Dear Vacation Diary, We’re approaching the home stretch now. OSFO was pretty pooped today after sleepover #2.  She stayed up until 2 a.m. and woke up real early.

Mid-morning, we joined Diaper Diva at the Tea Lounge, where there was supposed to be a kiddie sing-a-long. The performer didn’t show. But we hung out anyway. The place was packed with toddlers, older kids, WiFi-ers, students, parents. A mish mash of a scene.

OSFO joined me in my office and made xerox copies of a comic book she drew this morning.

In the evening, she went with a friend to Word Sprouts, the reading series at the Park Slope Food Coop. Tonight: a special bedtime story night with cookies and milk. The kids were told to come in their PJ’s.

On American Idol, we watched Bobbi Bennett (Mr. Copacabana) learn that he got the lowest number of votes from America.

So tired, so sleepy. One more day of vacation left.  And she better look at the study book for that math standardized test she has to take when she gets back to school next week…

Vado Diomande, a drum maker and choreographer, who had a drum-making studio in DUMBO contracted Anthrax from spores found on the untreated skins of African goats he used to make drums.

Diomande came down with Anthrax while traveling in Pennsylvania, where he is in a hospital. Here’s the story from New York 1.

City officials say a Manhattan resident has been hospitalized after he
was accidentally exposed to inhalation anthrax while working with
animal skins in Brooklyn, but investigators say there is no evidence
the exposure has anything to do with terrorism.

In a press conference at City Hall Wednesday afternoon, Mayor
Michael Bloomberg announced the 44-year-old man, who sources say is
Vado Diomande, became ill last Thursday, February 16th, during a trip
to Pennsylvania.

Diomande was hospitalized in the town of Sayre, where doctors
diagnosed the inhalation anthrax exposure and traced it back to New
York City.

Diomande is now recovering in a hospital in Sayre, where he is in an Intensive Care Unit listed in fair condition.

City officials say Diomande, the artistic director at the Manhattan
dance company Kotchegna, makes African drums from animal skins.
Investigators believe was exposed to the anthrax after he worked with
unprocessed cow and goat hides that he had purchased on a visit to the
Ivory Coast in Africa in December.

The city says he told investigators he worked with the animal skins in the days prior to his trip to Pennsylvania.

Anthrax is a potentially deadly agent that naturally occurs in animals such as goats and cows.

As a result of the exposure, the Department of Health and the
Centers for Disease Control have sealed off Diomande

Regina Bakery is closing its Seventh Avenue shop on February 28th.

Farewell colorful cookies, good bye black and white cookies, so long elephant ears and Jewish/Italian cookies by the pound.

Okay. It’s not Two Little Red Hens. It’s not Uprising. It’ sure as heck ain’t Cousin Johns, which is the most sophticated baking operation on Seventh Avenue. It ain’t Cocoa Bar, which has an amazing selection of the best of local artisan bakers (i.e. Red Velvet cake, Oreo cake, ganache cake, etc. Awesome stuff).

But in it’s ordinary way, Regina is beloved, especially by the kids of Park Slope. Their challah on Fridays is pretty darn good. And OSFO loves their cat.      

Are all the stores closing or just the Seventh Avenue one? Or is the Seventh Avenue one the only one left? 

Questions.

From the Daily News:

Residents of five trendy Brooklyn neighborhoods will soon be able to check their e-mails and surf the Web from park benches.

The city is looking to bring free wireless Internet access to Fort
Greene Park, Columbus Park near Cadman Plaza, Carroll Park in Carroll
Gardens, Cobble Hill Park and the Brooklyn Heights Promenade.

The Parks Department

This from loyal reader Famdoc. He calls 311 and so should YOU.

And what about those Fresh Direct trucks idling while making 11 PM deliveries?  I call 311 every time.

So far, so good.

Vacation, Day 1: Diaper Diva took Ducky and OSFO for a swim at Eastern Athletic. Now they’re on their way to mid-afternoon showing of "Curious George" at the Pavilion.

It’s  Ducky’s first movie theater experience, so there’s no telling how she’ll react. Teen Spirit saw "Mrs. Doubtfire" when he was two and really freaked out during the choking scene.

If she can handle the largest image she’s ever seen, "Curious George" should be fine content-wise, as it’s a G-rated re-thinking of the first book  with many of the scenes that are in the original with some PC-ification.

