood. Also, there is much less going on.

There is something special about seeing a city on foot. You can stop at will and never need to take your eyes off the road while driving. Also, the smells indicate the ethnicity of restaurants and markets as you pass. Also, it is rare if you do not strike up a conversation with a stranger.

I walked almost every neighborhood mentioned in the NYT’s article. There is too much to mention here, but some of my favorites include Nagel and Sherman Avenues near the Inwood Section of Upper Manhattan, The Convent Avenue spine that goes through City College and takes you to Strivers’ Row, which runs from 138th Street to 139th Street and from Frederick Douglas Blvd. to Adam Clayton Powell Blvd. This is now part of the St. Nicholas Historic District.

Not far away to the west is the Trinity Church Cemetery and Mausoleum at 155th Street and Broadway in Manhattan. The streets between Broadway and Riverside Drive slope very steeply towards the Hudson River from 135th Street up to the 150’s.

I re-read the NYT’s article several times so that I could mentally retrace my steps. I particularly enjoyed the images of the 135th Street viaduct from below. It was a wonder to be seen by a seven-year-old brave enough to venture down from 141 st Street with friends collectively defying our mothers’ dire warnings not to leave the safety of the neighborhood.

I’m sure that others can recall their youthful walks in all five of NYC’s boroughs.

There is much to be said about today’s technology and opportunities, but I find slowing down time to be part of the fabric is a much undervalued skill.

Mendel link

8/24/2020 02:23:35 am

In A Walker in the City, Alfred Kazin recalls his childhood in the Brownsville section of Brooklyn with such tactile specificity that readers, too, will smell "that good and deep odor of lox, of salami, of herrings and half-sour pickles" that emanated from the neighborhood pushcarts. His story is set in the working-class Jewish community of New York City in the decade preceding the Great Depression, but this classic memoir of the first-generation American experience resonates universally. Kazin depicts his younger self as a smart, unhappy kid who dreamed of escape from a confining local landscape. He found in books the road map to a freer territory. In Kazin's case, this was "the city" ("everything just out of Brownsville") whose glamorous institutions--the New York Public Library, the Metropolitan Museum, the Brooklyn Botanic Garden--spoke of an American past and an intellectual community that this son of eastern European immigrants was determined to make his own. (And he did, with his pioneering 1942 critical work, On Native Grounds, published when he was just 27.) Yet Kazin came to understand that the roots he had been so anxious to tear up were the source of his deepest identity. His loving portrait of his past acknowledges the crucial importance of belonging, even as it affirms the compelling necessity of escape. What could be more American? (Amazon.com Review - Wendy Smith)

George

8/24/2020 08:34:00 am

Mendel: we read each other's minds. As I read Alan's note, I flashed on Kazin's wonderful "A Walker in the City," and flashed back to Mr. Lichtenstein's English class at Hofstra, late 50s. Yes, I think of Kazin and Lichtenstein on my walks in neighborhoods. One time in the late 70s, when I was covering religion, there was a disturbance in Brooklyn...to get the feeling of the neighborhood (Crown Heights?) I put on my yarmulke and walked...and walked...all was peaceful. Your writings give me some on-the-ground feel to your city, Jerusalem. Keep writing. GV

George

8/24/2020 08:27:13 am

Alan: thanks for the memories. Yes, the city has hundreds, thousands, of neighborhoods, I'm sure you held your neighborhood together with your store -- part of the reason you opened again after the blackout, I've been blessed to be visit great corners -- Coogan's in the Heights, Bill Rhoden's introduction to Chocolat uptown, and my beloved L'Angolo, run by Pino, where Massimo from Firenze and The Village made me feel like a regular. All those clean, well-lighted places, homage to Hemingway. GV

Michael

8/23/2020 11:15:29 pm

Thanks George. Bittersweet story. And a great photo.

