You are currently browsing the stories about the “Lower Manhattan” neighborhood.
Look at me! I bolt through Battery Park City. The air is sharp in my chest, piercing wind stinging my skin. I listen to the leaves crackling beneath my feet and watch them swirling around me, caught in the wind. My cheeks are burning red, cold sweat runs down the side of my face. I am 11 years-old and am [...]
My husband’s Manhattan apartment overlooks Fraunces Tavern—a three-story brick building with dormer windows and a columned portico. Apparently, George Washington said goodbye to his officers there at the end of the Revolutionary War. But now, as I sit in the deep windowsill sipping coffee and watching the bar revelers below, I see a horde of men in banana costumes filing [...]
image by Laurie Rosenwald When they say you have to love yourself first, before anyone else can love you, it’s just not true. I’ve had lots of boyfriends! And each of them has taught me something. From Joe I learned about architecture. From Steve I learned about music. From Anders I learned about art. From Gerard I learned about sadism [...]
In 1981 I was working as a part-time super at 258 Broadway and taking graduate courses at NYU. For a time, in early spring, I was the only person living in the eight-story building. It was being converted from offices into co-op apartments, and the real estate company wanted a super for security and to be available for new owners [...]
Years ago, I coined the term “White Socks Moment” to describe that instant when you are suddenly and jarringly turned off by a romantic interest because of something distasteful and unusual happening. The kids today refer to this phenomenon as “the ick”. Once I was turned off by a guy – who had seemed so intellectual – when he started [...]
The Literary Life: NYC 1982 I recall distinctly The famous author Standing over me As I scraped the plaster Off her bathroom floor Left behind by Workers renovating The building The first time I talked to her She called me up To express her Indignation About the bathroom I felt I’d done Something wrong Like I was in trouble With [...]
During the summer of 1978 I worked as a Good Humor man. I would push a cart from the Good Humor depot, located at 3rd Street between 1st and 2nd Avenue, on the Lower East Side, to Exchange Place in the financial district of lower Manhattan, where I would sell the company’s offerings to traders, office workers, messengers, or anyone [...]
February 1996 is bitter and icy and windy and numbing. My boyfriend Raz and I have been rendered homeless due to our depravity, immaturity, and stupidity. By day, we relax at the Lower East Side needle exchange, the Beth Israel methadone clinic, or our favorite diner, Leshko’s, on Avenue A. Nighttime is more problematic. We often sleep in the lobbies [...]
Waterbugs Before I was a super If you asked me what A waterbug was I’d of said One of those little things That kind of runs on the top Of ponds or quiet pools On the sides of streams But at 258 Broadway Down in the sub-basement where I had to make my way through The cavernous half lit Cement [...]
My daughter Hazel, after ten years of listening to what her parents wanted to hear and wanted her to hear, found music that neither her father or I could lay claim to, pop music designed for girls her age: Britney Spears, Jennifer Lopez, Christina Aguilera. We'd taken her to see Bob Dylan at Jones Beach when she was one, Hazel [...]
As the 6 train chugged past grimy buildings in dicey neighborhoods, I felt I was being safely transited through vast danger zones. In those days before air conditioning, the train’s windows were kept open, so the amplified sound of screeching brakes and rumbling wheels was a constant assault. Mature ladies fanned their dripping faces with magazines; the raised arms of [...]
The final summer of my father’s life, I worked for him as a runner, making food deliveries at his restaurant. He and I weren’t getting along too well. I had just turned seventeen and my mother had died the previous winter, either one of which would have meant a strained relationship, but the combination was a killer. I had long [...]
Whenever I go to a party or I am introduced to people I don’t know, they invariably ask me what I do. “What do you do?” And I always tell them, “I am an elevator operator.” I say that I drive an elevator in downtown Manhattan. The reaction to my announcement varies. Some people smile politely and then move on [...]
"Jeez, I hope he hurries." The doctor said to his nurse. "I don't want to miss my train." "Me, too. I've got to get my kid by 5:30pm." Her answer tinged with aggravation. Hearing this exchange through the bathroom door, my bladder shut down. I was on the 60th floor of the Woolworth Building, the world's tallest building from 1914 [...]
Throughout the 1950s Stan Novick was locked up at least four times in “The Tombs,” Manhattan’s now-closed city jail and holding cell on White Street. Pictures from that time show “The Tombs,” now torn down, as a Dickensian sort of place with looming towers and small windows. Photos of Stan Novick at that time show a tall, dark and handsome [...]
