Looking Backwards.

Oct 27, 2004

What with moving and now unpacking, I haven't been able to write much. I've been looking at some photos on my camera's card (wonder what my dad would've made of that: "a camera card? No film?") wanting to clear it of its contents and came across photos I took a few days after the move. We went back to our old house to fetch the contents of the one single drawer that Stacey forgot to pack. (Don't ask). And so I had my opportunity, missed on hectic moving day, of shooting the house, empty.

It was strange to see my old home vacated of its contents, sounds of our footsteps echoing through the empty rooms. The buyer, we hear through the grapevine, is not moving in but renting it out for the time being. Apparently, they haven't sold their condo as they expected and so they won't be moving in anytime soon. And that also means, I think, that the house, won't be a "tear down", unusual for Manhattan Beach, but, instead, will be renovated and preserved for the time being. We've heard that one before and it's turned out to be not so. We'll see.


Looking to the front of our empty house.


And to the back.

Dani, artist that she is, decorated her bi-fold doolrs in her bedroom. This was a many year project that coincided with her enraptured adoration of the rock group Smashing Pumpkins. And so the doors (no pun intended) took on the shibboleths of the lead singer, Billy Corgan.

Take a look. I love them. We didn't take the doors with us -- except in my camera. Hey Dad, they're on my hard drive now. And now they're on my Blog!


Dani's beautiful doors in her bedroom.


An overview of Dani's doors.


Detail of Dani's doors.


Detail of Dani's door.

Unsettled In Brooklyn.

Oct 22, 2004

Moving sucks. First a month or so of hell - intense pressure to pack up 26 years into cardboard boxes in a month's time. Now the pressure's gone. But the tsoris remains - I'm living in cardboard hell - boxes everywhere, I have to walk sideways through narrow passages that we've left to negotiate from room to room. And where is everything? Today Stacey suddenly realized that she forgot to empty one of our kitchen drawers.

I feel quite beat up. My back aches. My knee is blown up, the victim of moving heavy boxes up and downstairs, kneeling on the floor installing our new stove and microwave. Today I ran a water pipe to the refrigerator so it can produce ice and cold water. We moved dozens of boxes into the backyard (under a shed roof that will somewhat protect them from rain). That, so we can get into the rear guest room and build shelves to hold at least some of the contents of those blasted boxes. Our friends have offered storage at their country house for at least some of those containers. And maybe the landlord will allow some more storage in the basement. And I think, we'll just have to part with stuff that we haven't been willing to throw out. Again, if you haven't seen this stuff for five or ten years, then does it really exist?

I know that the time will come in a month or so when we can say we're settled. But for now it's unsettling, confusing, depressing.

====

Last night we walked around the corner to Vanderbilt Avenue and discovered a lovely Italian restaurant - Aliseo. The owner, Albano, has a heavy Italian accent and hails from the Marche region of Italia and so the cuisine reflects that origin. It's a small, warm and cozy room with wallpapered walls and a tin ceiling. The food was delicious. A real find.

Earlier, we walked over to the Brooklyn Museum and met our friend Tamar. She's a public school art teacher and uses the museum regularly as a teaching tool for her students. We had lunch at the cafeteria and took a tour of two current shows: John Singer Sargent and his portraits of children from before and after the turn of the last century and a more contemporary artist, Kehinde Wiley. He's a young Black artist who uses Black males as models. He discovers them on the street, interviews them briefly in his studio where he allows them to peruse the great classical portraits painted through the ages. He then asks them which pose is their favorite and then photographs them in that very same stance. He bids his model farewell and the painting is made later from those photos. They're large works that blend the classical pose with a portrait of young Black man man dressed in modern street garb. Add a touch of very colorful whimsy and a dramatic juxtaposition of the old and the new. A video shows the young artist at work in his Harlem studio.


Young Black man as a saint ascending to heaven?

The neighborhood is, from my first glance, wonderful: diverse, young and hip. And the politics? I've never seen so many Kerry posters in so many windows. Not to mention the derisive Bush signs in house after house. I love the brownstones and I love walking down the side streets that run from our place on Underhill Avenue over to Flatbush Avenue.

This is a biking neighborhood for sure. Our street is very quiet with very little car traffic. But just three blocks away, Flatbush Avenue is a major artery and is overrun with trucks and cars. Walking or bicycling is the way to get around. And the neighborhood kisses all the other neighborhoods that I love so much: Park Slope, Cobble Hill, Boerum Hill, Clinton Hill and Brooklyn Heights. Manhattan is just minutes away as well - by car or by subway.