The Man with the Yellow Hat, now named Ted, is no longer a zoo employee who brings animals back from Africa for the zoo. Now an archaeologist, he works for a natural history museum in San Francisco. George follows him back home. There are lots of plot changes of this ilk but there’s still the scene where George re-paints the upstair’s apartment, and flies around the city hanging on to a bouquet of helium balloons.

The songs by Jack Johnson are a nice touch and the movie is a quick one hour and twenty minutes or so. Voices by Will Ferrell, Drew Barrymore and Eugene Levy are also terrific.

After the movie, OSFO has a slumber party…

As for Teen Spirit: I’m not sure what he’s up to today. He slept past noon and then parked on the much-loved red chair in the living with his computer laptap on his lap.  He wants to see "Curious George" but not with his aunt, sister, niece.

No way.

Continue reading VACATION DAY 1: MONDAY →

Today on This American Life there was a  great story about a Russian teenager named Alex who lives in Brighton Beach. He and two friends decided to take a short boat trip around Jamica Bay–with a bottle or rum. Things didn’t go according to plan. They were shipwrecked and young Alex ended up on a desert island (with a view of midtown Manhattan ten miles away) not from from the south tip of Brooklyn called Russell Barr. He was stranded there for seven hours and the story is truly hilarious.

Today’s show was themed: Living Without, stories
of people living without. Nubar Alexanian explains what fish can do for
him that his own ears cannot.

Sarah Vowell explains the cheerful
journalism of deprivation. And a short story about someone called to
donate a heart. It’s by Judith Budnitz, from her collection of stories
called Flying Leap.  Broadcast the weekend of February 17-19 in most places, or here via RealAudio next week.

Check WNYC.org to find out when it’s playing on Sunday. It’s that good. It’s the first story on the show, you won’t want to miss it.

More from NY 1 about the stray electrical current that killed Barkus, a Park Slope dog, on Third Street in the Gowanus.

Con Edison now says the underground "hot spot" that killed a dog in
Brooklyn Wednesday was slated to be turned off seven years ago, but
never was.

Danny Kapilian’s dog Barkus was electrocuted on the sidewalk in
front of a Con Ed substation in Park Slope yesterday. The dog collapsed
while walking along Third Street.

On Thursday, the power company said it was notified by the
Department of Transportation in 1999 to turn off power to a street lamp
that was being removed at that location. However, the power was never
cut, even after the light was removed.

Con Ed says the location was inspected less than a month ago, but workers did not find any stray voltage.

The utility believes melting snow and salt from last weekend’s
storm helped electrify the concrete on that portion of the sidewalk.

Kapilian says he has been contacted by a Con Ed claims person who
offered to pay for the veterinary bills. He also tells NY1 he has been
talking to lawyers about suing the utility, and indicated he would take
legal action out of concern for public safety.

Meanwhile, a fraud investigator with the city’s Human Resources
Administration says she was shocked Monday when she stepped onto a
storm grate on Allerton Avenue and White Plains Road. She credits her
rubber boots with saving her life.

Con Ed says a preliminary test showed the grate was electrified,
but when an electrical crew was called in, tests found no stray
voltage.

Con Ed has been under pressure to fix these so called stray-voltage
problems since the death of Jodie Lane in 2003, who was electrocuted
while walking her dogs in the East Village.

A dog was electrocuted by a stray electrical current on the SIDEWALK  near a Con Edison sub-station on Third Street in the Gowanus area. The dog’s owner was not hurt.

The electrical current came up through the concrete. The cause: a street lamp that was removed 2 years ago. Apparently, there were still some live wires underground and the salt that was sprinkled on the sidewalk because of the snow conducted the electricity.

The dog bit the owner as he was dying. Two police-vets were on the scene. They tried to lift the dog but just touching the dog caused them to be shocked by the electricity.

Note: If you are ever around someone who is being electrocuted, do not touch them with your hands. Take off your coat and loop it around them and pull them away from the cause of the electrocution. Husband told me that this morning.

AND NOW THIS FROM NEW YORK1:

A Brooklyn man says his dog was shocked Wednesday while walking down Third street in Park Slope, right in front of a Con Ed substation.

Danny Kapilian says Barkus starting convulsing, yelping, and baring his teeth. He then died shortly afterward at a veterinarian

Bid on today’s NO WORDS_DAILY PIX BY HUGH CRAWFORD: Smith and Ninth Street in Snow
Minimum Bid: $30.

