On Friday, November 22, 1963, after lunch the St. Stephen of Hungary’s student body assembled in the auditorium for our once in a blue moon movie. That day our feature was “The Yearling.” A kid adopts a baby deer and his father played by Gregory Peck gives him the business. I was happy and not… Read more »
Only good part to getting older is how I pop up in the early morning like a Reverse Vampire. Makes it easy to get outside when the light’s right. This past Saturday, I rode my bicycle to Central Park and arrived at Bow Bridge on The Lake at 6:45. The colors in the park slowly… Read more »
I used to ride in my father’s rumble seat,” Dad told me while we sat at the bar in Loftus Tavern. As Dad drank a short beer and I sipped a coke, I wondered what’s a rumble seat? I asked. He said, “It was a seat that hinged out of the back of the car, it felt like you… Read more »
As a boy in the early 1960s, I’d go up my grandparents’ second floor apartment on York Avenue several times a week. Their hallway was lit by one low watt exposed bulb. The dark hall frightened me. Sometimes my fear was compounded when I’d hear fuzzy radio sounds coming from the usually locked basement. I… Read more »
Last weekend, I wrote and worked on a park bench near Sailboat Lake. I saw a few trees that looked familiar and thought back. As a boy, I’d climb trees all over Central Park, never looking down, go up as far as I could, then I’d look down. My heart would relocate to the outside… Read more »
In October of 1960, Mom was pulling for Kennedy and Dad was rooting for Nixon. I couldn’t have cared less one way or the other—my thoughts were on baseball. The Pittsburgh Pirates had just crushed my heart by beating the Yankees in the seventh game of the World Series (to this day, I still wonder… Read more »
This past Sunday at Rockaway Beach, I met my first book customer: Bailey the Puppy. Bailey told me that he’d ordered River to River: New York Scenes from a Bicycle the moment after YBK published it last Thursday. He confirmed his purchase with a printout of his Amazon receipt, and paid for the book with Greenies. I was touched and gave him… Read more »
Summer’s almost gone in New York City, but the beauty of the season reveals itself in many ways. Two that move me: the severity and speed of weather changes, and the final days of the sun’s slow descent until next year. In the past week, I’ve been caught in the rain twice (along with the… Read more »
The midnight heat created a film of sweat between me and my underwear. I couldn’t take it. I began dragging my mattress toward my parent’s bedroom. With my mattress pulled around me, I squeezed through their doorway. There was no door, just a sheet tacked over the threshold. My father’s grunts and moans drowned out… Read more »
Next Tuesday, August 14th, Garland Jeffreys—one of my songwriting heroes—will perform at City Stories: Stoops to Nuts at the Cornelia Street Cafe. It’s a family affair: Garland, Claire, and Savannah Jeffreys will take the stage along with Robert Conroy, one of my favorite artists from the Loser’s Lounge. Jeffreys is a New York City treasure. Please… Read more »
