High Anxiety...in 1978

(Originally published 3/4/14)

The 2014 Academy Awards are yesterday’s news. I didn’t see a single movie that won an Oscar, or even one that was nominated and lost. I just haven’t seen any new releases in a while. And not for reasons of quality or any such thing. It’s just that movies and me nowadays are largely confined to Netflix, and even then, I don’t watch all that many of them. For both business and pleasure, I just finished viewing seasons one through nine of Seinfeld.

Recently, I stumbled upon various scrap-paper “journals” that I haphazardly kept in my teenage years. They mostly chronicled events in my life with occasional editorial commentary. One such "journal" listed the movies I saw in the summer of 1978 in places ranging far and wide—everywhere from my very own neighborhood to Fordham in the South Bronx to the isle of Manhattan. I patronized theaters in Lavallette, New Jersey and Mattituck, Long Island, too.

What was most memorable to me about this summer movie potpourri was not the Academy Award-winning caliber of them—quite the contrary—but the aftermath of seeing Hooper, starring Burt Reynolds, which I didn’t especially like. On our way home from Fordham’s UA Valentine theater, my two friends and I were accosted by knife- and belt-wielding street thugs. They were street and we weren't—and I'm kind of happy about that in the big picture. Where are they now? Although it was a humiliating decision on our parts, we opted to run for our lives and—with the exception of a few haphazard whacks from a belt—escaped lasting physical harm. The ride home on the BX20 bus felt pretty good, although the alpha-est male in our pack wished that—in theory at least—we had stood our grounds and defended ourselves with honor. However, one of the hoodlums had threatened to “slice up the fat one,” which was he—and he wasn’t all that fat. And since we weren't in a John Wayne movie—or even a Death Wish sequel—I still believe running away under those circumstances was a good idea.

Later that summer, I saw Heaven Can Wait, starring Warren Beatty, Julie Christie, and James Mason, in a Manhattan theater. This was on the heels of witnessing an armed robbery on the subway ride down there. The fifteen-year-old me made note of the irony—Heaven Can Wait—which no one else appreciated. It was the 1970s, after all, and such things happened more frequently than they do today—and the muggers back then weren’t after iPhones, either. Heaven Can Wait was actually nominated for an Academy Award but lost out to The Deer Hunter, which I didn’t see in 1978 if I am to believe my paper trail.

If I had to parcel out an Academy Award in 1978 to my movies, I’d have given it to the one released in 1977, High Anxiety, which I saw a couple of times. While on vacation in Lavallette, New Jersey, I recall coaxing my father to see it. He was hysterical when Mel Brooks got drenched in bird poop. Simpler times for sure.

(Photo from the personal collection of Nicholas Nigro)

Have a Good Day, Folks...

(Originally published 3/2/12)

Just yesterday, something completely unrelated prompted me to check out my high school’s alumni newspaper. I scanned a PDF file version of it online and was drawn—as I often am—to the most recent additions to the“In Memoriam” roster of those who were, once upon a time, part of the school’s diverse family. There were students like me on the list and former teachers, too. Among the latter was a man I remember both very well and very fondly. When I was a student, he taught physics and other science courses, and was chairman of the department. I never had him as a teacher, but I called on him one time to get his John Hancock, and official approval, for a chemistry course taught by one of his colleagues.

The man was quite affable and looked the part of science geek with his sweater vests, corduroy sports jackets, high-water pants, and hush puppies. But then this was the mid- and late-1970s I'm talking about, when I wore garish polyester sports jackets, gaudy ties, and earth shoes to high school. I see now the boys at my alma mater no longer have this sartorial freedom and are required to wear staid uniform jackets and slacks. So long as we wore a jacket, tie, and shoes (no sneakers), we could dress creatively and colorfully, if that is what we desired. It was a much freer time and, yes, somewhat stranger one as well.

Anyway, back to the man whose name was among the deceased. He was my homeroom teacher in senior year, 1979-1980, and had a catchphrase I always found warm and reassuring in a decidedly non-warm and non-reassuring environment. When the bell would sound to officially begin our school day, he would say without fail: “Have a good day, folks.” I had actually been witness to this good cheer in a prior year. During free periods, we had various options at our school, including calling upon a room dubbed “Quiet Study,” which was always moderated by a member of the faculty. My future homeroom teacher lorded over more than a few “Quiet Study” periods and—when the bell sounded for the next class—he would always exclaim, “Have a good day, folks.”

