Friday, December 30, 2011

hidden treasures

Broke in one ( of two) new pair of sneakers to kick start the new year today. Started out near Battery Park and walked all the way through Harlem Valley. On the way home, I actually had a destination this time.

I had come to a compromise with my bookcase. If I rearranged the books it already held, it would make room for the several rare and out of print books I had on my list of buy them for myself presents. Bookcase originally balked, but then obliged. So on my way home I stopped at the rare bookstore. An elongated, narrow space with books going to the ceiling, on the floor, and on the stairs leading to the second level. The two I had spotted a few weeks ago, I knew were mine. The other is being shipped from a used bookstore far, far away.


This one was hiding on the steps, left in the same spot I had found it, I told the shopkeeper that there were a few I was looking for. He looked down at the book a puzzled expression on his face.

" You weren't looking for this one were you?"

I nodded in the affirmative. He shrugged his shoulders and put it in a bag as I bounced out the door. This was the reason why I wanted it:


When I first saw it, all I noticed was the date inscribed on the front page. I'm a sucker for dates like this. When I got home I realized it was inscribed by the author himself the year it was published in 1918. The recipient left a 90 year old newspaper clipping neatly folded on page 25 including an article about the author. Sixty five years later someone inscribed it to the descendant of the subject of the book on the cover. And then almost 29 years later it came home with me.


Thursday, December 22, 2011

tis the season..


It came as an unexpected surprise from the friend whose home I hope to have one day...books overflowing on shelves, the floor and the spiral staircase that leads to depths unknown near 9th avenue. I have books overflowing but only in strategically placed corners..

She knew that in a time of festivity and joy I would be seeking quiet and center balance in the midst of the chaos. So she sent me this. Inscribed on the card:

Happy Holidays and Everyday!

A destination
A refuge
A masterpiece
A joy
A tradition

Sunday, December 18, 2011

Unwinding

The first thing my computer said after I hit the power button was "Where have you been?"

Well, not really but that is what it felt like as for the past six to eight weeks it had mostly been OFF as I didn't have the mental energy to sit down and do anything with craziness swirling from daily life..and I hated it.

When you can't stop at your usual port for repairs the gears start to wind up and get knotted.

Every time I tried to find a balance, the swing would go in the opposite direction.

Now the knots are unwinding. Screen goes on, research subject is happy, and oh boy so am I.

My sneakers were happy too ( and incidentally will need to be replaced soon). Walked over familiar haunts, seeing things as if for the first time, retracing steps over and over, not caring how long it would take, as long as it got me back to the clarity that I need in order to function.

Walked from Harlem to Chinatown and looped back around again. Faded ghost signs, architecture, sunlight that lasted longer than snippets gleaned in the morning, urban silence..

Welcome home..

..now back to the antics of that cranky ghost in the fedora...

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

1847 says hello to 2011


In the midst of sheer exhaustion, I managed after several phone calls, to find myself on a train bouncing to a great uncles house in the middle of dense trees, and lots of grass that wasn't apart of Central Park.

In the midst of catching up face to face with my other 90 year old great-uncle, a large cloth was pulled from behind the couch and unwrapped until I found myself staring into a painted picture of grandparents five generations back that I had only heard about in fragmented conversations.

Another welcomed reminder in the chaos that appears to be my life these days that the past is always near by.

Monday, October 17, 2011

puzzlement and amusement

"Excuse me miss, do you work here?"

"No."

A puzzled look...

"But, you've been coming here everyday for the past three weeks."

" Research"

Still puzzlement as if it couldn't be comprehended that someone could be that dedicated and engrossed in something.

Then out of the blue:

"You read alot of books don't you? You don't look like you own one of those electronic readers."

I smiled back..yes I own alot of books, my bookcase hates me for it.

Guess I'm that strange of a cookie. Could be worse...

Saturday, October 1, 2011

sound of silence


I had just concluded the week from hell and decided that the only way I would unwind from being a mouse on steroids would be by my favorite past time of walking. So under the Brooklyn Bridge I go, cut across Mott Street, sidestepping the shopping carts, displays of fish, fruits and bags, then Hester, then Orchard..looking for the Orchard Corset Shop, mainly to make sure it was still there. Forgot where it was, backtracked to the Manhattan Bridge, said fuck it, went back UP Orchard Street and passed the Tenement museum and clearly not caring how long it would take me to get home.

They crossed my path somewhere between Delancey and Houston. Didn't pay them any mind until I heard one of the men whistling. Then the other began singing in Hebrew with a shopping bag thrown over his shoulder like a knapsack. The woman remained silent and smiling with a bounce in her step.

