The Times They Are A-Changin'

As a youth, my family and I occasionally visited friends at their apartment with windows overlooking a busy El. In fact, you could practically reach out and touch the subway trains passing to and fro. It was the Number 4 line to be precise. And the apartment dwellers in question lived in a walk-up at the intersection of Jerome Avenue and East Gun Hill Road—where west meets east. That is, where the West Bronx ends and the East Bronx begins. The address was actually not too far from where I grew up in Kingsbridge. It was only a ten-minute drive, yet it seemed like a different world altogether.

For a kid who liked both playing with and riding on trains, I considered this apartment the absolute coolest place a person could live. Watching subway traffic at all hours from a bedroom window perch was akin—from my ten-year-old perspective—to an urban paradise. Now, more than forty years later, I can better understand why people might prefer to live someplace else.

Residing in eye- and earshot of a heavily-trafficked El would typically be considered less desirable living quarters than someplace off-the-beaten trail—like a block away. But the times they are a-changin’ in New York. Recently, I stumbled upon a rather large sign at W242nd Street and Broadway that advertised luxury apartments. During its building stage, rumors swirled that the completed edifice would be dormitories for my alma mater, nearby Manhattan College. What an awful location for college kids to burn the midnight oil studying for exams, I thought then, not to mention for sleeping off a Natural Light Beer binge. With trains coming and going at that very spot all day and all night long, it’s a never-ending story of metal-on-metal screeching, earsplitting horn blowing, and—the pièce de ré·sis·tance—air-brake sighing when the Number 1 train comes home to roost. "Luxury,” it would seem, is in the eye and ear of the beholder.

If nothing else, they are "close to transportation."

And close to sprawling Van Cortlandt Park, too.

Every time there is a heavy rain, Tibbetts Brook "daylights" itself in the park.

In barbecue territory...

It's that time of year around this part of the Bronx. On weekends, buses become trains.

The luxury apartments will have a bird's-eye view of this sort of thing on a regular basis.

As a youthful passenger in my father's automobile, I remember requesting with a certain yanking hand-gesture that truck drivers blow their loud horns. The luxury apartment dwellers can mime something similar to passing train operators.

There once was a time when Dunkin' Donuts was "worth the trip." That is, pretty scarce and hard to find. Not so anymore.

An empty Natural Light beer can—a Jasper's preferred brew.

Groundbreaking at the college for its future state-of-the-art "South Campus." This locale once hosted a house on it that was owned by boxer Sugar Ray Robinson. When I attended Manhattan College, the house was still there and called Farrell Hall. For a reason that now escapes me, I visited Farrell Hall on one occasion.

Springtime on Broadway. A couple of days ago, I wore my winter jacket.

Today it's close to ninety degrees.

Tony Riverdale's haphazard building through the years would have made Ayn Rand proud.

When "The Century" building in Riverdale first opened, there was no covering on its tennis courts. For a summer or two, the woods surrounding it supplied us with bag loads of free tennis balls for our stickball games.

Stickball games that, by the way, were played down this block at John F. Kennedy High School. The school was built on land that previously housed an area we all knew as "Shanty Town."

"That's a fancy-looking apartment building over there. I wonder how much an apartment is?"

Elevated subway tracks were once the rage, even in Manhattan. Now, only the Number 1 train—and briefly at that—daylights itself in the northernmost reaches of the borough.

I grew up with the El on nearby Broadway. I waited for my "Special" bus, which took me to high school in the East Bronx, under the El. I enjoyed a snow cone at Woolworth's in the shadows of the El. It was an evocative area institution for sure. Nowadays, however, I can better appreciate the quieter and cleaner benefits of an underground railroad.

(Photos from the personal collection of Nicholas Nigro)

Imperfect Together

While growing up in the Bronx, many neighborhood families vacationed on the Jersey Shore. It was relatively close, covered a lot of ground, and action-packed—lots of boardwalks and amusements. I was also witness to Interstate 80 at long last cutting a course through New Jersey to Teaneck, a hop, skip, and a jump from the George Washington Bridge. This welcome extension turned a three-hour trip to Bangor, Pennsylvania—home of my maternal grandparents—to a much more tolerable hour-and-a-half. The traffic snarls at the bridge were always pretty bad, but they are a whole lot worse now, even with the vaunted E-ZPass replacing human flesh toll takers and speeding up the money exchange. I haven’t soaked up the sun at the Jersey Shore in quite a while, since “New Jersey and You” were “Perfect Together.” Local television was inundated in the 1980s with commercials featuring then Governor Tom Kean extolling the many virtues of his state. Seems like only yesterday and a long time ago.

Sun, take a good look around. This is New Jersey.

I was taught that "fifty-five saves lives." Can't say what "sixty-five" does.

