Press Queen

When I was an undergraduate at NYU Heights I was a commuter student,  but stayed on campus after classes as much as I could to enjoy the extracurricular college life.  (See Ghostwriting in the Family and College Theatre) Steve,  the editor of the school paper,  was a friend and I’d often stop in his office to watch in awe as his staff turned out the paper every day.  It may not have rivaled the Columbia Spectator or the Harvard Crimson,  but the  Heights Daily News was a...

Read more

“May You Live in Interesting Times”

As we start a third year of this fearsome pandemic it’s hard to believe we’ve gotten through it this far.   At first I was in a state of disbelief and it took me awhile to internalize how serious the situation was.  And then I felt sorry,  very sorry for myself. But in time I saw how selfish and wasteful that emotion was,  and I began to empathize with everyone else – young parents with children at home while offices and schools were closed;  high school and college kids in...

Read more

17 Gas Stations

Why won’t men stop to ask directions? The answer may be in John Gray’s well-known book Men are From Mars,  Women are From Venus.   Or in another fascinating book about gender differences entitled You Just Don’t Understand: Men and Women in Conversation by Deborah Tannen. Tannen,  a linguistics professor,  coined the word  “genderlect”  to describe the cultural differences between men and women that are reflected in the differing ways they think and converse – in...

Read more

With This Ring

I’m not superstitious or especially sentimental,  and that’s a good thing because over the years I’ve lost some precious pieces of jewelry – two or three watches,  innumerable earrings,  and even a few wedding rings. When we married my husband gave me a simple band – not of gold or silver but of jade.   I lost it. He also once gave me a lovely pink opal.   One day I looked down at my hand and although the ring was still on my finger,   I saw that the opal had fallen out...

Read more

2026 McGraw

Leaving Manhattan recently on a wintry Friday afternoon we hit rush hour and my husband turned off the highway to avoid it traffic.  We were taking local Bronx streets when I realized we were about to pass my old neighborhood,  and we decided to drive down my old street. I’ve written before about 2026 McGraw Ave,  the house I grew up in,  and that I last saw a dozen years ago when I went to a wonderful neighborhood reunion. (See Parkchester, Celebrate Me Home,  Mr Bucco and the Ginger...

Read more