You are currently browsing the stories about the “Outer Boroughs” neighborhood.
“You’re blocking the whole fucking street, you’re a total asshole!” The woman in the road screamed at me. But she only knew one of my attributes and that hardly qualified her to give a generalizing narrative to all of the other onlookers. I agreed to move my vehicle but she was the bitter, lingering sort. I wasn’t sure if she [...]
Travis Barker--he of the Eminem-a-like hip hop wigger lifestyle replete with marital discord (in his iteration it includes a catfight between the old ball and chain and pre-prison Paris Hilton)--yes, that Travis Barker, was briefly my boon companion aboard a rather small US Air carrier for some four hours when the traffic radar in Atlanta went out, was rerouted to [...]
Arriving at work for the night tour on October 29, 1974 I discover the firehouse to be as abandoned and silent as a cemetery at midnight, I was spooked by something but wrote it off to the approach of Halloween when in reality it was actually an omen. I am the first member of the night tour reporting in for [...]
Early March 1954, in a Woodside apartment overlooking the # 7 Subway El and the Long Island Railroad station below it, two express trains crisscrossed, one rattling over the other. “Bob, please get me some food.” Patricia pleaded from the kitchen to the living room. “There’s plenty of food,” Bob answered as he played with the bunny ears antenna on [...]
One thing Sambath Suen can’t abide is the cold. Until four years ago, Suen lived in Kandal, a Cambodian province that borders on Vietnam. Before that, he lived in Vietnam, where he earned his diploma, and before that he had lived in his native village, about thirty knots downriver from Phnom Penh, where he spent what Cambodians call “The Time [...]
In the mid 1960’s it wasn’t easy for multi-sibling families like mine to get along well financially, but somehow my Mom and Dad made it work on the salary of my Dad, which wasn’t much. But there were times where budget cutting ideas may have went a little too far, like the "Save money on haircuts by doing it ourselves"initiative [...]
Somewhere, over the din, a thin voice called out, “Open!” I darted around, swaying from one foot to another, but before I could realize what had happened the elderly woman in line behind me had already scampered around to the newly opened lane. In her shamrock green coat and stiff knit hat, she leaned over carefully to begin taking out [...]
I hesitated before walking through the alleyway that led to my old backyard. I could see that my mother and father’s old fig tree was still there in the yard. It was late summer and there had just been a light rain. This would have been prime fig picking time back in the old days. I remembered that after a [...]
After my daughter was born, I spent part of each day on the balcony of our third-floor apartment in Sheepshead Bay, rocking her in her stroller. Even when chilly, we’d sit out. Just like her mama and papa when they were little in St. Petersburg, Russia, Sasha has spent much of her first year wrapped in blankets on the balcony. [...]
The Mets are out of town. My childhood friend Jim wants to see a ballgame before he's tied up remodeling his Long Island house, which he estimates will take all of his free time May through October. He can't wait until the Amazins, his favorite team and mine, return from a trip to the West Coast and Atlanta, so it's [...]
Looking around for the lieutenant, I find him standing alongside the firehouse, staring down into a neat row of freshly clipped hedges. I hurry to his side and he tersely commands, "Get to work." Right then and there, my life changes forever. * For firemen, there is nothing more startling than a Verbal Alarm--the riotous banging of fists on the [...]
The first nice weekend of the season, temperatures in the 70s, a light breeze, and not a cloud in the sky. A year ago today, I would have had a pang of jealousy thinking of the suburbanites who were combing their garages and heading to Home Depot to find tiki torches, bug zappers, weed whackers, and new patio furniture for [...]
Arriving before the engine, with fire blowing out two windows on the third floor and people in the street yelling, "There's two kids in there" our asses are about to be kicked and there is nothing we can do about it. It's 1977, and Lieutenant Annello leads the way as usual. He is simply the best fire officer I have [...]
Inside the firehouse, sweeping floors, cooking meals and maintaining equipment are routine parts of the job. However when the doors go up and the rigs go out you have to be as flexible as Gumby, because you do not know what you are going to be faced with next. While responding to alarms, we always scan the sky for smoke [...]
A beaten body sat slumped on the back step of an anonymous pumper. We nearly walked right by Danny without recognizing him. Danny’s turnout coat was half open and covered with remnants of the building burning at the corner of Townsend Avenue and the Cross Bronx Expressway. His face and hands were black with soot. Steam seaped from his helmetless [...]
Autumn has arrived and the cooler air has dampened but not ended the fires of this years "Summer Offensive." Somewhere the trees are changing color but here in Hunts Point it has been one of those days. We've already caught more work on this day tour than any company outside the ghetto will see in six months and the smoke [...]
Heath Avenue. I recognized the building right away. Public housing always stands out from all other domiciles. It looms, and, like a tall man, commands your attention. But when you look up, expecting to see his face, you see a blank outline, no distinguishing features. No nose. No mouth. No eyes. We parked on the side street around the corner. [...]
Oh man, he's going to die! I live 100 feet from Interstate 95 and from my living room window have an unobstructed view of this sea of vehicles. Having lived here many years the sounds of impending trouble are familiar. So when the horns started blaring it was a cue to look out the window and I did so, just [...]
