View Today

It's been a little over three weeks since we welcomed Little O (as he shall be named) to the world and things have been going well.  There have been many sleepless nights but it's an adventure each day. We learn about one another. I figure out how to add mother to the roles I've assumed throughout my life.

I love to hold him in my arms. I love to watch him sleep. I like to dress him -- a real life doll, squirming, squeaking, as I fit a tiny arm through a sleeve.  Right now, I am simply amazed at the way he moves from sleep to waking and reverse. Then I wonder what he might see when he is awake, wide-eyed and staring out into our world. His eyes are big and, right now, blue, and I like to watch them look. I try not to think too much of what's to come but it's hard not to wonder who he will be.

This month, I'm going to attempt the February Photo A Day Challenge which I discovered, during a late-night, bleary-eyed feeding. I thought it might be a low-stress way to be on the blog a bit and work creatively in small patches of time.

I missed the first day but I have a few photos that I believe fit that theme of a view today.  I love the foot bridge at the end of our street.  It takes us over the highway to the subway, to our neighborhood of shops and restaurants and tree-lined streets and stoops.

To me, this is what it looks like to live where I live, on the waterfront. If I were to close my eyes and imagine our neighborhood, these are the first structures I think about, the movement of shipping containers all along our ribbon of street. 

Why I Love My Neighborhood

Because I'll walk into the local flower shop, (which I'm reminded has been in the neighborhood for over one hundred years) be told I can get whatever I want (yet, if I get anything but fresh tulips I'm crazy) and leave with, not just tulips but, four lollipops, a Saint calendar (and, really, even three months into the year, who can refuse a saint calendar?), and a very official business card.

This Is: New York Alive

This. As a follow-up to last week's photo. Because we're still counting the years. We're still trying to decode the mystery.

Them. Because they are tangled, windblown, like I used to be. Because they're together but each one looks towards another something else.

Her. Because the words can't wait.

This. Because maybe gold will stay longer than we thought it would.

For the story of New York Alive go here.

At the Edge

The first time I lived in New York City, over one summer during graduate school, I lived at the heart of it, in the 30's on Third Avenue.  I wanted to be in the center of things.  I craved crowds and anonymity. 

When I moved back years later, I was pushed out towards the river and lived on First Avenue.  This was completely dictated by real estate prices.  The farther you are from the subway in New York City, the less expensive the rent.  I stayed on the far East side of Manhattan for several years and, slowly, I began to set up a life on these quiet edges of Manhattan. I preferred less crowds, the East River running path, the quiet streets.

Now, I live on the other side of the river. In Brooklyn.  I live on the 'wrong' side of the Brooklyn Queens Expressway in a neighborhood no one has ever heard of (the Columbia Waterfront District) so I have to claim a different neighborhood in conversation (Carroll Gardens).  I live far from the subway next to shipping containers and terminals and abandoned lots teeming with stray cats.


Today, Tyler and I rode our bicycles along the edge of our Brooklyn, to Greenpoint.  He watched the tugboats.  I became fascinated with these statues.  While there is so much to see in the center of New York, I always point visitors towards its edge. A river path, a pier, a park.  The ghosts of people sit here, looking as water laps against the rocks. It's strange, and empty and beautiful. And there is, in my opinion, just as much inspiration, if not more, at the edge of things.

What lies at the edge of your world?

(Almost) Wordless Wednesday: A Pair

When I was in San Sebastian Spain, I came across these twins, one boy, one girl, who reminded me of 'my' twins in Brooklyn.  I walk with them every morning to the subway.  They go to school. I go to work.  We walk at the same time every day.

What a strange and perfect balance.

(Insert transition here)

Happy Independence Day to those in the states. :)

San Sebastian Twins

Brooklyn Twins

A Home For the Past

I took a long walk through my neighborhood today. Through, what some would identify as, Carroll Gardens proper. New Yorkers are in epic disagreement about neighborhood borders (it is an endless conversation at dinner parties) so I can't give you the cross streets. Only to say: you know Carroll Gardens when you see it.

Streets canopied with trees. Gardens that stretch from the front steps of each brownstone to the sidewalks. Young professionals with baby bjorns and strollers, toting canvas bags from a trip to the Sunday farmer's market, bicycle helmets clipped to their messenger bags.

But there are also old women sitting on their stoops. Steeples of Roman Catholic churches creeping up towards the sky. And if you really look, you'll see them: Italian social clubs where men sit on plastic folding chairs playing cards.

As I bought an armful of used books, as I rummaged through boxes of old photographs and sheet music, as I continued to walk and look, I realized that it is a neighborhood trapped in a constant state of remembrance.

