You are currently viewing the stories for October, 2008
George Isn’t Homeless
by Melissa Dunn 10/12/2008Neighborhood: Across the River, Manhattan
“Hi George,” I said, with a wave, as I rushed toward the subway. George, who was sitting in his low-to-the-ground folding chair at his usual post in front of the liquor store, sat up bolt straight, as if I had touched him, giving him a shock of static electricity, and said with some outrage, “How […]
Bet on Crazy
by peter nolan smith 10/12/2008Neighborhood: Midtown
I knew very little about diamonds as a child other than Superman could squeeze coal with his steel-hard hands to create diamonds and my father had bought a diamond ring for my mother. It was a hundredth of the size of the diamonds Superman never gave to Lois Lane, but my mother loved hers, often […]
YEAH, YEAH, YEAH? NO, NO, NO!
by Candy Schulman 10/07/2008Neighborhood: West Village
I met John Lennon in Washington Square Park. My friend Susan and I were returning home to the Village from our jobs as drug abuse counselors in the roughest schools in Brooklyn…when we spotted him. It was 1973, and his hat gave him away: a black Beatles’ cap that had become their trademark, a newsboy […]
Farrell’s
by Ken Nolan 10/04/2008Neighborhood: Across the River, Brooklyn
There was McCawley’s and its blinds that hadn’t been cleaned in decades. One block over was Connie’s Corner where Chris the German bartender would always announce, “I know your family, Nolan,” cause we lived around the block and Chris served my parents, aunts, uncles and all. On the next was Val’s, used to be Casey’s, […]
Marie’s Golden Cue
by J.H. Palmer 10/04/2008Neighborhood: All Over, Brooklyn
A couple Sundays ago my husband and I played pool, something I haven’t done in years. I’d been invited to an appreciation party for volunteers of the Old Town School of Folk Music, a Chicago institution that recently celebrated it’s 50th anniversary. I’ve never attended an OTSFM volunteer party, but this one took place about […]
Air Disaster 1960
by Michael J Toro 10/04/2008Neighborhood: Brooklyn, Park Slope
Numerous fissures and cracks can be observed on many buildings along the intersection of Seventh Avenue and Sterling Place, in the Park Slope section of Brooklyn. This quiet, upscale neighborhood, less than a half-mile north of Prospect Park, goes about its daily business with little notice for defects in a city so rife with fissures, […]