In future blogs I hope to document with word and picture just what this new neighborhood means to us and why we like it so much. Please check back.

Mission Accomplished.

Oct 18, 2004

Sorry for using that much derised George Bush declaration. But in this case it fits. We moved in yesterday, Saturday, October 16th, 2004. It was the Move From Hell.Ten hours it took...I've never seen four human beings work as hard as the guys who took our stuff of 28 years, pile it into their truck and move it 7 miles from West End Avenue in Manhattan Beach to Underhill Avenue in Prospect Heights.

May as well have moved it around the world for the vast differences in those two neighborhoods. More of that in future blogs.

Just suffice it to say that I'm very tired. I don't think I've ever felt this beat up - physically. My right knee is swollen with fluid. I can't bend it or kneel on it. My lower back is sore. Haven't been to the gym in weeks. Nor have I ridden my bike. I miss that so much but the act of moving is so demanding on time and energy - we've focused on nothing but the move for the last month. The pressure was intense - the deadline was Friday the 15th but the forecast was for heavy rain so we prevailed on the mover to move it up to Saturday. Still - it never seemed to end. The more we packed into boxes, the more depressed and agitated I became. There was always more. And, of course, the other question was: where the hell are we going to put all this stuff. (More on that also in a later Blog).

So. It was a terrible experience that people shoudl try to avoid at all costs. Why do we accumulate so much stuff? That's really the question to be answered. The corollary is: Why can't we part with it more easily? The theory should be, I believe: if you haven't touched it or laid eyes on it in many years, then, for all intents, it don't exist - bye, bye! But no! That resulting contradiction led to lots of tension and arguments between my wife and me.

But now it's over. And we're here. And we survived. I think. It'll be several months before this lovely apartment in an old Brooklyn brownstone on a great Brooklyn street takes shape. But that will come and there's no horrible time constraint as there was before the move. I just can't wait to dig into my new neighborhood - which is just where I want to be: it's great here -- diverse, tree-lined, low-rise, great old buildings, the great Park, the library, the museum, the restaurants...yes, the restaurants. The other night we sauntered around the corner to Vanderbilt Avenue and had Indian food - couldn't do that in Manhattan Beach. We wanted to try the very sweet Italian restaurant that was next door but it was Friday night and the line was out the door. Next time.

I think I'm gonna like this very much. Time will tell. But right now time is telling me to get into bed and get some needed rest. Tomorrow we close on the sale of our old house and a large part of our lives will begin to fade away. The new chapter starts now.


Moving day and our old house is bare walls and lots and lots and lots of boxes...ready to go.


A poster of Dani at a very young age stands forlornly, waiting to be moved to the new apartment. What to do with all those pictures?


Moving van is here. Goodbye old house of 26 years. My parents' house (sold in April) stands overgrown on right.

You Say You Never Had A Wild Turkey?

Oct 3, 2004

We visited my best friend Lonnie yesterday and took (Stacey's cousin) Stephanie and her husband, Ray, with us. Should have been packing but, what the hell, we still have 16 days left ... we can finish that any time. Oy.

Our idea was to attend the once-a-month auction held in Cuddebackville, the town-ette near Lonnie's country house. These are real country auctions where you can get great prices on antiques, collectables, furniture. So we started off, in the rain, in the car, and, after 3 hours or so, arrived. A little meal of ribs, shrimp and wine was served and then we were off to the auction.

Well, not quite. As Lonnie was taking the new guests on a tour of his manse he spied a flock of wild turkeys in his back forty. Quick as you can say Thanksgiving is a comin,' Lonnie was gone. Stephanie thought that he, being the photographer that he is, was off to "shoot" the turkeys with his camera. I knew better. Like a flash he ran through the living room where I had been sitting with Stacey and Monique, shotgun in hand and a strange expression on face. He didn't quite run. But if you've seen racing walkers and the strange way that they stride, then you've imagined what Lonnie looked like as he whizzed through the house. Out across the meadow he headed. I could swear the turkeys did a double take as they saw Daniel Boone cum elderly Jew from Brooklyn race toward them. They headed swiftly into the forest, Lonnie in pursuit. The next thing we heard was the loud report of the gun and then ... silence.