Randolph

8/24/2020 08:30:05 am

George,
I think each of you for your writings.
New York City is woven into the fabric of your heart.
Thanks for sharing it...
RF

George Vecsey

8/24/2020 09:00:10 am

Michael: Thanks. I did try to talk Shaun into investigating Bell Blvd. but he respectfully mentioned Donovan's.... I don't think Foley's II is coming soon to a neighborhood near me. GV

Randolph: Fact is, there is room in our hearts and memories for other places. My e-pal Bruce says on his annual pilgrimage to Paris, one cafe owner knows what he will order. And as you can sense, I feel part of another part of the world, country roads, take me home, Eastern Kentucky, SW Virginia, Rocky Top Tennessee, Almost Heaven West Virginia.....GV

Randolph

8/24/2020 02:20:36 pm

George,
The stories of New York that you, Alan, Mendel, Altenir and others weave is a true gift for those of us that have not been fortunate enough to experience it’s beauty. It is a more precious gift in this time of the pandemic.

Yet I want you to know that New York City holds a special place in my heart and in my family history. You see, I keep a story that is more than 100 years old.

In 1910 my grandfather immigrated through Ellis Island. He was an Italian stonemason from northern Italy. He came into the city with a small leather bag, a change of clothes and a slip of paper. The slip of paper had the address of a boarding house in the city, where my grandfather hoped to meet up with another Italian stonemason from his small town in Italy.

Eventually he made his way onto a street car. Since he could not speak English, he showed the address to several people and a man volunteered to help him find the boarding house. They rode through the city and my grandfather was overwhelmed by the immensity and beauty of the metropolis. After some time, the man got up and started to lead my grandfather off of the street car.
But suddenly, an elderly woman reached out, grasped my grandfather’s arm, shook her head and nonverbally communicated that my grandfather should stay on the street car. My grandfather stayed and the man, angry and yelling at the woman, exited the car.

My grandfather rode on the street car for several more miles. At a certain stop, the woman stood and signaled for my grandfather to come with her. They left the street car together.

This stranger, a small gray-haired woman, walked my grandfather, a young Italian man for five or six blocks. She took him up the steps of a Boarding house, met with the landlady and made sure that my grandfather had a safe place to stay.

100 years later, my elderly mother would passionately tell me this story: A tale that had been told a 1000 times. A tale that always ended with her reflection:
“Randolph that man would have robbed and perhaps killed my father. We are only here today because of the kindness of that little New York City lady. Aren’t the people of New York City wonderful?”

I think she was right.
All the best,

RF

George

8/24/2020 04:59:21 pm

Randolph: THAT is an O. Henry story.
And you know where he is buried?
Same hilltop cemetery as my favorite writer when I was young, Thomas Wolfe.
Imagine that. Two writers who helped people feel NYNY — Both buried in Asheville, NC. I sat there once for a very long hour to pay homage to Wolfe...and noticed o. Henry’s stone. GV

Alan Rubin link

8/25/2020 10:01:05 am

Randolph,

New Yorker's often get a bad rap, but the story of how an unknown woman helped your newly immigrated grandfather is about the city as I know it. Just stand for a while on almost any street holding an open map and see how many people will stop to help.

Once heading north on the IRT #3 train, a non-English speaking family of tourists asked how to get to a place in lower Manhattan. When all hand signals, etc. failed, the only logical thing to do was to take them there.

I’m not a hero, just a New Yorker.

Randolph

8/25/2020 10:23:28 am

Alan,
You are a New Yorker, but you are also a good writer and a good storyteller. I always enjoy your posts.
All the best,
RF
For that immigrant family lost in the city, you will remain a hero.

bruce

8/25/2020 10:39:58 am

alan,

i've travelled a fair amount and my experience is that most people are very helpful.

been to nyc a few times and asked for directions and everybody was always helpful.