Please send in your bid as a comment or email: louisecrawford@gmail.com

Bidding ends at 11:59 Feb. 14th.

Brownstoner, which has a new look (check it out), had someone take notes at last week’s Brooklyn Height Association Meeting. Seems that Marty came up with some new slogans. What do YOU think of them.

Our faithful correspondent Whitbo took notes for us at last night’s Brooklyn Heights Assocation meeting…

Marty Markowitz spoke briefly and shared some of the top Brooklyn Tourism slogans that are being considered to become our Borough’s official tag line. Here are some of the best:
– Brooklyn: The Bridge is just the beginning
– Brooklyn: It’s like an everything bagel
– Brooklyn: New York starts here
– Brooklyn: The 10th planet
– Brooklyn: In your face and in your heart

Also, in announcements about the recent progress on the Brooklyn Bridge Park, a list of the athletic facilities in the latest plan was read. Along with the requisite softball, soccer, basketball and tennis courts, there are also plans to build a seasonal skating rink under the Bridge itself and topping the list, a cricket pitch! Who’s playing cricket? And much to my chagrin, no petanque courts!

READ MORE AT BROWNSTONER

I ran into Nancy Soyer, someone I went to high school with, and told her abot the 30th reunion that is being planned. She’s from a younger class, but we’re inviting people from other classes as well.

She seemed happy to hear about the reunion and I expect that she’ll want to attend.  I asked for her e-mail and she handed me her card which had a portrait of a dog on it. A really, really cool painting of a dog.

I used to run into Nancy all the time in Park Slope because she was a dog walker around here. "I haven’t seen you in ages," I said. She told me that she’s primarily painting now.

I was really happy to hear that because she’s a very talented painter and her paintings are — gorgeous.

Nancy will do a custom portrait of your dog. She’s obviously quite busy doing them because her web site is filled with paintings of dogs. In addition to the portraits, she sells prints and notes cards. Check out her site if you’re interested.

On her web site, there were these bits of biographical-info: Nancy studied with Marshall Glasier and Julian Levy at the Art Students’ League. In addition, she has trained with Marianne Reynolds and Lydia Riojas. In the winter of 2002, a group of Soyer’s drawing were included in a Moses Soyer show at the Ridderof Martin Gallery of Mary Washington College in Virginia. Her work has also been exhibited at the Phoenix Gallery and Art Students League in New York, and the Feral Art Gallery in Brooklyn. Her paintings and drawings are found in many private collections.

Great to see you Nancy.

A Brooklyn Life ran a piece about the Dunkin’ Donuts that seem to be popping up around Brooklyn.

As I’m sure many neighborhoodies have noticed, Dunkin’ Donuts has
not set out to invade Carroll Gardens alone. Knowing the terrain would
be difficult, the Double D enlisted the help of his good friend and
often shop mate Baskin-Robbins. It goes without saying that there is
some great homemade gelato in this neighborhood, and I sincerely hope
those businesses don’t suffer. My optimistic belief, given the love the
neighborhood has for its local, family-run businesses, is that most
Brooklynites will continue to patronize their old favorites (or, who
knows, maybe some entrepreneurial spirit will open up an independent
coffeehouse/ice cream stand nearby).

She mentions a  NYDailyNews article about
how the owner of the Carroll Garden’s wants to blanket the area with
the chain. He used to live in Carroll Gardens..

READ MORE AT A BROOKLYN LIFE.

Brownstoner’s two cents.

Brooklyn-born Wendy Wasserstein died of cancer on Monday. This from NY1:

Award winning New York playwright Wendy Wasserstein died Monday morning.

The 55-year-old had been battling lymphoma for several years. She died at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center.

Wasserstein achieved success both off an on Broadway, making a name for herself by writing about the joys and challenges of being a woman, being in love, having a career and motherhood.

One of her best known works is the Tony and Pulitzer Prize winning play, "The Heidi Chronicles," which was later made into a film.

She was born in Brooklyn and raised in Manhattan. She attended Mount Holyoke College and the Yale School of Drama.

While best-known for her plays, she also penned screenplays, children’s books and essay collections.

I’ve always wondered if the order of posts on OTBKB should be:

-Daily Pix
-Scoop du Jour
-Postcard from the Slope

Usually it’s:
-Daily Pix
-Postcard from the Slope
-Scoop du Jour

I’ve always thought it makes more sense to put Scoop du Jour before the Postcard because it has the day’s weather and What’s Happening. It’s the "Wake up and smell the world" portion of this blog. But my sister called this morning and said that she’d so much rather see the  Postcard first.