I followed behind them, wondering how far they were going, but mostly because I wanted to hear the whistling and the Hebrew. Up First Avenue, past Third Street, Fifth, Ninth..past DeRobertis cafe, glance in at the tiled ceiling and desserts. They weave their way along Stuyvesant Town, before turning to disappear in a courtyard of that city unto itself. On the corner they turn and smile absentmindedly in my direction and I smile back.

And continue on my home, finally unwound.

Thursday, September 22, 2011

Repost from My Private Coney

Thursday, September 22, 2011

Welcome To His New York. Got Kidney?

This is Juan.

And he needs a kidney.

He's New York Mitchell Lama houses on 95th and Amsterdam. When he was growing up there, you still could see New Jersey from Amsterdam. Never lived anywhere else but New York (and you can't count those 8 months in Kansas City). His high school job was opening-the- doors-closing-the-doors at the Planetarium. TWA flight attendants, then glamorous heroes of the sky, in full length fur coats taught him the difference between a silly drink of vodka and orange juice and the sophistication of a kir royale. Christmas finery in those days was skinny jeans and a shirt unbuttoned down to there. Well, after all it was the 70's.

Then Tom met him.



Tom is not from New York. He's from Missouri. He moved to New York and went to a Buddhist gathering. Took one look at Juan and that was that. And that was 26 years ago. Tom is the only reason Juan lived in Kansas City for eight months.

I ask Juan, "What about you is New York?"

"I experienced everything. We didn't grow up with money, but I experienced everything."

This is my friend, Juan. And what I want him to experience is something he hasn't before - a new kidney.

So if you are B+ or maybe even O or O+ or 0- and you got a kidney, my friend needs your help.

And if you are not any of those things, would you help and pass this post forward? Post it to your blog, post it to your facebook, send it out with your pigeons, let your friends know.

Spread the word. And welcome to His New York.

Friday, September 16, 2011

photos for an overworked brain to submerge in..

Confectory Store-1924

Bike Store-1912

Woolworth Building at Night-1913

all from Shorpy

Sunday, August 28, 2011

thoughts on a rainy day

Character is determined more by the lack of certain experiences than by those one has had.

All truly great thoughts are conceived by walking.

One must still have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star.

When you look into an abyss, the abyss also looks into you.


-Nietzsche

Sunday, August 7, 2011

34 going on 110

                 I'm a good pretzeler = I'm a good German ( in his slang)

It seems like only yesterday ( which it was.. literally and figuratively) that two German-Jewish immigrants in their Yorkville tenement apartment welcomed a cute little baby boy named Arthur. Of course, little Arthur was the apple of his mother's eye...could do no wrong. Except the usual slip ups like robbery, homicide with a gun, grand larceny, beer baron, and policy king to name a few of his achievements by the time he reached his final birthday at the age of 34. You may not recognize the name Arthur Flegenheimer, but you would recognize his adopted moniker of Dutch Schultz.

He has also been the cause of excitement, writer's block, bottles of aspirin within easy reach and ridiculous wild goose chases through archives and police stations ( see some of my posts from early last year) as I work on a biography on the man. Pat Downey, a swell fella and awesome crime historian gave me the honor of doing a guest blog for The Dutchman's birthday which you can read here.

Happy Birthday Dutch!


Sunday, July 31, 2011

going back in time to move forward..


Schifft's Pier, Fralingers, White House Subs, Ocean One mall with the Arcade and Atlantic bookstore on the top floor. Those forbidden dens of brightly lit machines that only adults could go into, the plush carpets and chandeliers that I proudly told my father I wanted in my own house when I grew up...

My first real vacation, the only noise I heard were the hysterical laughter of seagulls, the crashes of waves. Pausing at the ramp right next to Fralingers, a powerful memory of my father parking the car at the end of the street, me and my cousins running up the boards with buckets, blankets and an umbrella, with a cooler packed with sandwiches made by my grandmother. Ham and cheese on white bread, and a handful of salt water taffy from Fralingers, it's red awning right on the corner.

White House, best subs in town since 1946, nothing has changed, same orange colored walls, same men behind the counter albeit much older. Now I can look over the counter and see them as they prepare the order but remember the excitement of Italian rolls disappearing from sight to be placed in large bags filled with yummy food.