25 times to paris and never had a problem. had parisians actually go out of their way to show me or take me somewhere.

very good friend of mine is from melbourne. met him when i was living in japan--he's still there.

i've been to melbourne twice and people were incredibly helpful. my friend came to canada once for a visit and then spent a few days alone in toronto. he said it was a big city but seemed like a small town because people were so friendly/helpful.

the only exceptions were in japan sometimes. mostly because of uncertainty about english--i speak a tiny bit of japanese and french--being surprised to see a gaijin unexpectedly.

the only problems or reactions that showed the person was a bit annoyed occurred when people--usually from a particular country--approached locals and just started speaking english.

i always make sure i know a few lines of the local lingo--as in apologizing for not speaking french or etc.

having english as a first language is a huge advantage when travelling.

bruce

Randolph

8/24/2020 05:38:22 pm

George,
Wolfe and O....
Synchronicity.
As always thanks.
Best to Ms. Whipple.
RF

bruce

8/24/2020 10:42:03 pm

george,

always enjoy your nostalgia pieces and love of where you grew up and worked for so many years.

paris is the most walkable city i've ever wandered around in my travels.

thanks for the mention....it's le josselin creperie in the shadow of montparnesse. owner's son always insists on giving me a brandy when i'm done.

same thing happens at an okonomiyaki restaurant at ishigakijima in the okinawan chain about 300 km due east of taiwan.

it's only 7509 miles from where i live in the national security threat to the usa.

bruce

George Vecsey

8/27/2020 08:07:28 am

Bruce: your Paris story reminds me of a much more prosaic diner on Long Island, when I worked at Newsday -- the Stewart Grill, half a mile from the office. We were in there just about every day -- coffee, meals, whatever. I moved to the NYT in 1968 (!!!) and did not get back to the diner for five years. I wandered in one day and George the counterman looked up and said, "What'll it be, George?" Like yesterday.

bruce

8/27/2020 09:48:01 am

george,

it is a good feeling.

makes you feel like you've got another home.

in happened one other time in nara.

i went into an okonomiyaki restaurant near gakuenmae station.

hadn't been for a few years. the cook saw me and started mixing up the ingredients right away.

i marvelled and thanked him.

he said,'do itashimashite' (think nothing of it) and then told me that i was lucky i'd come in that night. he'd taken a job in osaka and it was his last night.

bruce

Gene

8/27/2020 02:50:06 pm

George, You said, "As you can sense, I feel part of another part of the world, country roads, take me home, Eastern Kentucky, SW Virginia, Rocky Top Tennessee, Almost Heaven West Virginia." Know what I wish? I wish that, after you'd done those two interviews − in Mexico, in 1979 − with the soon-to-be-assassinated Archbishop Romero (who you said you were so struck by), you'd come here (El Salvador) to cover him at home for a month or so; if you had, I'm sure you would have added El Salvador to your list as another part of the world that you feel part of.

George

8/27/2020 02:56:30 pm

Gene: I can only judge from a few forays into the countryside when I was in Mexico a few times -- during the Pope's visit in 1979, a Mass in some hilltop village, in Nahuatl language, with trumpets instead of organ music, and a definite feel of spirituality.

It would have been amazing to visit Salvador while Arch. Romero was on this earth, just to see what kind of trouble he was fomenting by following his religious commitments to La Gente. I knew I was in the company of a saint-like person (I don't make judgments like that normally, or ever) and also knew he was endangered as soon as JPII began talking in the Zocalo. Romero knew it, too, because I asked him the next day, but he went home and continued his ministry. As for Salvador itself, yes, U am sure you are right. Right now I hardly budge from our little town. MY best to you both, G&M

Gene

8/28/2020 03:18:23 pm

Gene Palumbo
8/28/2020 08:51:25 am
George,

You got it exactly right on an important point: Romero did what he did, and said what he said, because of his religious commitments to his people, and not because — as those who loathed him (and had him killed) claimed — he was a communist. One of his commitments was to publicly denounce the injustices his people were suffering. One Sunday, after a particularly forceful homily, his assistant told him that he feared a violent reaction. Romero replied, "I had to say it. If I'd said anything less, I would have fallen short; I wouldn't have been expressing the fullness of church teaching."

A good friend of Romero's, an outspoken Jesuit who worked with impoverished farmworkers and encouraged them to assert their rights, was murdered by a death squad for doing so. A Salvadoran nun was sitting beside the Jesuit's body, staunching the blood that continued to trickle out, when Romero arrived. She said he stood before the corpse in silence for several minutes, and then said, "If we don't change now, we never will." He would later say, "When I looked at him lying there dead, I thought, 'If they killed him for doing what he did, then I have to walk that same path.' " And he did walk it, knowing full well what the consequences could be.