I’ve also gotten rid of the two news sections on Scoop du Jour. It was too much work and it was taking up too much space. If you need news you know where to get it. Husband thought there were too many murder and car wreck stories, anyway.

Does anyone look at Scoop du Jour?
Does anyone care about the order of posts?
Does anyone want to weigh in? 

Last January 23rd was all about snow. What a different kind of January that was.

Sunday 8 a.m

–It’s still snowing
–There are snow drifts
–White blanket out there
–The wind looks fierce; the air is white
–They’re predicting 18 inches on WNYC
–Only people walking their dogs
–or shovelling their sidewalks
–are out on the snow thick sidewalk
–Bare tree branches shake heavy with snow
–Brownstone rooftops look downy soft
–Smartmom’s air conditioner, her window sills are snow platters
–Hepcat, Teen Spirit, OSFO are still sleeping
–Wait until they see what happened.

This is from last February 17th. Oh what a February that was: the tyranny of high school admissions and such. So glad that’s over for now. Happy to report that Teen Spirit has settled in nicely at his new school (not so new anymore).

Smartmom still can’t believe she has a thirteen year old son. It seems
just yesterday Teen Spirit was bundled into a stroller bound for Mommy
and Me, a toddler exercise class they used to attend on Sixth Avenue
near Lincoln Place. One of the girls they met in that class just had
her Bat Mitzvah. Another girl looks impossibly hip slinking down
Seventh Avenue with her friends.

It’s like someone pressed the fast forward button and all those cute babies became cute teenagers at a too rapid speed.

All
this comes to mind because today will be an important and not
altogether pleasant day for many of these former toddlers: the
acceptance and rejection letters from the specialized high schools will
be handed out at my son’s middle school.

Yay or nay: Stuyvesant,
Bronx Science, Brooklyn Tech, LaGuardia and the others have decided
who’s in and who’s out. A rite of passage of childhood in New York
City, it will be a day of pain for some and exhilaration for others.
Hearts beating fast as they open their letters, Smartmom can only
imagine what must be going through their minds.

And at school there’s no one there to remind them that it’s just a test, just a school, just a stupid education system. 

In
the coming weeks, the other high schools will be sending their letters
out. Fingers crossed, fingernails bitten to the pulp, parents and teens
wait, their futures in the balance.

In the midst of this
Darwinian shake-out, Teen Spirit and the other thirteen-year-old Park
Slopers exist in a universe of their own. They instant message each
other, hang out on-line at Xanga, practice with their bands, eat pizza
at Pinos.

They walk down Seventh Avenue feeling the force of
their emerging selves: independent and so very alive. It’s a mixed bag
these teenage years.

A Mixed bag.

A French blog called Media Cafe mentioned OTBKB in a post called,  " Developper des Blog d’infos Hyperlocales." With my  iffy French I gathered that it was a rather serious piece about "hyper local" American blogging. Here’s an excerpt:

Ces sites d’infos hyper locales se mettent en place doucement, un peu partout. Comme ici aux US : H2oTown, the New Haven Independent, Only the Blog Knows Brooklyn et Pittsburgh Dish. Mais ils se d

Dang, I meant to sing the praises of Park Slope Writer’s "Park Slope Food Shopping Overview," but Gawker got there first. Yay to Park Slope Writer, who took the time and did a first rate round-up of what’s out there. Here is her post about Gawker’s post about Park Slope Writer’s Post.

Has anyone ever denied  that the Blogsphere is a tad self-referential?

Well,
now I understand the source of today’s influx of (sometimes hostile)
comments. My posting on Park Slope food shopping was featured (rather
sarcastically) on Gawker.com:

Alison Houtte, owner of Houtie Couture, the vintage clothing store on Flatbush avenue near Seventh Avenue, has written a book (with her sister, journalist Melissa Houtte) called  Alligators, Old Mink and New Money.