Well, my friend Lonnie, the great hunter that he is, has been trying to bag a wild turkey for lo many years. He has never succeeded. But we will now remember and consecrate the second day of October forever more as the day that Lonnie brought home the bird. Actually, two birds.

October 2, 2004 - the day that Lonnie flipped the bird, er, birds.
No doubt you're familiar with that old TV theme song for the pioneer Daniel Boone:

Daniel Boone was a man,
Yes, a big man!
With an eye like an eagle
And as tall as a mountain was he!
Daniel Boone was a man,
Yes, a big man!
He was brave, he was fearless
And as tough as a mighty oak tree!
From the coonskin cap on the top of ol' Dan
To the heel of his rawhide shoe;
The rippin'est, roarin'est, fightin'est man
The frontier ever knew!

And now Stephanie and Ray's version:

My friend Lonnie's a man
A nice Jewish man.
Equipped with a gun,
Though mostly for fun.
Shooting away
But with mostly dismay
Until that fateful October day
With a visit from Steph and Ray.
The turkeys, they were nibbling in the meadow
Unaware of this fearless gun-toting fellow.
Then the birds they were shot
But by a camera - - NOT!
Were the turkeys tired? Slow?
Sadly, this we will never know.
But one thing is for sure,
Lonnie's settled the score.
Now it's man over beast
At this November's Thanksgiving feast.

The Debate Should End The Debate - Shouldn't It?

Oct 1, 2004

To the doubters out there, last night's debate should have ended the debate as to the caliber of George Bush. I really tried to be objective (it's hard when it comes to Bush because the man engenders very strong negative feelings in so very many people), to put my views aside and to see what a less partisan person might see watching the debate. Was there any contest here? First of all, to my mind, vast differences in positions. Here's what I heard:

Kerry: Essentially against the doctrine of preemptive war. We need alliances in this complex world and must respect the opinions of mankind.
Bush: Arrogantly: "I don't need a permission slip", etc.

Kerry: For continuing on the path of nuclear disarmament.
Bush: Acting to weaken historic disarmament treaties. Wants to develop a new generation of nukes to defend us from whom??

Kerry: Global warming to be taken as a serious threat.
Bush: Pulled out of Kyoto. "Global warming is not proven."

Kerry: Iraq is a disaster. Bush made a colossal blunder.
Bush: Iraq? No problem. Bring'em on! Mission Accomplished!

Kerry had a very fine command of facts and figures. But he didn't sermonize. He was calm but on target. He sounded and looked reasonable and "Presidential."

Bush on the other hand was on the defensive for 70% of the evening. He seemed peevish and testy and struggled for words, rebuttals and answers, continously returning to a carefully rehearsed theme: "I'm consistent. People know what I stand for." But further than that he couldn't travel. And I believe people saw that and it should give them pause that this man of limited intelligence and complexity is the head of the world's most powerful military. I don't know how many times he repeated the phrase "mixed messages". Another oft-used phrase by the President who has spent most of his Presidency on vacation in Crawford, Texas, was that waging war was "hard work." Yeah, probably about as hard as his stint in the Texas National Guard.

Polls, taken afterwards by various news media , put the win for Kerry at anywhere from 70 to 30 down to 60 to 40. Of course, the spinmeisters and talking heads went to work immediately trying to save the day for King George, I hope to no avail. Is this the turn-around we've been waiting for? Time will tell. One thing is clear. Kerry (and his advisors) have finally seen the light. You cannot win the election by being Bush light. Ain't gonna work and it wasn't working - he was falling further and further behind. By taking a forthright stand against the war (he still has more to go in that regard) and putting the blame where it belongs on Bush and his neo-con gang, he can wrap up the election on November 2.

Bush appeared to be astounded that Kerry would criticize him, The War President. After all, that's what Rove and Cheney had assured him. Kerry put that one to rest and now the tragedy, blunders and lies of 4 years of Bush are fair game. Go get him, John!

We watched the debate at Jerry's, a Soho restaurant on Prince Street. The crowd, as any New York crowd would be, was about 90% Kerry. There were two Wall Street 30-something Bushies in the crowd. And, in a friendly manner, there was a back and forth between them (they were vociferous on behalf of George) and the rest. But even they (and this impressed me) had to admit that George lost the night badly. Did it change their mind? I don't know. It certainly had to plant the seeds of doubt.