You're also right when you say he was endangered. One day, at that same meeting in Mexico where you interviewed him, a few journalists were talking with him. One of us, without explicitly mentioning the death threats he was receiving, asked him, "Are you really going back to El Salvador?" — as in (but not actually saying), "If you do, they're going to kill you."

"I know what you're getting at," said Romero, "but, you know, they say that I'm the pastor, and the pastor is supposed to be there for the flock. And the flock is back in El Salvador. So, yes, I'm going to return." Fourteen months later, he was murdered.

George Vecsey

8/27/2020 03:01:12 pm

Gene: I was driving in Florida when the car radio said he was assassinated.
I thought: "They got him."
Who "they" are is a complicated issue.
GV

Gene Palumbo

8/28/2020 09:16:08 am

(NB: This note from Gene refers to a comment by Bruce that has vanished during some restructuring by George the Techie. I will try to find it. GV.)
,
Bruce:
You're probably remembering the murder of three nuns and a lay missionary by El Salvador's National Guard in December, 1980. "The Murder of US Churchwomen That Exposed a Government Cover-up" is a fine documentary about them:
https://www.retroreport.org/video/a-search-for-justice/

"Roses in December," one of the best documentaries about El Salvador, is the story of the lay missionary, Jean Donovan. You can see it for free via the website of the Romero Trust: http://www.romerotrust.org.uk/videos

I did a review of it (https://www.commonwealmagazine.org/martyrs-el-salvador) and a tribute ("A Bond of Blood: Remembering William P. Ford") to the extraordinary brother of one of the women, Maryknoll Sister Ita Ford. Bill worked for decades to find out the truth about the killings, and to achieve a measure of justice in the case. https://www.commonwealmagazine.org/bond-blood

You also asked, "What did you think about the movie made about Romero?" Sadly, it's so misleading and superficial that I advise people to skip it and see one of the documentaries about him instead. This next is from a piece of mine:

The feature film "Romero" is another of the culprits fostering the belief that Romero's change was all about the killing of [Father Rutilio] Grande. In addition to its other falsehoods (e.g., the film has Romero being arrested and jailed and, on another occasion, detained and stripped, and it has one of the Jesuit priests who worked with Grande taking up arms — none of which happened), "Romero" invents a rupture between Grande and Romero just before Grande was killed, with Grande angrily saying to Romero:

"Don't you see what's going on around here? Anyone who says what he thinks about land reform or wages or God or human rights … automatically he's labeled a communist … He lives in fear … They take him away … They torture him, they kill him … You don't believe me, do you?

"Goodbye, Óscar."

This is a total fabrication. Romero did know what was going on, and Grande, far from breaking with him, was constantly standing up for him, trying to convince reluctant priests to give him a chance. A rupture between the two? No way. Of course, if you've decided that your film will present Grande's murder as a "road to Damascus" moment in which Romero, like Paul, was suddenly "converted," the rupture narrative sets things up nicely. There's only one problem: It's not true.
"Archbishop Oscar Romero: Setting the Record Straight," https://www.ncronline.org/news/opinion/archbishop-scar-romero-setting-record-straight

The link given above for the Romero Trust website, will give you free access to the documentary "Monseñor: The Last Journey of Oscar Romero" (full disclosure: I was the associate producer).

bruce

8/28/2020 09:50:55 am

gene,

thanks for taking the time to answer and including attachments.

i can't be surprised by the movie mess.

not the first time a film was, to say the least, misleading.

unfortunate my comment disappeared.

it was the greatest comment ever posted anywhere about anything.

at least that's what people are saying.