Ocean One mall is no more, it's skeleton remains now filled with shops outside my budget. The length of an ocean liner extended into the ocean the decks are still there. Walking along the beach I get slammed by waves, welcoming me back and punishing me for being away for so long. stress, worry and fear and doubt get swept away with each tide.

Time it was, and what a time it was, it was...

A time of innocence, a time of confidences.

Long ago, it must be, I have a photograph,

Preserve your memories, they're all that's left you.

-Bookends Theme

Tuesday, July 19, 2011

tale of two Luckys

this is Lucky, or Tiny Tim..I like the first name better. He was found in a driveway, probably the runt of the litter as his mother was nowhere in sight and he still had the afterbirth on him when a dog performing the role of surrogate mother began cleaning him off. To the man who rescued him and gave him a home with ten other brothers and sisters he thought he was a tennis ball.

Now he's a curious 5 week old rascal who posed for the camera when my friend took his picture in between feeding him. She got it right, I got it wrong as he became a wee bit agitated when the milk wasn't coming out of the bottle.

this my Lucky...well not really mine, but I found him and I didn't want to keep calling him baby bird. On a hot Sunday, quite a few blocks from home, lost in my own thoughts, something moving near the curb caught my eye. This baby had fallen out of its nest, breaking its leg and was using all of its energy to push up against the curb, and almost into traffic. I could tell by its labored breathing that it was taking everything out of it.

I didn't want to leave it, but didn't know what to do. The city hot line told me there was an animal hospital on the opposite side of town from where I was that could take it, provided I put it in a box. So in 90 degree weather I rushed home and grabbed gloves, a washcloth and the perfectly sized Panasonic battery box from the bodega owner on the corner. Reaching back to the bird he had surprisingly pushed himself even further down the street. I learned later that it was a baby robin which explained why it wobbled hurriedly towards me with its mouth open when I crouched in the street as my tank top was the color of an adult robin's chest.

Cross town to the hospital, only to be told that there were no vets on staff, that I could take him the next morning to the wildlife rehabilitator all the way back cross town, as they were closed.

"You gotta keep him for the night, if you leave him here he will die."

"What am I supposed to do with him?" a perplexed me countered as my new lodger banged in his box. Food ( which didn't work) and keep him safe.

Back in my apartment I whistle for Lucky to eat ( he chirps back but refuses to open his mouth for any other purpose) I look up that baby robins eat between sunrise and sunset so I rationalize in my head that he simply missed his last meal. In the cool darkness of my bedroom I sit his box on the floor and then proceed to wake up every hour to check that he is still alive.

"Please don't die." His wings moving up and down show me that he is alright...

Then promptly at 5:15 just when I begin to fall asleep, little Lucky starts chirping up a storm, despite my gratitude that he's alive and my pleas for him to be quiet for at least another hour and then I would take him to a nice place where he could eat real food and get his leg fixed. He obliges by turning into a snooze alarm and chirping every 5 minutes.

Bus ride downtown, a moment of panic in the box when an ambulance rolls by but then quietness when the nice wildlife people take him in.

He's doing much better now...and eating.

Tuesday, July 5, 2011

well needed laughter

I found myself the other day crouched on the floor of a bookstore and was engrossed in a book that advertised itself as therapy for writers or something of the sort. Writer is a word that I find hard to identify with at times even after well appreciated critiques of this project that I am engrossed in. There are many others I am in awe of who I think carry that mantle very well.

But there were many things in this little therapy session I could identify with ( silly me, thinking it was all in my head). This one had me rolling in unexpected laughter that was very much needed at the moment:

Writer's Block: When your imaginary friends won't talk to you.-Unknown

:)

Sunday, July 3, 2011

Second Hand Rose

been in my head all weekend...thought I would share so it can  be stuck in yours too. :) from 1921

Friday, July 1, 2011

A Lakota Prayer

When I am lonesome
I look up to the clouds
For they tell me of how
They come and go.


When I am confused
I listen to the wind
For it tells me
What is best for me.

When I am mad I
Listen to the waters flow
It helps clear my mind.

Monday, June 20, 2011

An evening unlocking myself

I'm used to waddling in the muddy waters of time concerning others, so it was a rare treat having it done to me...

A quick train ride into the country, the mouth of the Hudson opening wider and wider. A car ride to a 100 year old house with the cousin who fled my home city forty three years before, whom I didn't meet till I came running in her footsteps.

Dusty boxes and plastic containers full of pictures of people I heard of but never met to be sent in pieces to the cousin in Virigina to scan so that others can have them too.

" If he doesn't send these back, I'm going after him."
 she says over her glasses.