Jerry's on Prince Street. Nice little bar and restaurant, just
a block west of Broadway.



Watching the debate at Jerry's.

Afterwards, and to my amazement, the crowd broke into a chant:
"Hey, Hey! Ho, Ho! George Bush has gotta go!" I'm not kidding. They actually did that. Over and over. One cool young guy at the bar began it and the entire place picked it up! I had absolutely nothing to do with it except to join in. New York is not Arkansas, that's for sure.

Joining us for dinner was Stacey's cousin Stephanie (in town for a trade show at the Pier) and her employee and friend, Emily, who lives in Jacksonville, Florida. She complains because she is ardently anti-Bush and it's not easy down there in that part of Florida. And so she was elated and cheered by the scene in the bar.


Emily on Prince Street - after the debate.


Stacey, Stephanie and Emily on Broadway.

This is the most important election in our lifetime if not in the history of our country. Despite a complacent and compliant media that misleads our people and distorts the truth; despite the lies, smears and calumnies of the Bush Gang, I believe the truth will out. Bush can spout(and the media can support) the bull about bringing Democracy to Iraq. He can paint a rosy picture in the face of terrible tragedy. But sooner or later, as Lincon pointed out, most of the people will be fooled no longer. Let's hope it's sooner.

Movin' Blues - Part II.

Sep 29, 2004

My good friend, Henry Foner, sent me a verse (only the first so far, says he) after reading my Got The Movin' Blues Blog of yesterday. I thought I would share it with the world. Here 'tis:


Movin' Blues

I've got those "life-was-always-in-my-reach,
Living-in-Manhattan-Beach blues."
I've got those "shedding-all-these-bitter-tears
Shredding-all-those-bitter-years blues."

And ev'ry time the moving man knocks,
I've got to give him another box --

I've got those now-that-Sol-Gorelick's*-gone,
Who'm-I-gonna-lean-upon blues.

* Sol Gorelick was a labor and community activist and friend, who passed away recently.

Only In Brooklyn.

Sep 28, 2004

Brooklyn - fuhgeddabout it! So says the signs posted by the omnipresent president of the same borough, Marty Markowitz. And so, while perusing some streets in Bensonhurst the other day, I came upon this side yard decorated with life-sized figures of whom?? Betty Boop, Elvis, Marilyn Monroe and Frankenstein, among others. All seem to be beckoning us to enter the garage, here decorated as the Brooklyn Battery Tunnel. The picture speaks for iself. But why, how? I figure, it's Brooklyn, is all.

Bensonhurst driveway as the Battery Tunnel lined with the likes of Frankenstein and Elvis. By the way, you can click on any picture for a larger view.

Got The Movin' Blues

Sep 28, 2004

Haven't been able to post. Moving is my every day, every minute activity. I'm tired, depressed and stressed. We started taking boxes over to our new apartment. Our intention was to get boxes out of our way as they began to pile up. So we shlepped some over to the apartment. Then, in a few days, we made another trip. Then another. So far, we've moved 75 boxes to the new place and the end is not in sight.

Yesterday we got our closing date: October 18th. So the end (of the moving) is in sight. We've made a big dent, but there's so much more to go. Day in, day out: get up and attack another room, another area of the house. But the big question in my mind -- where are we going to put all this stuff? We're moving from 8 rooms to 6 rooms. And the kicker? No basement. So things have got to go: either in the garbage, to Goodwill or to storage.

It's very hard to throw stuff out. Try throwing away pictures, for example. Having been in the business, I have amassed tens of thousands of photos. Maybe there are millions of photos, I don't really know. But there's a lot. Boxes and boxes of photos. Many are in albums. But thousands are not. These are the recorded history of our family. Parties, Thanksgivings, Passovers, travel, camping, babies growing into toddlers, then into children, then teenagers, then adults. Problem is, too many photos. Put them in storage? Then what? Who's going to look at them? When?


Pumpkin is still perched on unopened moving boxes but her perch is getting narrower as we go continue to pack.


Our van, filled with boxes. Heavy work.

And here's where they've been ending up.

We moved into our house in 1978. I was 32 years old. I'm 58 now. This house contains a big chunk of my life. Of my family's life. Just like our photos, it's a depository of so many events, of so much time, energy and work expended on it. So many happy times, some sad times. If this house could talk it could tell the story of my family, week by week, year by year.

