You are currently viewing the stories for “August 2002.”
When I was a kid we visited New York once or twice a year. I usually went with one of my folks and one or two of my brothers but we almost never went as a complete family. Back then we lived in rural New England, so it was always a big thrill to board the series of buses and [...]
Dear Readers, Like many roads and buildings during the summer months, Mr. Beller's Neighborhood has been undergoing renovations. The site is surrounded by scaffolding and there are banging and drilling sounds emanating from within. Like all renovations and road reconstruction, especially summer ones, and especially ones taking place in New York, there have been delays. People who were promised a [...]
I was sitting in a bathroom stall in late June on the third or fourth floor of The New York Public Library, back past the Charles Addams drawings, and I began to think about my old schoolmate Derrick Foster. I ran into Derrick about 10 years ago, long after I had known him in grammar school, and we chatted about [...]
One of the other editors is looking at the Dow Jones or the stock market or something and whistling. “Wow!” He shakes his head. “You wouldn’t even believe how bad it is!” He sounds kind of merry. The staff reporter is reading aloud from a posting on a job search web page from a woman, a college graduate and a [...]
"American Vogue, please!" screeched the group of blond, stick-figure 16-year olds teetering on platform espadrilles, each one clawing to get a grip on the gleaming steel reception desk in front of them. "Who are you here to see?" said the straight-faced security guy, who was, clearly, over the model thing. From my vantage point behind them , these girls looked [...]
It's not easy to ask for a picture from a fireman's widow or a mother who has just lost a child. That's the worst aspect of my high-pressure job as a member of the New York City working press. I step into people’s lives, often for less than an hour, usually in moments of great joy or sorrow. My job [...]
On the 4th of July my girlfriend and I took a friend visiting from Richmond, Virginia out to dinner in an area of the West Village that we refer to as Charm Central. We parked the car on West 4th, which is my favorite street of its kind in the city. It’s quiet, tree lined, narrow, and it, as well [...]
Ann Magnuson begins her new one-woman show, Rave Mom, standing in a hotel room in Las Vegas, high on ecstasy, staring at the radiantly naked form of a young, blonde man with "the body of a surfer." He reaches out to touch her, and though Magnuson refrains from describing what happens next, peals of another kind of ecstasy follow. She [...]
I step onto the 1 downtown train at 116th street every day and usually stand all the way down to Houston Street, where I get off for work. Sometimes I am able to balance and read a book as I hold on to a greasy pole. Other times, I am not so lucky; at five foot one, the long horizontal [...]