Christ Zig, what did you do? Whenever I'm asked if the fire department had an effect on my personal life, those six words explode into my brain. It's a beautiful summer Sunday afternoon in 1977 at the Bronx zoo with my wife and three kids. The kids are riding a camel and shouting what all exicited kids shout, "Look at [...]
I took my second grade special education class to my dentist as part of my career education unit. While they were learning about dentistry, I'd also get my teeth cleaned. It seemed too good to be true: taking care of my teeth on school time. I recruited two speech teachers to come along. They were tired of giving speech lessons [...]
"The Case Of The Missing Pasta" I tried improving my second grade special education students' skills at addition by having them count pasta. I had them line up the brown and white rigatoni into two groups. Then all they had to do was add them. It worked well - my students were learning while enjoying what they were doing. Then [...]
Although I moved to New York in 1994 with Manhattan in mind, I quickly became fascinated with the city’s boroughs. On weekends I'd take the subway to Coney Island, Brooklyn, Astoria, Queens, or the Bronx Zoo to see the other parts of my new home. Staten Island, however, remained elusive. In my early days, I often took the Staten Island [...]
So you’re teaching again. No, not the cushy adjunct work at the college where you got the MFA. This will be the crack your knuckles, roll up your sleeves type of teaching that New York City has to offer. Once you realized that The New Yorker was just as happy to ignore you with or without those precious writing awards [...]
In 1978 I had the only blue record album in the Berkeley Townhouse apartment building, on 35th Avenue, and probably in all of Flushing. It was the age of disco and Cheryl and I, the founding—and only—members of the Funseekers Club, (co-presidents of the Queens headquarters) were about to outgrow the unruly, shag rug in my parents' living room, and [...]
Ladies! Who are suffering from terrible and terrible hair days all the time. Who always get out of your house in such pissed off mood because your hair is not shaped the way you want. Who must get up earlier than others to calm your hair down and end up dozing off at work Who are just simply dissatisfied with [...]
Check out Rachel Sherman's new book! ** No one who does Japanese hair straightening at Hair Village is Japanese. You can't have highlights if you want your hair straightened. You can't touch your hair - even put it behind your ears - for three days afterwards. You can't wash your hair for three days either. You should probably wear a [...]
We arrived at Giants Stadium. There are four huge spiraling ramps through which the stadium's population of 80,000 enter and exit. They wind their way from the ground level up to the top, a huge cement coil faintly reminiscent of the Guggenheim Museum, though with a more prison vibe. My friend explained that it was a tradition for all the [...]
Like the homes of many New Yorkers these days, the Illera apartment in Flushing, Queens, has a small American flag taped to the door. Six-year-old Vanessa answers the knock, her hair held back with a stars-and-stripes headband. She walks inside, past the Colombian flag in the kitchen, into the living room. The walls of the Illera home are covered mostly [...]
Since I wrote my piece about Fresh Meadows a year ago, the sleepy little Klein Farm has exploded into public prominence. In late 2001, word spread that the elder Klein, now happily ensconced out in Jericho, had indeed decided to sell the no-longer profitable farm, despite the younger Klein’s desire to continue the enterprise. ("It’s the only job I’ve had," [...]
Ever since my first wooshing ride down a log flume, I’ve been enamored of water. From sprinklers to swimming pools to lakes and the Atlantic,water soothes me like no other substance. Except beer. So when I heard the Staten Island ferry served cold brew on its cross-bay excursions, I knew I’d found my manna. A Friday night was chosen. That [...]
A sloppy silver and rose sunset is visible over the bunker-like structure of the Whitestone Lanes bowling alley, whose sign says: PLAY AMERICA’S GAME/75 LANES OPEN 24 HOURS 7 DAYS. Ahmadullah Raghbat, his uniform and sneakers in a polystyrene shopping bag, stands waiting for the bus. Raghbat is a young Afghani, and though he has lived in New York for [...]
Peggy Darlington has always loved the New York City subway. As a little girl, she rode the trains frequently, and when she wasn’t on a train, she played “train” in her bedroom. One day, Darlington’s parents ordered her to play with dolls. After finding that she had put the dolls on pieces of cardboard to shuttle them around, they finally [...]
If I leave the windows open in my classroom, I can hear the endless hum of traffic coming from the Long Island Expressway. There's a certain degree of wonder in its sound. So many people, an endless whoosh of thoughts and dreams whipping past me like rush hour- forever. There's this postcard I keep in my classroom that reminds me [...]
First came the hugging and the crying and the storytelling. We're all alive and it's groovy. Long live the marketing department! Long live the company! We'll rebuild! Then came the fatness. Working in an office, in a cubicle, is the surest way to obesity. You scorch your eyes looking at the Internet all day, sipping a mocha with whipped cream. [...]
In 1949 I arrived, aged seven, at the threshold of P.S. 26 in Fresh Meadows (Queens), and saw there, graven in the imposing door frame above, the words: Rufus King Public School. Who, I wondered, was Rufus King? It was quite likely my first historical query, though I wouldn't have been able to conceptualize what I was experiencing in that [...]