There are many wonderful memories in this old house. There was the time that Larry (Stacey's dad, now gone) and I installed new Anderson windows. What a job. We removed the ancient double-hung windows, enlarged the opening and installed the new units. Brave, I was! And Larry tought me to be brave but also how to use tools, how to measure, how to build.

Stacey and I built our rear deck. We chopped out old windows and converted them into a sliding door. Then we installed upright footings into concrete. On top of that we constructed the deck and transformed our meager back yard into a living space that has given us so much pleasure over the years. Our new apartment, which is two floors in a Brooklyn brownstone, has a postage-stamp sized back yard. But at least it has some outdoor space which I felt was a prerequisite for any new place that we would live in. To move from a house with a driveway and yard to a small, cramped apartment without any outdoor space (even a terrace) was impossible to me.

The deck and the door that we built with sweat and tears.

Our deck - countless summer hours spent out here.

When our picket fence, which had been built by the former owner, deteriorated and began to decay, we decided to recreate it. It's probably the only white picket fence in Manhattan Beach, being more at home in Yankee New England than Brooklyn, and we loved it. The original was a traditional picket fence with pointed tops. We copied our new one from fences we'd seen in Martha's Vineyard on many visits there. Unfortunately, it, too, is now decaying, a victim of the salt air and time.

Me and the upright footings that will support our new picket fence, August, 1999.

Work in progress.

Checking the level. Puttin' on the pickets.

Stacey -- she's on the level.


Our house and picket fence today.

The not-so-famous one-column house on Amherst Street in Manhattan Beach.
Is this what's going to replace our old house?

We're leaving our old house behind. Most likely, it'll be torn down and replaced by some enormous castle-like structure devoid of personality, out of context (except, by this time, these new houses have become prevalent and thus, they are now the context), too large for the 40x100 city lots that they occupy. I guess they too will eventually contain their memories, replacing the houses that once stood in their place. So we're leaving the house, but we'll take our memories with us. Yep, I'm loading those boxes of pictures.

Guantanamo

Monday, Sep 20, 2004

The house looks like a mess - we've begun to pack in earnest. Moving is an incubus. Twenty six years of stuff to go through. Decide what comes with us. What gets discarded. The boxes are beginning to get filled. We're piling them in various rooms. Or moving them toward the front of the house and stacking them there. Pumpkin is very upset. She knows something is happening and she's not happy about it. Come to think of it, I'm not happy either. Moving sucks. I don't know how some people move every few years. Impossible. Pumpkin is my cat, in case you're wondering.


Boxes, boxes - everywhere you look, boxes!

You're probably wondering why this post is called Guantanamo. Sometimes I just write these posts backwards.

The other night we saw a play: "Guantanamo: Honor Bound to Defend Freedom." It came here from a run in the UK where it received raves. It's a documentary play. That is, like its predecessor, Exonerated, at the same theater -45 Bleecker - the dialog is the actual spoken or written words of either persons incarcerated at the infamous prison camp in Cuba or the words of their anguished family members.

Nightmarish are the terrible descriptions of being caught up in the throes of war, arrested and taken thousands of miles from family and home. Held in cages in the tropical heat of the Guantanamo without charges. Presumed guilty without trial or evidence. No explanations given. Years pass without a glimmer of hope. Suicide is the answer for dozens as hope gives out. The arrogant Rumsfeld is presented and questions are asked him about the Geneva accords and democracy and human rights which he rudely brushes aside.

If you have questions about the direction our country is headed, this play will only confirm them. I hope you get a chance to see this play before it closes in several weeks.

Here's part of the Times review by Ben Brantley:

On an anxious night, you have probably had a dream that goes something like this. You are arrested by uniformed officers for a crime that is never specified but that you know you did not commit. And there is no way for you to prove your innocence. Such a scenario was immortalized by Franz Kafka in "The Trial." It is also the real-life situation of Jamal al-Harith, Bisher al-Rawi, Mozzam Begg and Ruel Ahmed. Their stories are told with a bafflement that shades into gut-level despair in this deeply moving documentary play by Victoria Brittain and Gillian Slovo. First produced in London by the Tricycle Theater, this calmly condemning drama considers the plights of some of the British detainees in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. There is no question that it is a partisan work. But it exerts an icy visceral charge that is never achieved by flashier agitprop satire, like Tim Robbins's Bush-bashing "Embedded." - Ben Brantley.