I celebrated my 60th birthday and my 25-year job anniversary the same year my employer accepted billions of TARP money. And then, on a bright July morning, I was laid off. I could pretend that it was because business was changing, as the notice letter said, or that there was a need to make more cuts, as my manager—I’ll call [...]
We bounded out the exit of the Municipal Building like two cowboys pushing through saloon doors. Kurt set the pace as he trotted to the VIP parking lot, where six black Lincoln Town Cars belonging to elected officials and agency commissioners rested during the dignitaries’ brief visits to their offices upstairs. He reached one of the cars and popped open [...]
It was a lousy and bleak first Sunday in May. I walked into City Hall Park, in my neighborhood, and Richard the gardener greeted me and introduced me to the other volunteers. “Can I pull out the tulips?” I said to Richard. “ My knees are in bad shape and I'm afraid of making them worse by kneeling on them.” [...]
There’s a low of five degrees today, and a woman gets off the 2 train with no hat, gloves, or scarf. An older man offers her some space under his umbrella, and she graciously accepts. I walk ahead of them, keeping my eyes down and forward to keep from slipping. Having underestimated the snow, I left my boots at home [...]
It was the third week of what was to become my first real job, at Irving Plaza, the club in Union Square. I was working three days a week after school, doing odd jobs around the venue. Basically whatever tedious tasks they needed me to do. I was a junior that year, and took the minimum amount of classes, so [...]
Most violin students must diligently practice on their instruments many hours a day, for many years, before even thinking of turning professional. Some may give it up long before they become proficient. And even should they pursue their musical studies, and become skilled at playing the violin, there are only a limited number of professional openings available to them, whether [...]
My dad was the Ralph Kramden of St. Peters Avenue. He always had some plot, some scheme to try to make extra money. The first I remember, he played the number. No, not “Lotto,” but the real, old-school number “played” to scary old men in the back rooms of candy stores that sold wormy Chunky bars and pretzel sticks so [...]
“I don’t know their names, but I know them by voice,” said Galo Cardenas, proprietor of GC Snax, located on the ground floor of the New York Supreme Court building at 60 Centre Street. And if Mr. Cardenas looks at his customers askance, it’s because sideways is the only way he can see them -- he’s legally blind, and only [...]
Having grown up in the City my entire life, I should have had my guard on and my extra sixth sense alert for the criminally suspicious. But I had just come off an awkward date, and I was still reflecting on its minute details, and otherwise pondering the futility of finding love in this hard-worn City, so I was not [...]
If all goes according to plan, in three weeks I will run the New York Marathon. For most people, training for a marathon is empowering. It gives them a feeling of accomplishment and a sense of self-worth. For me, it has been one lesson after another in humility. At five am one morning this past August, I set out on [...]
I really did try all the conventional methods. Really. I wrote imploring letters to the Office of the Mayor, I called my City Council members' secretary at all hours, I testified at public hearings before assorted half-awake bureaucrats. Nothing and again nothing. It would have been less frustrating to tell it all to the guy at the token booth. I [...]
The air on the fourteenth floor of 1 Police Plaza is a little thick, and Captain Z. wheezes. "You’re wheezing," I say. "I am not," he says, and pulls out his asthma inhaler, shakes it, and takes a puff. His lung sounds immediately clear. It’s 4:30 on Thursday, August 14, exactly nineteen minutes after the power went out. I had [...]
There were no rollerblades in those days. We wore our roller skates on our shoes. The skates had straps that buckled across the instep -- clamps, also referred to as "clams," that we tightened with the all-important skate key we wore on a string around our necks. The wheels themselves were ball bearings; in fact, we referred to our skates [...]
Mr. Beller’s Neighborhood was started in the year 2000, and we have published many stories about what happened in New York on 9/11/2001 and the months that followed. Today is the 24th anniversary of that day. This story was first published on March 11, 2002. (JM) Here was a morning like any other. I got up at 6:40, took a [...]
I haven't dressed up in several Halloweens. I've been reluctant to do so since third grade when I came to school as Diane Keaton in "Annie Hall." I blew my wad that year. This year would see no disguise. The better part of the day would be spent with my friend Sabine killing time before our respective Halloween parties by [...]
The brass-plated elevator door opens, revealing it's operator, a man named Kenny Coleman. A horde of cops, assistant district attorneys, and clerical workers bustle inside as if they're heading to a sale at Macy's rather than for work at the state court building at 80 Centre St. In his mid-40s, thin-faced and short, and wearing a fedora, a Western string [...]