bruce

George Vecsey

8/28/2020 03:14:29 pm

We're going to get this sorted out, right now.
1. The comment just above that has George Vecsey talking to George is wrong, obviously. It's from Gene to George.
2. When Bruce says "people are saying," this is his subversive way of making fun of the American president. The fact is, Trump is on top of everything, 24/7, and his major advisors all seem to be named Hannity or Carlson,
3. Bruce was making the point that four American religious women were murdered and some Salvador and American officials tried to make it sound as if they were serving some dark force rather than making a preferential option for the poor.
4. In 1979, I ran into 3 or 4 American religious women in civilian clothes, in Mexico City, not Puebla. I was struck by their dedication to the poor. When the American women were killed a few years later, I had the feeling that these were the women I had met. Couldn't prove it but they were down there at that time. Years later, I met Bill Ford, brother of Ita Ford, the Maryknoll sister from Brooklyn, who was slain in 1980. He did not know if his sister had been in Mexico City at that time. I feel that I met them....GV

ED MARTIN

8/29/2020 11:10:16 pm

Joining late, but loved catching up. On FB Brooklyn Dodger Nostalgia, I have been chatting about OM the Ebbets destroyer and responding to some who think parking was the problem.

In 1946-50, I had a Brooklyn walk from the Atlantic Avenue Long Island Railroad station down Nostrand Avenue to just before Easter. Pkwy, and then west to Bedford and Ebbets Field. I have no idea how far it really was but guess about two miles. There was a trolley down Nostrand, but I only took it once or twice, when late.

Leaving the ballpark after the game, people were sitting on on their “stoops” listening to the postgame show, their radios sitting on the sill of open windows.

Another NY memory, either 47 or 48 there were two big snowstorms just after Christmas. My Father and I had driven in from Rockville Centre to L.I.City to his, and partners, small wholesale bakery as the snow kept falling. By noon, trying to go to lunch, we got stuck, plowed in at the curb and walked and subwayed to Times Square. All the railroads were stopped, the subways running only underground. We found a grungy hotel on 42nd, the Piccadilly. The trip was for me to get Knicks tickets to a game that night as a Christmas present.

There was no traffic moving. Six huge Burns Brothers Coal trucks were circled like elephants in the square itself. There was NO NOISE. Silent snow. One man had a sleigh and was pulling groceries up BWay.

We saw the Knicks in the Garden, and still stuck, the next night we saw the first professional tennis tour, Pancho Gonzales, Bobby Riggs, Jack Kramer and Pancho Segura.

New York without sound, no sirens, no horns, no engines roaring.
Years later we sat in the MOMA garden listening to a John Cage composition including the random city noises.

George Vecsey

8/31/2020 01:14:45 pm

Ed, good to see your name (and read your latest):
My feeling of NYC is that the present is superimposed over the past.
I can remember what it was like back in the 40s -- including the snowstorm of 1948, and the subsequent rushing of melted snow down the glacial hill toward Hillside Ave in Queens.
I can remember the funky neighborhood behind Radio City, across Sixth Ave. --I worked evenings at the Associated Press. Some of the older copyboys and editors would vanish into the warrens across 6th, and later talk of unspecified vices and delights therein.
Then again, friend of ours has gotten me interested in Dutch New Amsterdam, the streams and hills, the Lenape people, and piles of shells on the shoreline. It's all there. Best to you both,GV

ED MARTIN

8/31/2020 02:57:57 pm

HI Back, George and to the world’s most literate fan club.

You and friends might enjoy a series based on a book, called “Washington’s Spies,”Set on LI and NYC vicinity during British occupation of NY. Many real people involved, LI “spies” old families like the Townsends, Benedict Arnold, etc.

NY back in the day...

Andy Tansey

9/1/2020 06:58:42 am

Wow! Much more than a walk in the City, a journey through time and around the World. Almost full circle, I'll reach:

A few months ago, my good guitar friend, missing our get-togethers which were put on hold by the pandemic, suggested Cunningham Park. I pass there several times a week as I roll down 188th Street to Hillside and then Jamaica to gather Mom's caretaker. Another half-verse of one of the songs we like to strum and sing (though I've never been to the named State):

Since I came down from Oregon
There's a lesson or two I've learned
By standing in the road alone
Standing watching the fires burn
[More from Pride of Cucamonga]

Wishing for peace and a USA that is better than the resident incumbent.

Alan Rubin link

9/2/2020 10:35:31 am

Ed-

Good to see you back.