Tickets can be had at 212-307-4100.


Go see it!
Guantanamo at the 45 Bleecker Street theater.

Rolling Around The Big Apple With 5000 Other Bikes

Sunday, Sep 12, 2004 --

Today was the 15th annual NYC Century Bike Tour (my 5th or 6th - lost count a while ago) and what a day it was! Stunning and perfect for a tour on bicycle of our fair city. Stacey and I joined 5,000 others as we started from the Harlem Meers (the Meers is a lovely lake and lawn at the far north end of Central Park at 110th Street).

We woke at five. (Yes, you read that right- five o'clock). The word "Century" as applied to a bike ride signifies one that is 100 miles long. The rider, however, gets a choice of 15, 35, 55, 75 or the whole megillah if he or she is so inclined. We're not. We took the 35 mile tour which just right.

As I loaded the bikes into the car for the trip into the city, I stopped to admire the beautiful day that was dawning. A tiny crescent moon coupled with a very bright Venus were dueling with the rising sun.


Getting ready to leave for the bike ride. A beautiful sliver of the moon and Venus greeted me.

There were 1000's of bikers and bikes at the starting point. The ride is sponsored by Transportation Alternatives, a wondeful NYC organization (of which I'm a proud and long-standing member) that promotes bicycling, walking and more sensible (read less cars) transportation policies to make city life healthier, less stressful and more enjoyable. Despite the large number of bikes lining up to take off, things went very smoothly thanks to TA's well-prepared organization. The time you departed depended on which mileage you were riding. So the 35'ers were to leave at 7:30. If you were doing the 100 you were expected to be at the starting line at 5:30! (another reason for choosing a lesser amount, right?)


Some lined up for the WC before lining up to leave on the tour.

The beauty part of this tour is that you get to see so many great New York sights and neighborhoods. It covers every borough but Staten Island and it's designed to show off great NYC bike routes - many of them car-free - part of the ever-increasing NYC Greenway System. However, many miles are on the road and sharing it with cars. Cyclists, with TA at their vanguard, declare that the roads belong to bicycles as well as cars and that we have rights that must be respected. It is very evident from the numbers of bicyclists participating in this and other rides around New York that we have arrived and we will be heard!

Every few minutes the marshall would allow several hundred bikers to begin their tour, then holding back the rest. This assured the ride would spread out on the streets and be unencumbered by sudden stops (and thus, possible accidents) due to congestion.


Waiting at the "starting gate." The marshalls would stagger
departures to avoid bunching up on the road.

Well, we're finally on our way. We've done this many times but it's always a thrill. It's 7:30 on a pristine, but sleepy, Sunday morning. One thing I love so much is that almost silent sound of bike tires on pavement and the quiet click-click of the chain and gears. It's now amplified by hundreds of bikers either passing me or being passed by me and its music to my ears.


It's early morning and we sail down Fifth Avenue past the Guggenheim Museum.


Say hello to the Cardinal - rolling down Fifth, Saint Patrick comes into view.
(i.e. we rolled - the cathedral was stationery).



The lighting at this early hour is beautiful -
here the Flatiron building at Fifth and 23rd Street.

The next borough on our tour was our home town - Brooklyn, via the bridge that bears the same name. Kind of nice to be heading towards Brooklyn at 8 in the morning, the sun coming up strong now and turning the cables and granite arches into sillouhettes as we biked across the river. We're headed through Brooklyn Heights, Cobble Hill, Park Slope and to the first rest stop at the Prospect Park carousel. Here, TA has arranged for us riders to take a break, help ourselves to bagels, Krispy Kreme donuts, bananas, plums and apples, use the bathroom in the zoo and then enjoy a free ride on the carousel. How great is that?


Crossing the Brooklyn Bridge.


An added bonus for bikers - a seal show at the Prospect Park zoo!



Not to mention a free ride on the carousel. Built n 1912 for Coney Island
and moved here in the 50's, it was restored to its former glory in the 1990's.

We left the park at Grand Army Plaza and headed up Underhill Avenue -- right past our new apartment! This was certainly grand -- the bike tour headed through the most beautiful parts of "Brownstone Brooklyn" - Prospect Heights (our soon-to-be new "hood"), Fort Greene, Clinton Hill and the Pratt campus. Then further north into Williamsburg. The contrast was striking: lycra shorts and tank tops on bikes whizzing through neighborhoods teeming with ultra-orthodox Hasidim dressed in long black garments and wide black hats.