Okay, so it’s been thirty-two years since I graduated from high school. My classmates and I will turn fifty this year. But our teachers—wow—thirty-two plus thirty, forty, and fifty. Do the arithmetic. We’re talking about men and women in their sixties, seventies, and eighties or, of course, gone with the wind. I liked my senior year homeroom teacher a lot and will never forget his unfailingly upbeat wish to students one and all. He was new age in an old age. I thus leave you with this: "Have a good day, folks."



Two Professors and a Classmate

(Originally published 4/30/13)

Have I entered the Twilight Zone? I fear I’m starring in a modern-day, couch potato version of “The Purple Testament.” No, I’m not looking into men’s faces and seeing ethereal glows that portend their imminent deaths on the battlefield. Instead, I’m innocently searching people from my past’s names on the Internet and finding them all right—as the leading men in very recent obituaries.

What’s unsettling is that it has been three for three for me. And it all began so innocently when I was thumbing through some old folders of mine that were chock-full of college papers and blue-book exams. This stroll down Memory Lane, in fact, inspired me to write an essay that is being held in abeyance until tomorrow—May 1st—because of its timely subject matter. But this return to yesteryear also led me to search for a certain professor—the wind beneath the wings of that essay—who was alive and well the last time I checked. This go-around, however, I discovered he had sadly passed—and only last month. Yet another sliver of college ephemera prompted me to search for one more old professor of mine to find out what he’s been up to. And he, too, passed away last month.

Fast forward several days—to today, as a matter of fact—when I encountered a certain surname in a totally unrelated news story. It was a somewhat unusual one, and I recalled a classmate of mine in college with that same last name. He was a good guy—kind of bohemian—and I liked him. I distinctly recall him quietly saying, "Who's this dick?" when our seemingly nerdy microeconomics prof walked into the room on the first day of class. Anyway, I searched his surname coupled with his first name. There couldn’t be too many people with that name combo, I reasoned, and I was right. He passed away, again, last month.

Is it all a coincidence—everything in threes, maybe? Or am I really in the Twilight Zone? In fairness to all others from my collegiate years, I’ll not Google anyone’s name—for the time being at least, until I’m one hundred percent certain I’m not an angel of death, sitting in front of my computer, in the Twilight Zone.

Granted, in order for this “Purple Testament” theory of mine to hold water, the deceased folks mentioned passed away in anticipation of me Googling them down the road. A reverse “Purple Testament” sort of thing, I know. Nevertheless, I fear what searching my own name might unearth right now.

The Bluefish Flush Flashback

(Originally published on 8/7/16)

It was a pleasant summer’s day in the Bronx—on the warm side but with low humidity, which sharply contrasted with yesterday’s soupy feel. On this agreeable morning, I was mistaken for a man named Malcolm; twenty-four hours earlier it was a fellow named Joe. While scam artists are legion in this town, I believe the two distinct individuals who thought I was Malcolm and Joe, respectively, really do know—although not especially well—a Malcolm and a Joe who somewhat resemble me.

I frequently cross paths with the elderly man who thought I was Malcolm. He always looked me over, like he had something on his mind. Well, now I know what it was. Okay, if I’m a dead ringer for Malcolm, he’s Ben Bernanke twenty years from now. As for Joe and the previous case of mistaken identity, I watched a stranger make a beeline toward me from a Broadway sidewalk under the El. I was sitting on a bench—in “Van Cortlandt Park’s Tail,” the sign says—when he approached me.

“Joe?” he said.

“Excuse me?” I replied.

“Joe?”

“No.”

“No?”

“Yes, no.”

“Sorry. I thought you were somebody else.”

And off he went—two ships that passed in the night. As I watched him heading south down Broadway, I remembered being stopped—in the vicinity of where he was headed—a couple of years back. It was by a man who thought I was—yes—Joe. It must have been him. I sure hope he finds the real Joe because, really, time waits for no man. Then again, maybe the scam revolves around finding an actual Joe and then taking it from there.

