With Oscar time approaching I remember the 2010 Oscar race when the film Precious, based on the young adult novel Push, was a best picture nominee. The Hurt Locker in fact won that year, but in my view the Oscar should have gone to Precious. Years before the film adaption was made, the African American poet Sapphire who wrote Push came to speak to students at Jane Addams, the south Bronx high school where I was then the librarian. Push had been widely translated and Sapphire...
Archive - December 2013
Blogging recently about my dad and his Liberty, NY childhood, I thought of a writing workshop I took years ago. (See My Dad, Dec 21, 2013) One of our workshop prompts was to write about a place our heart remembers and I thought of my grandmother’s hotel on the Neversink Road in Liberty where I too spent childhood summers. When I was 11 my grandmother was no longer able to run the hotel and had to sell it. Years later when the Catskills were no longer fashionable, we heard...
I’m not a big shopper or one to boast about my bargain coups, but let me tell you about some boots I once bought. We were living in London for an all-too-brief, magical time in the 1970s when I went shopping one day for a pair of chic, high-heeled, black leather boots. I found a fabulous pair in a Kings Road shop for €35, but the exchange rate then was $2.50 to the pound, so I knew they would make an $87.50 dent in our American budget, more than I ever paid for boots in...
I had ankle fusion surgery this past week and must thank my great surgeon and the Beth Israel Hospital nursing staff for their good care. But all things medical only serve to remind me of the best doc in the world, my dad. My father Arthur graduated from NYU medical school in 1936 at age 24, yes 24! Raised in Liberty, NY where my Russian immigrant grandparents had a small farm and hotel, my dad went to a one-room schoolhouse for the early grades. He was skipped ahead often, he...
Let’s face it, I’m addicted to my iPhone and I walk down the street with it in my hand, waiting for heaven knows what important call or text or email. But with the weather changing I’ve discovered you can’t use an iPhone while wearing gloves. I guess a human touch is needed which is actually kind of sweet. So now when I’m out and it rings, I have to pull off one of my gloves. The trouble is if I stuff the glove in my pocket or my bag, or drop it on my...