My family moved from Washington Heights to Teaneck, NJ in December of 1947. My older sister and I took the bus from the George Washington Bridge down Rt. 4 from September until we actually moved.

Our house was a newly completed and the 25” blizzard of 47’ hit two days after we had moved in. The early forecast called for scattered snow flurries.

We were the fourth house up from the River Road, on a newly developing street. Our backyard was woods that eventually became five more streets. We did not know any of our neighbors and the power was out for two days. I never understood why, but only one outlet in the dining room had power. The two sockets alternated between serving a lamp, a radio and a hot plate. At least the heat worked.

I had always lived in a NYC apartment. The creaking sounds of a new home unsettled me until I got used to sleeping in my own room for the first time.

I loved it. We were near the bottom of a long hill and the roadway was covered with packed snow for about ten days. You could ride your sled safely for almost a quarter of a mile down to River Road as very few cars could get up.

Our mother did not believe us when we came come home from the first day of school after the Christmas break and said that it was closed. In 1947, NYC schools never closed for snow as most teachers lived in the city. Showing her usual faith in us, she called the school to check.

There is something so peaceful about newly fallen snow, whether enjoying the view or walking through it. There is a unique serenity similar to sitting by a lake or listening to the flow of a stream.

The flip side is getting stuck in snow related traffic. Once afternoon I left work from the Upper West Side about 2 PM and arrived at home in Suffern, NY after 10 PM, normally a 1-hour drive. I avoided the long backup getting on to the George Washington Bridge by bypassing the Westside Highway and taking local streets, which I knew from having grown up in the area. It was slow and steady until the Tappan Zee Bridge, which was a sheet of ice and zero visibility.

I needed to repeatedly turn the car off to avoid draining the battery and to scrape ice off the windshield. Then I missed my turnoff at exit 14 on the NY Thruway and lost another hour in what would normally have been a 10-minute detour from exit 15. Also, no cell phones back then.

However, walking or driving through a blizzard can be quite an experience. A blanket of snow covers the city’s grime and makes it a picture post card. It is a peaceful shared comradery with those who you pass.

It seems that the more rural roads get plowed much sooner than in urban areas. The perfect time to explore back roads is right after a snow storm, particularly if it was a wet snow, as the trees are fully covered.

Winter is coming, but we need much more than snow to control the Covid-19 mess. A favorable election result might also help.

bruce

9/2/2020 10:56:26 am

alan,

enjoyed your trip down memory lane.

triggered a bunch of memories tho i'll only mention two.

my late wife was japanese. we met in nara, japan--japan's first capital--and ended up splitting our time between canada and nara.

snow was not common around osaka and nara.

mieko loved walking in it when she moved to my part of canada which is outside hamilton, ontario.

the sound of it scrunching as we walked, the way the sound deadened because of it. the beauty.....she loved it when it snowed.

she never adjusted to 'black ice'.

introduced her to snow angels and the time honoured male thing of peeing your initials into the freshly fallen snow.

the other thing is when, at eight years old, we moved from the industrial east central end of hamilton to the hinterland of greensville west of the city.

my first day at the start of the school year was three days after we moved.

i remember sitting there with--i thought--a bunch of country bumpkins and farmers--looking out the window and seeing cows munching away in a field about 100 yards.

it was the old, 'it's not the end of the world, but i i think i can see it from here'.....

a few weeks later, i was happy as hell.

one of the best things that ever happened to me.

bruce

Ed Martin

9/2/2020 11:31:29 am

Bruce, since photos dont copy, I’ll send you text:

Red hat, with “Canada is Already Great” on it!

bruce

9/2/2020 11:40:14 am

ed,

if you have george's email address you can contact him for mine.

thanks.

bruce

bruce

9/2/2020 11:47:11 am

ed,

having trump so soon after dubya, made us think we're better than we are.

sort of, as i often say, being the tallest guy at a munchkin convention.

bruce

bruce

9/3/2020 01:39:42 am

video from nyc 1911

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hZ1OgQL9_Cw

Comments are closed.

I Miss My Home Town

Categories

Buy the Book