Happily, I encountered one man today who wanted to speak with me because I’m me, not Malcolm or Joe. I’ve run into this fellow before. His modus operandi: a recurring request for seventy-five cents. Not a dollar or fifty cents, but seventy-five cents. But, this morning, he threw me a curve and phrased it a bit differently. “Can you spare just three quarters?” he asked. Previously, when he asked me for seventy-five cents, I declined his request. He once asked me twice in the same day—in different locations within an hour’s time—believing, perhaps, I was Malcolm and then Joe. If nothing else, the man is tireless. I gave him a buck this time around and off he went without so much as a thank you. He was reasonably well dressed with a fanny pack (for all those quarters, I guess) and took off like a bat out of hell. He had something very specific in mind to do with that dollar.

Finally, after the seventy-five cents guy departed, I witnessed a young rat frolicking in the grass and flowers. An area squirrel seemed stunned by it—the rat was on its patch after all—and initially moved toward it. After a start and a stop in every direction on the compass, the squirrel thought better of it. Even squirrels are leery of rats apparently—regardless of their size.

But my adventures weren’t yet over. I had approximately eight blocks to go when I realized that I had to go. Fortunately, I’ve never had an accident in my adult incarnation, but there were a few close calls. The last one being about fifteen years ago and the byproduct of my favorite diner’s dinner special: bluefish. It tasted good as I recall but came with a post-dinner kicker a couple of hours later. A friend of mine experienced the very same thing and it has forevermore been deemed the “Bluefish Flush,” a natural enema like no other. Like last time, I made it just in time this time.

O Christmas Tree, O Christmas Tree, Wherever Are Your Lower Branches?

Submitted for your approval: More March Madness. For starters, I’d like to give credit where credit is due. While the New York City bureaucratic morass is typically a sluggish, chaotic mess, it’s also tree friendly. Sidewalk trees protected by makeshift wooden fencing are familiar sights at construction sites and such. Tree guards are required by law.

In seeing the forest for the trees, though, there is one area, I feel, where the city gets a less than stellar grade. New York City trees are “trimmed” every several years, often by contracted companies who dub themselves “tree experts.” Now, I’m not a tree expert by any stretch of the imagination, but I know a non-tree expert when I see one. In my view, the trimming brigades willy-nilly lop off tree branches. Long-standing trees that are unlikely to sprout new growths and branches are hacked cycle after cycle, with no regard for their age. A grandfather clause might help. Over time, the trees assume an umbrella shape—with everything on top and nothing on the bottom. And why, pray tell, would “tree experts” hack off the lower branches of a perfectly shaped pine tree in parkland no less—and one that is decorated each year with Christmas lights?

Permit me to make like a tree and leave this subject—and pivot to the ubiquitous electric scooters, bikes, and mopheads on the mean streets of 2024 New York City. Fueled by the pandemic and repast home deliveries, their numbers have skyrocketed over the past few years. Many of the vehicles are unlicensed and many of the drivers are undocumented—in other words, illegal on both counts. Most of the drivers I encounter—all day and every day—do not obey traffic laws. That is, they don’t stop at stop signs or red lights. They travel well above the speed limits. They zig and they zag to pass, dangerously so sometimes. In other words: They don’t care a whit about the common good or polite society.

Right outside my door this morning, I heard a small bang and spied a delivery guy sprawled on the asphalt alongside his scooter. My initial glimpse of him found him lying in the street near a thermal bag carrying a Dunkin’ Donuts order to a party that was going to miss breakfast. This poor fellow was immediately embroiled in an angry quarrel with the individuals he believed were responsible for his fate: lying prostrate on asphalt next to two spilled Mighty Macchiatos, a couple of Sausage, Egg, and Cheese Wake-Up Wraps, and a dozen Munchkins. What I could make it out in their non-English interplay was that the Scooter-Man went through a stop sign, made a wide turn right, and hit a car slowing in the approach of said stop sign. While awaiting an ambulance and the police—and blocking traffic both ways—the yelling back and forth ensued. The drama lasted almost two hours. Any lessons learned here? Hopeful but doubtful.

(Photos from the personal collection of Nicholas Nigro)

The Lord of the Ring

Several days ago, on my way to the Garden Gourmet Market, an SUV pulled up alongside me—an unwelcome act in these parts in 2024. A man behind the wheel shouted out something that I could not immediately decipher. Suffice it to say, he had a poor command of the English language—well, actually, no command at all. Eventually, I got the gist of what this stranger was trying to convey, or at least I thought I did. He was getting low on “petrol” and looking for the nearest gas station. By pointing the way with a few simple instructions thrown in for good measure—in the universal language of road navigation—I figured the guy would hastily make a beeline to this lifeline, a stone’s throw away on busy Broadway.