Leaving Prospect Park at Grand Army Plaza to head up Underhill
Avenue - we passed right by our new apartment!


Waiting for the light at Atlantic, Underhill and Washington Avenues.

North and north we went, through Greenpoint and then over Newtown Creek on the Pulaski Bridge and we were in Queens - Long Island City. This is a very interesting part of the tour as it takes you along the East River with fabulous views of Manhattan on the other side.

As I'm pedalling along I hear two guys talking behind me. One guy is sayng "I told my dad that I was biking through Prospect Park and he said 'what are you crazy??'" The next thing I hear this same guy say is "Is that Matt Weinstein I see?" It turns out I've run into a friend of mine (who I met recently), Alan, and his friend, Isaac. Don't you just love living in a small town like New York?


People regularly walk from Brooklyn to Queens (and vice versa)
over the Pulaski Bridge. Even though it's another borough, to them
it's just about getting from one neighborhood to another.



The view of Manhattan is awesome. Here's Stacey and our new
friend Alan, whom we met by coincidence.

New York City is so big and so spread out that you can live there, as I have, your entire life and not know of, or ever get to see, dozens of other neighborhoods in your own borough, not to mention in the other boroughs. The wonderful thing about this bike tour is that it takes you through some gems of neighborhoods. It gives me a new respect for the variegated city that I call home and for the people that live there.

When we cross from Brooklyn into Queens we are in the manufacturing section of Long Island City. But lately it's becoming home to an influx of young people fleeing the rents of Manhattan. So there are interesting looking bars, clubs, restaurants and cafes, interspersed with the warehouses, power plants and factories of the older industrial base of this part of town. That seems to be the story of the entire eastern rim of the East River. Neighborhoods are being re-invented and renewed. The views of Manhattan are splendid; the rentals are priced somewhat lower (albeit rising) and the subway delivers you to the "city" in a matter of one or two stops.


The industrial backwash of Long Island City.
Down the street a tennis club on the East River and
views of the Empire State building in Manhattan.


A beautiful old church in the Two Coves section of Queens.

Again we're headed north, this time our destination will be the second rest area - in the shadow of the Triboro Bridge in Astoria Park. It seems to me to be one of the city's great parks; a beautiful expanse of lawn and trees on the banks of the Hell Gate, a portion of the East River with treacherous currents separating Queens from Ward's Island, an island that was used for a large state mental hospital. Hundreds of bikers are converging on this rest stop and the grass is covered with their bikes and them, lying out in the sun of this glorious day. Food and water is being dispensed again and my odometer is reading 25 miles - just 10 to go to reach the end point back in Central Park.


Bikes spread out in Astoria Park - unknown to most New Yorkers
except those that live nearby but certainly one of the city's great parks.

After a while and a rest we head off for the final leg of the tour. The route, which is given to each biker on cue sheets that lists, ad seriatim, each and every turn to be taken for all 100 miles, now takes us across the Triboro Bridge. It's nice to know that there's a bike/ped path on that many mile long crossing, but it's certainly not one of our favorite parts. Hot, noisy and narrow is how we see it. And you have to carry your bike up steps several times as you cross the bridge. Not fun after 25 miles. But once again, the views are impressive. And I guess we should be thankful that there's a path at all. Robert Moses, the car-centric highway Czar of years past, decided to prohibit bikes and walkers from many NYC bridges, a legacy that haunts us to this day.

We're taking the bridge to Randall's Island. At that juncture, some will head up to the Bronx to build up more mileage. Others, like us, will cross the East River on a little bike/ped bridge at 103rd street and connect us to the bicycle path alongside the FDR Drive. From there we head North and cross the parkway at 111th street. Then it's cross town and back to where we started some three and a half hours ago. The weather has been great - we're not very tired. Free ice cream and massages are being offered to the returning champions. It's been a very wonderful New York city day.


My point of view - in case you're interested. The odometer reads
26.83 miles covered. Just a bit more to the end.


Carrying the bikes up stairs on the Triboro Bridge.



Still in all, wonderful views of the Manhattan skyline.


We took this little footbridge across the East River and back to 103rd street in Manhattan from Randalls Island.


Back to the beginning ... 35 miles and 3½ hours later.
Where's that free ice cream?