What fun. She’s one of my favorite Park Slope people that I don’t really know. Everyone knows Alison, don’t they: that impossibly tall, glamorous woman (5’11’ plus 2-inch heels) with a great sense of humor and a beautiful southern accent whose always in the store. And she’s the person who "found" our old diesel Mercedes when it was moved from one parking space to another by a movie production company. We couldn’t find it for two months. It was parked in front of her store when it was on Berkeley Place east of Seventh Avenue. She saw the tickets piling up on the windshield but figured it wasn’t an abandoned car because it had a car seat in it. She called the police and they tracked us down. I went to parking court and the judge believed my story: didn’t need to pay a thing. I gave Alison the most beautiful flowers I could find at Zuzu’s Petals and wrote her a thank you note.

The subject of both the store and the book can be reduced to one
word: VINTAGE. Or, if you want more words, think clothes and jewelry
and purses and the adventures that come with buying and wearing old
stuff. The subtitle of the book is "One woman’s adventures in vintage
clothing," and it’s the story of Alison Houtte, who has been wearing
old clothes for most of her 45 years, when she wasn’t wearing new for
her job as a professional model in Paris and Manhattan.

To help tell her story, Alison, the youngest of six children, teamed
up with her oldest sister, Melissa Houtte, who has spent her career in
journalism. Together, they have opened the door on Hooti Couture,
offering a peak at the vintage scene, through both the clothes and the
people who buy them. Brooklyn-based illustrator Mary Coleman did the
cover as well as thirty illustrations that capture the charm of all
things vintage, from a leopard coat to a ’30s evening gown.

Alligators, Old Mink & New Money is published by William Morrow and it’s now available in bookstores. If you don’t see it, please ask for it! For more informtion about Alison and her sister go to their blog, hooticouture.com

I finally met the artist Simon Dinnerstein the other day. I’ve been aware of him for a long time: seeing his book at Barnes and Noble, and the signs advertising his classes that are posted around the Slope.

The other morning, we sat in the light-filled parlor of his Park Slope brownstone talking about his artwork, his career, and his penchant for making portraits of interesting-looking people in the neighborhood.

Currently, Simon has a drawing in a show at the Tabla Rasa Gallery in Sunset Park. It is a striking portrait of Thomas Parker (left), who works as a barista at Connecticut Muffin on Seventh Avenue. A few years ago, Simon asked him to pose for one of his classes. He was so taken with his face, "the movement and the lines and the way that his personality comes through," that he wanted to make his own drawing.   

The portrait, in black and white, captures Thomas’s aura, which is, says Simon, "regal and dignified."  Simon tried to follow what he calls "the external and internal map" that is his face. "He is a man who doesn’t ask too much and seems to have a real acceptance of people, of life," says Simon. "The lines on his face reveal his journey" and the portrait projects density and force.

Simon has also done a remarkable painting of Wajih Salem, the tall man with the beard who is one of the sibling-owners of D’Vine Taste. Pictured with a gigantic cactus plant that Simon bought from Zuzu’s Petals, Simon wanted to  juxtapose the complex lines of the plant with Rajiv’s long angularity. "He has a strong sense of form," says Simon, "and a strong internal presence."

Looking through Simon’s book, I see that much of Simon’s work reveals an engagement with Brooklyn, its people and Simon’s personal history in this borough.  This close understanding of the urban life of the community reveals Simon’s ability to look deeply at the internal and external lives of the people around him.

Simon told me about the studio he used to have in Sunset Park where he worked on a painting called "Fullbright Triptich." In the early 1970’s, a Madison Avenue art dealer came "all the way out" to Brooklyn, which was unusual at the time, to have a look at the half-finished work.  "I think that’s a great picture," he told Simon. "I’d like to own it." A week later, the dealer called and offered buy the large (79" x 168") painting over the two years it would take to finish it, a gesture which supported Simon and his family during a difficult financial time. "It was a first class rescue operation and it set everything in motion after that." says Simon referring to his  Rome Prize Fellowship to the American Academy in Rome in 1976-1978.

Simon, who is a bit of Luddite,  was motivated to check out this blog, at the suggestion of a  good friend of mine, who is  taking life drawing classes with him on
Wednesdays; an experience she treasures — a chance to learn drawing
from a master. He knew immediately that
"Only the Blog Knows Brooklyn" was a reference to the short story "Only the Dead Know Brooklyn" by the great Thomas Wolfe, a favorite story of his.

On the day Simon looked at OTBKB, the "Postcard from the Slope" was about Wajid Salam and D’Vine Taste. Simon was delighted to read about the man he’d made drawings and a painting of. We spoke about coincidence and fate; the way unexpected things present themselves in unexpected ways.