But, lo and behold, he didn’t. While the fellow claimed to be low on “petrol”—yes—he further communicated to me that he had lost his “Visa card.” He therefore required monetary assistance—i.e., some bread—and was willing to give me the ring off his finger in exchange for some. For show and tell, the chap aggressively dangled the ring outside the driver’s side window. Now, I’m not employed with New York magazine as a financial advice columnist, so I was a little suspicious of the proposed deal. I reasoned that this wayward soul wasn’t quite on the level. 

“Sorry, fella, I don’t have any dinero for the petrol,” I called over to him. The ring man didn’t appear too pleased at my response—let’s put it that way. He angrily accelerated, driving off in search of a riper pigeon, I suspect—a Mourning dove, perhaps, conversant in his native tongue.

I don’t know: Maybe the guy was on the level, and I was being too cynical. Had I accepted the ring and booked an appearance on the Antiques Roadshow, the thing could have been a historical artifact from the Ming dynasty and worth $70,000 to $80,000. And this Bronx tale of mine would then be the story a Good Samaritan, who unexpectedly and immeasurably benefited from trusting his fellow man—a dude in distress—who merely wanted to gas-up, as my father would say. Such is the price we skeptics sometimes pay.

(Photos from the personal collection of Nicholas Nigro)

No More Perfect Storms

(Originally published 2/11/13)

My hometown dodged the worst of this recent epic snowstorm. I’d estimate we received eight or nine inches in total, which is more than enough when you have to shovel it—but at least it wasn’t two or three feet. Once upon a time, believe it or not, I used to love snow and snowstorms—the bigger the better as a matter of fact. I was a kid then and wrongfully assumed this heartfelt love would last forever. After all, what wasn’t there to love about snow and its pristine blanket of white? I couldn't imagine a man or woman alive not appreciating the unique hush that big snows engendered—for one brief shining moment at least—when virtually everything and anything came to a standstill.

Actually, a part of me still enjoys watching snow fall from the sky and gazing upon its sprawling, blanket of white aftermath. But it’s an increasingly smaller part of me. Nowadays, any uplifting snowfall moments are remarkably fleeting and cannot compete with the stark reality of shoveling it, driving in it, and—most importantly—walking in it (sometimes for multiple days after the fact).

As a school kid, a lot of snow meant a lot fun and frolic in the great outdoors—and, it should be noted, welcome snow days, too. The Monday, February 6, 1978 blizzard is, for me, my all-time favorite snowstorm. Snow actually began falling on Sunday night, the fifth, and continued through Tuesday morning, the seventh. The seventeen inches or so that fell in New York City amounted to three full days off from high school, a most welcome fringe benefit. So, this was the “Perfect Storm” in my book. As I recall, my high school re-opened its doors on Thursday of that week, but it was rather difficult getting there. Snow-cleanup technology and the New York City Department of Sanitation just didn’t deal with snow removal in the 1970s as well as they do today. Our “special buses” didn’t show up that day and we had to find alternate means of getting from the Northwest Bronx to Northeast Bronx.

Fast forward thirty-plus years and here I am—a middle-aged man, still breathing thankfully, and shoveling snow with a weighty prosthetic right leg. I can still pull it off, which is reassuring—but for how long? There’s a guy up the street from me—an overweight senior citizen who smokes like a fiend, and has difficulty walking even in sunny, warm climes—who was shoveling snow right alongside me a couple of days ago. Several snow-shoveling entrepreneurs offered to help both him and me, but we declined—courteously. I, for one, cannot afford these contemporary snow shovelers' rates. Nobody is shoveling snow for five and ten bucks anymore; it’s more like fifty dollars (or more) for an average job—and I don't blame them. Five dollars buys two slices of pizza around here. Why break your back, or contribute to your chances of having a coronary thrombosis, for two slices of pizza in an over-priced metropolis and rotten, inflationary national economy?

I guess it isn’t just blizzards that aren’t what they used to be; it’s the world—both my personal world and the world at large. Perhaps dropping dead of a heart attack in a snowbank isn’t such a bad way to go. You know—in that beautiful blanket of white, virgin natural beauty, and clean, crisp, cold air. But not this year…some other time.