One shop after the other, desperate to hold on to an old Brooklyn. There are coffee shops with boxes and boxes of vinyl records lining the walls. Hamburger places that aim to mimic old soda shops. A modern day pharmacy (now called the Farmacy) that sells egg creams, sundaes, and tuna sandwiches at it's counters.

And it is a neighborhood that fights hard to preserve it's history. Tirelessly working to restore the nearby Gowanus Canal and conserve the gardens for which it gets it's name.

Today, I walked past a storefront I'd never seen before. To be honest, it looked more like someone's old apartment. Though it was closed, I looked through the window to find a shop full of junk. Faded newspapers scattered everwhere. Dolls and books and clothes in heaps on the floor. There was no order, that I could see, no rhyme or reason to anything.

But the sign in the window said it all: I appreciate all your donations to my store but I am overstocked. Please don't leave any more items at my door. Thank you!

And on a day like today, when there is just not enough room to hold all of our memories, when we wonder where we will keep them, I thought: this is what I love about Carroll Gardens. It is a place where it doesn't seem right to throw away the old. A place where someone is always looking to find a new home for the past.

How Do You Solve A Problem Like Maria?

Some of you had inquired about my neighborhood deli, which I told you was the victim of the fire. I am pleased to announce that the deli has re-opened with renovations that include: a brand new awning, a spanking new name “The Express Grocery”, the addition of floor to ceiling windows, and bright lights that shine from the awning in an otherwise dark, and dingy corner above the Brooklyn Queens Expressway. I saw the two owners smiling as they re-stocked their shelves and I thought all was right with the world.

Of course, not every story has a happy ending. I have not yet discussed what happened at the Laundromat because it is too confusing and painful. But I’m ready to tell the story now.

I do a Wash and Fold. For those of you who may not know, this means that I drop off my laundry and someone washes it, dries it, folds it and I pick it up when it’s done. Hence the name: Wash. And. Fold. It is a ridiculous expense (About $40 - $50 a month) but I don’t care. I am proud to say that I have not done my laundry since early 2004. To be fair, I have never had a washer/dryer in my apartment OR even in my apartment building since moving to New York City. In all honesty, I have forgotten what these strange contraptions look like. I enjoy living in ignorant bliss.

But things are not all rosy, happy, snappy at the Wash and Fold on Union Street. Maria is gone. My Maria. The woman who had me singing West Side Story as I skipped to and from the Laundromat. Who greeted me each morning with an amazing smile and said, “I hope you have a beautiful day Meleesa!” Who wondered where I was when I came back with a heap full of clothes after a vacation. Who told me I worked too hard and I deserved a rest when I arrived after 8pm to pick up my laundry (but who never once complained that she had been there since early morning). Who insisted that Tyler carry the laundry because that is the ‘right’ thing to do, the ‘chivalrous’ thing. Who told me, rather cheekily, that she makes her husband do all the laundry even when she could do it where she works.

She’s just…gone.

It’s now been 4 months without Maria and I’ve finally given in to that fact that she is not coming back. I don’t know who these crazy people are at the Laundromat now. There’s someone new every single day. They have some weirdo automated machine that prints out laundry tickets and they spell my name: Mallissa. And Tyler’s name: Taillor. Despite the fact that they have the machine, the drop off now takes forever and a day. They won’t do Taillor’s shirts because they have holes in the elbows (don’t ask, the guy has knives for elbows) even when he gives them permission to do so. They sigh when I tell them what time I will be coming to pick up the laundry. They can never remember what color my laundry bag is. AND, I didn’t want to bring this up, but I feel I must. There was once a pair of foreign black underwear in my laundry bag after a pickup. Let’s just say they were not mine and leave it at that.

I’m really devastated about Maria. Not because of my laundry, but because I just thought she was a warm, generous person I enjoyed chatting with in the mornings. I’ve considered frantically calling out her name on Columbia street in Red Hook (she once told us she lives on this street). But that is a predominantly Latin neighborhood and I’m sure there are probably 500 Maria’s in the many high rises that stretch along that one street. Other than that, I haven’t come up with any other creative ideas to find her. I’ll miss her very much. As the little Von Trapp children said in The Sound of Music when Maria went back to the convent, She didn’t even say goodbye…

If you are reading this post and you happen to know where Maria is, please let me know. I need some closure. And if any of you meet anyone named Maria, anytime, anywhere, please ask her if she once worked at a Laundromat on Union Street in Brooklyn and, if she did, send her my love.