There are four municipalities in Essex County, New Jersey with Orange in their names. William III of Orange has quite a legacy.

When my maternal grandmother and a great-aunt first laid eyes on this building off Interstate 80 in New Jersey, they marveled at its beauty. It was originally a Holiday Inn in the 1970s.

It was an end-of-the-school-year tradition at St. John's grammar school in the Bronx. Seventh and eighth graders were treated to a bus field trip to Lake Hopatcong, New Jersey, home of Bertrand Island Amusement Park. The place had a great roller coaster. But sadly, its days were numbered when we Bronx youth frolicked there in the mid-1970s. After seventy-three years, the park closed in 1983 and is now—what else—a series of townhouses.

The sign on this building reads: "This is no ordinary home." Indeed it's not. If inhaling perpetual car and truck fumes at the George Washington Bridge toll plaza is your thing, check it out.

The views of the bridge, Hudson River, and Manhattan are no doubt impressive, just don't open a window.

Only fifteen dollars...

Always an atmospheric launching pad for those teetering on the edge, Port Authority of New York and New Jersey bureaucrats have put an end to all of that.

The City on the Edge of Forever...

Imagine what the traffic would be like nowadays without E-ZPass...

Just up the river from the George Washington Bridge is the Tappan Zee Bridge. Recently, its original structure was completely replaced and—yes—renamed the Governor Mario M. Cuomo Bridge. Leave it to the politicians to mess with history. The first bridge was named for a local Indian tribe: the Tappan.

Late in coming this year...

Once upon a time my family vacationed on the Jersey Shore. Glad these people weren't there.

The future New York City skyline: Jenga buildings?

The Love Boat at the Statue of Liberty.

"Let it flow...it floats back to you."

Faster than a speeding subway train...it's Super Starling.

(Photos from the personal collection of Nicholas Nigro)

When No Place Is the Better Place

The news of baseball icon, restaurateur, and philanthropist Rusty Staub’s passing a couple of weeks ago landed another piercing blow and supplied a further nail in the coffin of my youth. Almost forty-six years ago to the date, I heard a very different kind of news. My favorite team, the New York Mets, had acquired Rusty from the Montreal Expos. I was nine years old at the time. To say that I was ecstatic at the prospect of Le Grande Orange, as he was affectionately known in Montreal, donning a Met uniform would be an understatement. For my youthful exuberance knew no bounds in what were—for me at least—vastly simpler times.

The announcement of the blockbuster trade was especially uplifting in the wake of revered manager Gil Hodges’ untimely passing. Hodges had long wanted Rusty on his team and had, just before his unexpected death, given the trade his blessing. Some years later, I learned that the Met organization was widely criticized for announcing the Rusty Staub acquisition on the morning of Hodges’ funeral. But I was a wide-eyed kid then interested in baseball, not adult inside-baseball.

In retrospect, death was much less pressing and a whole lot more fleeting to me as a fourth grader. I do, however, remember the news crawl, which reported the passing of Gil Hodges, appearing on the TV screen. It was Easter Sunday, April 2, 1972, and I was staggered. Just as a pizza place on nearby Riverdale Avenue called the New Concept served up a mean Sicilian slice, death was a pretty new concept to me at the time.

Rusty Staub had been a much-loved member of the expansion team Montreal Expos during their first three seasons in existence. The adoration wasn’t only for his hitting prowess, which was considerable, but for Rusty's community-oriented commingling with fans as well. The man learned to speak French and was a indefatigable, redheaded, roving ambassador for the new team on the block. When he came to New York, he fast became a fan favorite, too, and played four seasons with the Mets before he was unceremoniously traded off to the Detroit Tigers for a rotund, past-his-prime pitcher named Mickey Lolich and a prospect who turned out not to be one. It was widely believed that the deal was consummated because of Rusty’s vocal participation in the Major League Baseball labor movement and—yes—potential free agency, which was the new reality. His eventual market worth was more than supreme skinflint M. Donald Grant—who controlled the team’s purse strings—was willing to shell out. Happily, Rusty returned to finish out his career with the Mets. By then the odious Grant—who had single-handedly destroyed a thriving, proud franchise—was living out the remainder of his years in the patrician lifestyle for which he was accustomed.

At a brief and emotional press conference, former teammate and close friend, Keith Hernandez, said that Rusty was now “in a better place.” Having been in intensive care for the last two months of his life—and in a lot of pain—no place was the better place. I was—once more—in a hospital emergency room this past weekend. As a visitor and observer—not a patient—I saw more than a few people in a very bad way. One was a psychotic woman who, apparently, was homeless and not unknown to the staff. Asleep one moment and wide awake the next, she had a major meltdown when she couldn’t find her cigarette lighter. Passersby were cursed out as she fumbled for a cigarette. Security guards warily stood by. The woman sobbed, raved, and wandered away from her stretcher bed on multiple occasions. A nurse came looking for her at one point to take an X-ray, but she was nowhere to be found. The peripatetic patient eventually returned and performed an Act II and an Act III of all of the above. All the while, I heard a perpetual wail from somewhere across the ER that sounded an awful lot like a cat. The repeated “meow” sounds turned out to be a cry of “help” over and over and over. As the days wear on and events play out, I think more often of the day when a better place will be no place. Queue up the news crawl!