(Photos from the personal collection of Nicholas Nigro)

Tis Bitter Cold and I Am Sick of January

(Originally published 1/15/18)

January has long been my least favorite month. It's thirty-one days, on the cold side, and sometimes snowy. It's also the month when the Christmas decorations come down and countless sorry-looking trees end up at the curbside. Returning to school after the New Year and Christmas vacation was, as I recall, psychologically grueling. It was a powerful one-two punch: the party's over locking arms with an extended stretch of nothingness. The school year's "mid-winter recess" or "winter vacation" wasn't until mid-February, and that always seemed like a long way away in early January. As a youth, the snow possibility was about the only thing that recommended this time of year. But now an adult long removed from even a second childhood, snowfall is the stake through the heart of January. 

Blizzard-like conditions still supply a great visual. But I make that statement on a conditional basis.

After their time has come and gone, Christmas decorations are sad sights indeed.

Neither snow nor rain nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of  delivering Amazon Prime packages.

For more than a quarter of a century, my father worked at the mega-post office with the unofficial postal motto emblazoned on its facade. He, in fact, worked the four-to-midnight shift, coming home on the subway in the "gloom of night."

I can't think of anyone more deserving of being a canine chew toy.

If you don't demand the best and will settle for okay, this is the place for you...

On Manhattan's other Restaurant Row...

In the vicinity of Times Square on New Year's Day, the garbage cans were closed but the barbershops were open.

If you can't throw your trash in a can, a non-working, dinosaur telephone booth is the next best thing.

If you've ever wanted to visit a DVD, take down that address.

Price Harry's favorite place for a sandwich and a smoothie when he's in town.

Donald Trump has been wont to refer to 9-11 in speeches as "7-Eleven." This is perhaps why.

Yesterday I ate lunch at a place with this sign on the wall.

And here it is...

The January saga...a picture is worth a thousand words.

I wonder what the "souvenir" is?

An abandoned women's prison? No, a permanently locked subway bathroom.

As a kid I always associated New York City steam pipes with Christmastime and a good kind of cold. Times change.

(Photos from the personal collection of Nicholas Nigro)

Poet for a Day...In May

(Originally published 5/1/13)

Thirty-two years ago in the waning days of my freshman year in college, I wrote a short poem entitled, “School’s Out.” What’s memorable to me about this piece is not that I got an “A,” but that I made the cut and landed on my esteemed English professor’s august mimeograph sheet. After each and every one of our poetry assignments were turned in, he would select what he considered the best works from his two freshman-year poetry classes. Previously, I had found myself on the mimeograph sheet—uncredited this time—with a poem the professor used as Exhibit A to point out glaring errors in execution or some such thing. And I actually liked that one better.

With the honor of being on the mimeograph sheet came—unfortunately from where I sat—a live reading. The poem’s author was asked to read his or her poem aloud in class, unrehearsed, and await a critique. I somehow pulled it off on this day in May. When my professor said, “Mr. Nigro, you read that very well,” I beamed internally in my guise as “Poet for a Day.”

As I further thumbed through my college ephemera on a recent trip down Memory Lane, I was struck, foremost, by the general pedestrian quality of my writing—largely uninspiring and very unmemorable. And I got the sinking feeling I wasn’t always giving it my best shot. Although I look back fondly on my collegiate years at Manhattan College, I nonetheless wrote a poem about being happy when the school year ended. The punch line: “Three cheers for this day…In May.” On the other hand, I was not in the least bit fond of my high school days, but, I suspect, “Three cheers for this day…In June” would not have gotten me on that prestigious mimeograph sheet. A great honor, but no poetry anthology forthcoming.

(Photos from the personal collection of Nicholas Nigro)

Make Like a Tree and Leave

(Originally published 5/4/13)

Barbara Walters once famously asked legendary actress Katharine Hepburn, “What kind of a tree are you?” She was subsequently mocked for posing such a juvenile question and its ridiculousness became the stuff of legend, even before things went viral. But now the rest of the story: Walters’ tree query was actually a follow-up to Hepburn saying how she was a tree or some such thing. And naturally, she was a very strong, very pretty oak tree. What else?

I thought about this blast from the past only because I stumbled upon an article about human beings and trees. Specifically, about how we can live on in our next incarnation as a tree or perennial plant of some sort. Yes, I can become a tree after I pass by having my cremated ashes placed in a biodegradable urn made of coconut shells. After adding the appropriate seed, compacted peat, and whatever other growing materials are required—Voilia!—I am a tree in the making as the nutrients of my ashes are absorbed into all of the above.