 She labels, and I type and listen to stories weaved in between..

    
"Papi always dressed like a professor no matter what he worked at, and no one could eat till he came home for dinner.. which included salad which in those days meant a slice of tomato, iceberg lettuce and mayo".      

"grandma came from Ireland, I always wanted to go over but never did. She was a nurse, ironic that the same hospital she met her husband, her son would be nursed back to health by his ex-wife's new husband, Uncle Kei some forty years later."



the great-great grandmother whose story I only heard in pieces growing up..

"she fled up to Maryland....he was stabbed, as you know interracial marriage wasn't exactly accepted back then. No one was allowed to ask where she came from or how she met him.."

"....funny how families carry learned behaviors and cultures..atleast you and I stop the pattern in its tracks"

thirty six years apart, but strikingly the same, guess some patterns don't change...

people constantly running, the white woman who ran north only to have three out of four grandsons and one grand daughter head back to place she didn't want to be. And her great-great grandchildren wandering all over...
         
after a day of unlocking ourselves and worn out, a spur of the moment drive to the next town over for food...                      


                                                                                                                              
then finally heading home, possessing equal questions and answers, and more mystery in those boxes.

Friday, June 3, 2011

wrap your troubles in dreams

It's rare that I have a dream that I can fully remember in the morning and when they do happen they usually leave me rattled. The one this morning ( at least I am guessing that it is when it happened as I woke up near 4am) was a mix of me being a kid sitting in a passenger seat of a car, trying to peer out the window and glancing at who was at the steering wheel.

Each time I turned back the driver switched from being my father, my mother and other family members.

Then I was a grownup, except the dashboard of the car went back about oh 80 years and I was wearing items that someone today would pay a ridiculous amount of money to own or replicate. And the words and images gleaned from within 50 plus microfiche cards ( containing over 25 pages of photostatic images mind you) came back and I got out of the car only to have that broken nosed ghost in a fedora to be walking toward me with a smile on his face. Stops in front of me and smiles patiently at me. At that point I woke up.

The rest of my day proceeded to be a whirlwind of hell, as if I was in a teacup at an amusement park and couldn't get off.

The point I realized was that I had and have become too stretched, worn out and jumping around like a mouse on steroids for everything and everyone except those things that have a higher level of importance for me. Those things that bring me joy.

Time to put the car in reverse and go back in the other direction, and boy am I looking forward to it.

Tuesday, May 24, 2011

quiet refuge in chaos


an actual smile as a greeting from the archivist.

"You are my favorite customer cause you always know what you're looking for. Oh you are one of us, you don't need my help." Gestures with his hand toward the twisting walkways in between miles of files.

Passage through semi dark hallways, glimpses of dusty books I'd like to go through another time.

Till I reach these..rows of them. And in the semi darkness in the midst of a chaotic week I get to pour over approximately 50 micro reels and counting on an old machine containing information on two people.

Yes, this is my quiet time.

Saturday, May 7, 2011

bonding over poison

The space a looong time ago use to be a bank, one of the first owned and operated by African Americans in New York. Knew of its existence but not its location until two years ago when checks over 75 years old turned up in boxes while I was researching my moody research subject. I live right above it.

Its recent reincarnation has been a pain in the ass, a fish market. I don't care for fish, particularly when it is steamed and comes into my apartment. That problem was fixed, me being the neurotic that I am, but then I come home today to my alarm screaming CARBON MONOXIDE! EXIT! EXIT!

After about three rounds of this I knew the battery wasn't dead so I opened the window more and called that wonderful information line on what to do next as there's one thing going through a test run and then the real mccoy..

well, that led to a parade of firemen coming into my home, looking very cute in their uniforms and managing to compliment me on my home as they went about their work, then me calling neighbors as then several other alarms went off like chimes. Then Con Edison men coming into my home and complimenting my space, and finally sitting outside till 11pm at night as said firemen and the con edison people worked on finding the problem in the wonderful arena of Mr. Limpet. A steamer that's bad, can't be used again until it is replaced. Thank God.

Sat outside with my other neighbors, some sharing their dinner with me and the older ones telling me everything that space was in between  being a bank that was a symbol of pride in the neighborhood to being a pain in the ass not only for me but the other apartments directly and indirectly above it.

Hopefully this will be the last of the problems from that store, though I wouldn't mind a pair of Dorothy's red slippers, not to go home but to turn that space back into the symbol of pride that it once was.

Wednesday, May 4, 2011

where I would rather be right now...

then waiting for a repair man/woman to show up....



