You are currently viewing the stories for August, 2012
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by Elizabeth S Titus 08/30/2012Neighborhood: Upper West Side
I have two photos of my daughter Lili on my desk, one taken in front of the the Brownstone School on West 80th Street in New York City in September 1996, the other taken at Ithaca College just a few days ago. I also have one of those acrylic, etched pieces she gave me for […]
Cross Streets
by Trevor Laurence Jockims 08/28/2012Neighborhood: Upper East Side, West Village
I was running late for a new faculty meeting at NYU. “411 Lafayette,” I said, jumping into a cab. The driver looked at me in the mirror with squinting, my-English-is-not-great eyes. “411 LA-FAY-ETTE,” I said, raising my voice, hoping to hurry us along. I checked the time: If traffic was very light I might—might—make it […]
Donald
by Heidi Rain 08/24/2012Neighborhood: Sunnyside
Daniel and Donald were the boys who lived next door to me when we were growing up. Well, they weren’t boys, really, but it was before the expression “teenager” was popular for those past childhood. By the time I was old enough to notice them – and their mother, a widow, Grace Grant – they […]
The Bed Story (Or Why I Never Sell on Craig’s List Anymore)
by Elizabeth Farkas 08/22/2012Neighborhood: Bedford-Stuyvesant, Crown Heights
Over the course of two years living in Brooklyn, I moved six times, including a failed attempt at cohabitation with my then boyfriend in what turned out to be an illegal sublet. The first thing I did when I moved into my second place, located in the West Indian section of Crown Heights was buy […]
The Green Sweater
by Erin Khar 08/20/2012Neighborhood: Midtown
It’s 5 AM and I am awake, too sharply awake, so sharply that reality is obscured. Chills crawl like ants on my skin, and I search in the dark for my green sweater. I have been wearing this sweater all summer. The sweater goes on and then is pulled off, repeatedly, each day, in my […]
Sanassa’s Phone Call
by JB McGeever 08/08/2012Neighborhood: Jamaica
A new school year is on its way and I did not get any of the classes I requested. My classroom’s been changed from the second floor to the basement, and my attendance list has another teacher’s name on it. Due to the unstoppable ramifications of mayoral control, my school has been whittled away, hallway […]
Faces
by Phyllis Schieber 08/03/2012Neighborhood: Washington Heights
I shift from foot to foot as I wait in line to see the Mona Lisa. The line snakes around the corridor of the second floor of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. My mother and Aunt Regina insist that we must see this wonderful painting. Helen holds my hand and tells me that Leonardo da […]
A Walk on Columbia Street
by Tina Portelli 08/01/2012Neighborhood: Carroll Gardens, Cobble Hill
If you never saw Columbia Street before 1960, you missed a lot. The street is still there; the sidewalks, the street sign, but the stores, the people, the charm are all gone. That strip of avenue is unrecognizable, now lined with barrack type housing and no character at all. The house where I was born […]