So, I can be eternal after all. Well, not quite. Said tree, first of all, has got to take root and grow. And if it does, the Tree Me will ultimately die at some point in the future. Pests might do me in, wild and woolly weather, or old age if I'm fortunate. It is nonetheless life after death—and a rather uplifting one at that—even if it is fleeting under the best of circumstances.

Now I can ponder Barbara Walters’ question for real and make like a tree and leave. This leafy green way to go—and the only avenue I know to live on for a little while at least—is certainly better than a boring tombstone, which hardly anyone will come to visit anyway. And I think I’d like to be—when all is said and done—a Weeping Willow, even if the species has little appeal to Walters. A tree grows in the Bronx. Who knows? Maybe someone will carve their initials in me.

My Walkie-Talkie Christmas

(Originally published on December 15, 2013)

In my youth the anticipation of Christmastime and Christmas itself was very exciting. So, the aftermath of the holiday and returning to school was—it stands to reason—extremely depressing. Seeing decorations and lights lingering in people’s windows—while knowing that Christmas wasn’t on the horizon but a memorable fait accompli—was an awful feeling. But it was a microcosm of life, I've since learned, where all good things come to an end, attached—quite often—to an ugly payback of some sort.

Anyway, in January 1973, upon my melancholic return to St. John’s grammar school in the Bronx’s Kingsbridge, religion teacher Sister Therese queried each and every one of her students as to what his or her favorite Christmas present was. Except for the fact that my answer was “walkie-talkies,” I might not have remembered this banal Q&A. For Sister Therese repeated my words in a somewhat befuddled tone. It was as if she was unfamiliar with them. “Walkeee…talkeees,” she said or possibly asked with a question mark.

It was a simpler time when one wanted walkie-talkies for Christmas. A neighbor of mine had a pair and we established contact times, where he would initiate a Morse code—something that his more advanced walkie-talkies were equipped with but not, sadly, mine. I recall my mother talking with his mother on the walkie-talkies as if it was big thing—a grand technological moment akin to the very first phone call. Of course, they could have called one another on the telephone—and gotten better reception—or walked down a flight of stairs and met one another on our adjoining front stoops.

My “walkie-talkie” Christmas—1972—assumes an even a higher importance to me because they were number one on my “Santa Claus” list that year. I was absolutely certain that ol’ Saint Nick would come through with them, but he disappointed me big time. But forty years ago, I had a very generous godmother who always bought me a Christmas gift—a real one, something that I coveted, and definitely not clothes—but I didn’t typically see her to New Year’s Eve. Albeit a week later than expected, my godmother got me those walkie-talkies. Evidently, Santa Claus had arranged it with her. The pair was coolly trimmed in blue, quite hip looking, and individually packed in form-fitting Styrofoam compartments—worth the wait and then some! They had that wondrous transistor-radio plastic smell, too—something a 1970s kid appreciated. Suffice it to say, walkie-talkie fun ensued.

For sure, there will be no commensurate walkie-talkie gift this Christmas. It’s just not in the Yuletide cards anymore. There will be no Morse code chatter with a neighbor, either. Such is life as time marches on and on and on.

Christmas Eve Traditions and Memories

(Originally published 12/22/12)

For a lot of people, Christmas comes attached to a healthy dose of melancholy intermingled with all the colorful lights, festive music, and hustle and bustle. As a boy I could never conceive of why one single person wouldn’t welcome Christmas with open arms and a happy heart. For me, its one-two punch of anticipation and excitement truly made Christmas “the most wonderful time of the year.” But now with my youthful exuberance pretty much spent, and so many key Christmas players no longer on the scene, the season just isn’t what it once was—and I understand completely.

Once upon a time Christmas Eve meant gathering with the cousins, exchanging gifts, and enjoying a traditional Italian dinner featuring Spaghetti Aglio e Olio—garlic and oil—and multiple fish dishes. I believe the official tradition calls for seven, but we never quite reached that number with fried eels, baccalà (salted cod) salad, boiled shrimp, and calamari (squid) in tomato sauce rounding out the menu. Honestly, I can’t say I ever relished this particular fishy mélange, but my grandmother had a knack for making just about everything as good as it could possibly be—really. Fish, in fact, were very hard to come by in my grandmother’s hometown of Castlemezzano in the rocky mountains of Southern Italy. Her village was pretty poor and accustomed to the humblest of fish fare, and the tradition crossed the ocean. There were no swordfish steaks, lobster tails, or sushi on our Christmas Eve tables. Actually, her spaghetti was more than enough for me on this one night a year. I would sample an eel or two, which were peculiarly edible, and a few benign shrimp as well—but that was the long and short of my seafood intake.