Times Square- 1911-looks more fun in this picture





Coney Island-1903


                                                              A drug store-1910


All photos from Shorpy

Saturday, April 16, 2011

Pulaskitown



over 100 plus years of memories...

stairs that creaked and whined over 20 years ago, and 40 years before that, still creak and whine.

Banisters with knobs as big as a bowling ball.

Original floors worn from all the children that skidded across them bounding for the street or the backyard.

Kitchen still the same, a little more modern with kitchen table in the same spot it would be on those summer evenings when my father and his cousins would play cards or backgammon or checkers and me and the younger ones bounded up the street for the park, or the yard, or the other cousin's house down the street.

Walls absorbing an equal mix of joy and sadness.

This was and is "Pulaskitown", as my great uncle recently said at his 90th birthday. Pulaski Avenue was the anchor for where his family and my family grew up.

and for me as a kid this house was at the center of it. And for my family, it still is. During a short weekend years of separation disappeared, absorbed in its walls. Replaced with fond memories, old and new.

Thursday, March 31, 2011

newspaper clipping

caught my eye on a ride to work..

"...I think just understanding what the whole city is about. New York, a lot of people wouldn't be able to deal with this. It takes a special type of person, a humble person but a real straightforward person to actually embrace a city like this. And for a city like this to embrace you, that means a lot."

Sunday, March 27, 2011

calm along the Hudson

One of the great benefits of moving to here is connecting with family I never knew...or to rephrase it, they knew me, but I never knew them. Only their names. A cousin who is 15 years older than my father came to New York in the 60's and never came back. From dialogue that I would hear as me and cousins my own age would run around my great aunt's house, she was clearly the bohemian type. I was in awe of her by the words and snippets of conversation I would hear.

So as I packed suitcases all those years ago, my father gave me her name and phone number as family to reach out to. After dragging those suitcases up and down streets parallel to Riverside Drive I called. We arranged to meet one Saturday afternoon and I had a brief moment of fear that I wouldn't recognize her. The only picture I had seen of her was circa 1972. But that was quickly put to rest as she was the spittin image of my grandmother. Her soul very calm despite the chaos around us.

Fast forward years later, to today and I have met her husband, her first husband, and her son whom I met for the first time last summer. Who is only five years older than me, has a restless spirit like his mother and lives less than 20 blocks away from me. I got an invite to lunch at the house ( where the second husband grew up) along the Hudson and me and the class weary cousin drove up, asking each other questions to get to know each other better.

 Rustic trimmed house, bright white walls and lots of sunlight with the Hudson gleaming down the road. The family I did know from back home ( her sisters and 82 year old mother) were there and it was a mini family reunion. Witty dialogue and old recipes sprung out from my great aunt. I always remembered her growing up, saying bits of wisdom back then.

Before she left to go home she grabbed my arm and smiled and whispered

" You're only as old as you feel. Live life, make friends and you will be happy. That's what I do. I don't waste my time worrying about what others do. It's not for me to judge, only God can do that...I can see in your face you are the same way."

I smiled and nodded yes.

 "Ooh it was great to see you! Wait till I tell your grandmother I saw you!"

 Me and my cousin waved goodbye, helped with the dishes and drove home. Grateful for the small break from the hustle and promising to stay more in touch. And meant it.

Monday, March 14, 2011

thought for the week

Face life as you find it-defiantly and unafraid.
Waste no energy on yearning for the moon.

-Nietzche
Thoughts out of Season

Sunday, February 27, 2011

memory lane

A new set of kicks ( one of two) a new set of adventures.

After suffering through a library induced headache, I headed south for coffee and food, suddenly stumbled across this, a place I hadn't been to in a long time,,,


through the eyes of that second story window I got my first preview of my new home. Sounds of trucks rumbling up and down the avenue at all hours. I was excited at being invited back to this city twice in one week due to an interview ( I got picked! yay!) and a friend was renting a sublet at this address. Never heard of a sublet, let alone been in one at that time. My old hometown is filled primarily with single family homes, or duplexes. If apartments existed they were camouflaged behind screen porches and front yards, mostly of the asphalt variety. If you actually got grass you guarded it.


the halls were just as dark as the vestibule. Sickly yellow and brown hallways, white florescent light in the hall and my other first encounter as an immigrant in a new world: A shared bathroom in the hall with the other tenants on the floor, with a shower head facing me directly in the face, verses planted on the wall to your left or your right. Those shower heads provided dark comedy in another sublet ( one I moved into after I knew what the word meant and before I was lucky enough to get my own space) when my slightly off her rocker roommate forgot to put the liner in the tub and the power of the water pressure leaked through the tiles to the chandelier in the lobby and set it on fire.
She didn't know what happened until the super came up with a firefighter. I didn't know until I came home from walking around my new home and saw the water marks on the lobby floor and soaked tiles in the bathroom. At any rate this bathroom was dark too, bulbs deciding they didn't want to work anymore. A cold water flat in another era.