(Photos from the personal collection of Nicholas Nigro)

That's the Signpost Up Ahead...

The next stop...

Bizarro World...

Last Wednesday's photo of the imposing George Washington Bridge.

Don't be afraid of The Fog...

The George Washington Bridge connecting Northern Manhattan with New Jersey, which never looked better.

Follow that garbage truck. It's astounding how much trash is picked up daily in New York City. How long will it be before the planet is buried in it?

Ode to men in fluorescent vests who are upgrading our infrastructure.

Have the Sannyasins spiked New York City's water supply?

Nursing home fare: as good as it gets!

First night of spring in the Bronx.

Garbage in...garbage out.

I remember bully boys mockingly calling certain contemporaries of theirs "pansies." Well, the above pansies are as tough as nails. 

 

My favorite diner's bathroom escape hatch.

Sound advice...

A clean toilet in a greasy spoon is like the cinnamon on the rice pudding...

Pretentious Manhattan...

Sign at the Stew Leonard's buffet ($7.99/lb.) goes a long way in explaining New York's obesity problem.

At Stew Leonard's and wondering whatever became of Tobey Maguire.

While ravenously attacking his non-organic BLT sandwich with sides of coleslaw and a pickle in a neighborhood greasy spoon, a friend of mine complained that Stew Leonard's doesn't carry enough organic products for his taste.

(Photos from the personal collection of Nicholas Nigro)

What's Fare Isn't Always Fair and Random Observations

Once upon a time Easter meant a vacation for me. It commenced on Holy Thursday and included Good Friday and the entire week after Easter Sunday—seven whole schooldays in the springtime no less. Trust me when I say this was a gift of providential proportions.

Nowadays, the Easter vacation and, too, the largess of the Easter Bunny are distant memories. There are no more popcorn bunnies, chocolate crosses, and triple-packs of baseball cards in my Easter baskets. There are no more Easter baskets. There are no more Easter visits, too, to the maternal grandparents in Bangor, Pennsylvania and hams from Speer's Meat Market. Nothing in life lasts forever, including meat markets. An Easter footnote here: Approximately a half-century ago, I actually spotted the Easter Bunny in my grandparents' Miller Street backyard. As soon as I laid eyes on the creature, he, she, or it hopped away with resolute alacrity. The official location of the sighting: under the newly-budding black walnut tree. Of course, it could have been an alley cat.

Well, that was then and this is now as Holy Week and Passover approach. It was a pretty chilly day yesterday—still colder than normal—but tolerable at least. The sun shone brightly on the "March for Our Lives" demonstration in Manhattan. In fact, the subway was overflowing with attendees and their placards. My favorite read: "Thoughts & prayers won't protect me from bullets." True dat.

My subway adventure began at the Van Cortlandt Park terminal, where I made my way to the first car, which is typically the least crowded on the southbound journey—Bronx to Manhattan. The first car being the last car on the northbound trip is also more apt to have homeless folks vegetating therein, and often in the Land of Nod. This was indeed the case yesterday, but the train operator would have none of it. He informed a prostrate man that sitting erect was required if he wanted to ride the train. This was too much to ask and the man exited the car to find another one where he wouldn't be bothered and could rest in peace. Before pulling out, the train operator exited his cab and sprayed the area previously occupied by the homeless man with an air freshener. It was the train operator's domain and he wasn't about to let any lingering body odor waft his way. Truthfully, I didn't smell the homeless man, but I did smell the air freshener, which didn't smell so fresh in an enclosed subway car destined for the land down under.

My day ended on a sour not with a visit to a nursing home at dinnertime. Considering what these institutions charge per day, one would think the fare would be at least fair, which most of the time it isn't. I won't say that what was served last night looked like dog food, because canine eats have taken a considerable turn for the better in recent years. Seriously, I don't think too many pet parents would feed the nursing home's Philly cheese steak and soggy French fries to their beloved canine companions. A nursing home is just not where you want to end your days, or even rehabilitate in for days or weeks. How about mandatory private rooms? Put up half walls where the curtains separating patients are. It's nice that every patient has a television set, but with two sets on in the same room—in hard-of-hearing central—it's enough to drive one to madness and a nursing home.

(Photos from the personal collection of Nicholas Nigro)