The image of my grandmother preparing Christmas Eve dinners, with a mother lode of cooking oil at her disposal, is seared in my memory. Interestingly, though, it isn't olive oil I recall but peanut oil—in big gallon tins. It seems that during World War II, olive oil was pretty hard to come by and—when available—too expensive, so my grandmother substituted with Planter’s peanut oil. It was comparatively cheap and, as it turned out, tasty enough to pass muster. She purchased it at the Arthur Avenue retail market in the Bronx’s "Little Italy." Times have changed. Peanut oil is now hard to come by and pretty expensive when you do find it.

The Christmas Eve tradition endures—I think we’ve even reached the magic number of seven fish—but the memories do too of genuinely exciting times from the past and the people who made them so. There is a definitely a downside in having exceptionally fond memories of what once was and is no more.

(Photo from the personal collection of Nicholas Nigro)

Man, They Were Out of Sight

(Originally published 12/6/19)

Man, they were out of sight. They, of course, were Dune Buggy Wheelies, by Remco, a popular toy manufacturer once upon a time. I was the elated owner of one in 1970, when Richard Nixon was president. I distinctly recall playing with my favorite Christmas present of that year on my grandmother’s dinette floor. If memory serves, two D “flashlight” batteries were all one needed to get this modest vehicle hopping, including performing rather extraordinary wheelies. The remote control sprouted two wires, I believe, which were attached to the Dune Buggy Wheelie. I could steer the thing and make it go either forward or backward. What more could a 1970 kid want?

As with many cherished Christmas gifts from my youth, I have often wondered—looking back now all these years later—how long it physically lasted and whether my interest in the Dune Buggy Wheelie waned before this battery-operated toy’s inevitable death knell? Did the Dune Buggy Wheelie make it until the following Christmas? Somehow, I doubt it.

Leave it to a Mockingbird in Manhattan to pose for a Christmas picture.

Wall Street's got the Christmas spirit.

I must disagree. The best way to see New York is on foot.

Or, by air, if you have the wings for it. Riding a bicycle on the mean city streets is not for the faint-hearted.

When the Abominable Snowman isn't available...

This is how you place a star atop a big Christmas tree. By the way, this is the New York Stock Exchange tree, which takes a back seat to the one at Rockefeller Center. Yesterday was the 96th annual lighting. It's actually a better decorated Christmas tree than the one in Rockefeller Center, which only has lights. 

From what I've read, there are a whole lot of tourists in New York City at this time of year. More than ever before. I remember walking on the Brooklyn Bridge and getting chided by a bicyclist for being in the bike path. Last weekend the bridge walkway and bike path were overrun with Homo sapiens from all over the world. 

No matter the time of year nowadays, the bridge is teeming with tourists and peddlers alike. I'm happy, at least, that the Circle Line has somehow endured the vicissitudes of time. Its nautical cousin, the Day Line, which ferried passengers to West Point and Bear Mountain, is only a memory.

A helicopter tour of Manhattan Island is, from my perspective, a viable alternative to taking an overly crowded boat to Liberty Island. Of course, it'll cost a tad more than $18.50 for the privilege.

Sit on it, Potsie, he said, and not a Millennial in earshot knew what he was talking about.

They certainly have changed the place and, at the end of the day, not always for the better.

New York City neighborhoods used to have real character with mom-and-pop businesses able to survive and thrive. The hot dog vendors, at least, are still around. But I suspect their cost of doing business is—not unlike the Dune Buggy Wheelie—out of sight.

Fifth Avenue isn't the same and neither is Ninth Avenue.

This is known as modern art. If you can make a roll of packing tape something other than a roll of packing tape, you've created a masterpiece worthy of a window on Ninth Avenue.

What a difference a "D" makes...

Christmas is coming...

The geese are getting fat. Well, actually no, they are not.

Even stop lights, blink a bright red and green...Ring-a-ling...It's Christmastime in the city.

(Photos from the personal collection of Nicholas Nigro)