I darted out of that vestibule to interviews, the Empire State building looming up ahead and me being stupid enough to wear heels four avenues and six streets over ( I quickly learned my lesson). I got the job and the rewarding sound of that noise in a different neighborhood.
The buiding appears to be empty now, black bags cover all the windows. Probably destined to be turned into something else.
on the way back home from coffee and food, I came across this. fitting for that other memory I am trying to reconstruct piece by piece as best I can.



Wednesday, February 16, 2011

wish for a moment

I want to go down to the open sea, I'll search for a sunlit strand.
Where clean scented winds blow cool and free, o'er glittering swirling sand.

I want to go out on the sparkling shore, where frolicsome wavelets play.
I'm yearning to feel on my cheek once more, the kiss of the ardent spray.

There's longing down deep in the heart of me, to look on the sun-shot foam.
I want to go down to the open sea, and then I'll come right back home.

from Wanderlust, Dorothy Parker

Friday, February 11, 2011

mental images heard and seen...

heard....

An older woman sits on chair outside her apartment on the Grand Concourse. A large pitbull sits next to her staring in the opposite direction. Neighbor comes out and says hello.

" When did you get a dog? Is that your dog?"

"Mine? Oh no, he belongs to the store. You thought he was mine? Lord, he's bigger than my whole apartment!"

Two men exiting a bank.

First one: " Did you hear about Joel? He was dead broke, played a dollar and got almost a hundred grand!"

" So what? That ain't helping me."

Seen:

Sign on the side of an apartment complex from over 70 years ago advertising for "Available Apartments" "Inquire within" or call the owner at Jerome-7119.

would love to know what those went for....

Sunday, January 30, 2011

the original and the knock off



natural light in Grand Central-1941

What used to be lit by nature is captured glaringly by a movie prop floodlight that can never replicate the original...


artificial capture on a Sunday afternoon

Monday, January 17, 2011

all roads lead home


left the house pretty early with one goal in mind, hadn't gone for a walk like this in awhile and I needed it. Grabbed a cup of coffee at the corner bodega, made my way down the central artery that cuts through Harlem valley. looped around the large green space in the middle, cut across millionaire's row, minks and uggs galore, pharmacies and florist shops since the 1890's.

Passed the luxury shops wondering how they can afford to stay open with no traffic going in. Light a candle for the lost souls in the church where F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald got married. Beads, threading, hats and purses. move on...

Passed what once was Tammany Hall, the sight of Luchow's and realize I'm hungry. Thought I could hold out till Veselka's for soup but got enticed by the hole in the wall selling dumplings and corn soup. Get distracted by the meat shop on Second Avenue and gaze at the sausages, blitzes and lamb chops the size of a football and have fantasies of being able to cook all of that. Russian filters in and out of my ears as I go up and down the display cases...mental note to come back but only to buy something I will realistically cook and eat.

Almost there...pass houston, delancey, grand..can see a partial view of the Manhattan bridge. Pass the cup and saucer lucheonette which looks more like one those old timey places for people on the run as I didn't see any seats, just counter space.



I made it!


then conversations of reform and orthodox, uptown and downtown, mentally making a note of what I need to change in that one chapter, unexpected company from a woman whose grandmother was a Ratner and the lady I was partnered with filling my head with 124 years of history I will have to remember at some point.


" Well you found you're right place, everyone has their own way for telling the story." It's alot to remember but think I can handle it,

As dusk sets, I get ready for the return trip cutting through another swath of my home. I survived. but the sneakers finally gave out. oh well, time for another pair.

Thursday, January 13, 2011

"you must retreat in order to advance"

So I am retreating...back to when women knew how to really dress it up....

Fox Furs-1910


to when you could be reminded of how small you were in the world
Banker's Row-Pittsburgh-1915
to when you had more choices to wet your imagination....

Zine Shop-1940


-images from Shorpy

Monday, January 3, 2011

lesson from the pond


keep your head above water, paddle even if you can't swim that well and eventually the barrier will slowly eb away.