After leaving Simon’s house, I walked down Seventh Avenue and noticed a homeless man staring at something in the window of Su Casa, the fabric store on the corner of Berkeley Place. I was intrigued and wondered what the man was looking at so intently. As I passed I saw that it was one of Simon’s class advertisements, which showed a painting from 1983 called "January Light" of a black woman in an orange gown. I kept looking back for a few minutes and the man was still standing there seemingly mesmerized by the painting Simon had just shown me in his book.

Unexpected things. Unexpected ways.

Now all these years later, Simon, who is represented by the ACA Galleries in Chelsea, returns to Sunset Park, not far from the studio where he used to paint. His drawing of Thomas Parker is part of a show called "Past and Present" at the Tabla Rasa Gallery, located at 224 48th Street in Brooklyn. The gallery is open on Friday and Saturdays from noon to 5 p.m. If you would like information about Simon’s classes call: (718) 788-4387.

Something very exciting happened last week: Husband took a full time job. And boy are things going to change around here. 

For one thing, we’ve grown used to his 24/7 presence in the apartment. Since leaving his last job, Husband set up shop as a professional photographer in the living room and he’s been spending an awful lot of time in there. So much so, that we built a make-shift wall dividing the living room. That was completed just days before he got the offer he couldn’t refuse.

A job. A good one.

But having Husband around here was pretty special. It meant I didn’t have to worry when I left the coffee pot on, that there was always someone home when Son returned from school –always a good thing for a teen. He was also available to pick up Daughter, make dinner, help with homework, change light bulbs, fix computers, and much, much more.

And his cooking: Husband has a way in the kitchen. And it’s completely improvised and delicious: Risotto, Curried Chicken, steak, pasta sauce with ground turkey, capers and many mystery ingredients, the best scrambled eggs, french toast with Tabasco Sauce….

And that’s just the utilitarian stuff. Having him in the same borough day in and day out was pretty special. We really got to know one another again and in a different way. We didn’t exactly work together but we did partner up on a few projects and supported each other.

And I got to see the intensity with which he approaches his photographic work. The perfectionistic printing technique, the daily photo walks, the complete immersion in his art.

So, it is with some trepidation that we send Husband into Manhattan. He has a tendency toward workaholic-ism. During the era of his last job, he was known to stay at the office until four in the morning.

It was just him and the cleaning staff sometimes. And we missed him back at the ranch. We really, really did.

Getting laid off, outsourced, axed — whatever you want to call it — was probably one of the best things that ever happened. It meant a severance that supported his efforts to reclaim his photography and establish himself professionally. It was a win-win situation, a gift to us all — we got more time with him, he got more time with us, and he spent a lot of time developing his art.

And then he got an e-mail from his old boss. Like Mr. Incredible in The Incredibles he was lured out of "retirement" from the computer biz. We never thought he’d go back in. But as the Al Pacino character in The Godfather 3 says, "They just keep pulling me back."

But Husband’s reasons are good. He’s doing something he really enjoys. Health Insurance. Benefits. A reliable salary. Money for Son’s college.

It should be fun to try the stable life for a while. Yes, OTBKB is losing her staff photographer (though No Works_Daily Pix by Hugh Crawford will continue as before), and she’s losing her sometime lunch mate at the local sushi shop. Hopefully, Husband will be home in time to make those great dinners he makes. And his homework help is much appreciated.

This time around, we’re hoping that he can set some boundaries. That he can get home at a decent hour and clock some time in as Dad. It’s as important a job as any and one whose time clock is running just about all the time.

Congratulations Husband.

I wrote this on December 27th 2004. Last year, we were, as usual, in California for Christmas. What a different kind of Christmas that was.

I cried four times today. FOUR

The first outbreak occurred while reading an e-mail from a friend after breakfast:

"I
got the BEST CHRISTMAS PRESENT EVER…a NEW NIECE!!! I am madly in love
already and they had to pry her out of my hands at about 2 am last
night…My son said, ‘I can’t wipe the smile off of my face!’ That
about says it all…"

The thought of all the loss and
sadness my friend, whose firefighter husband died on 9/11, has endured made her joyful
announcement all the more poignant.

The teariness was also
connected to the fact that will be getting a new niece
in the months to come when my sister and brother-in-law bring their baby
girl home from Russia. It’s been a waiting game but the waiting should
soon come to an end. They are expecting a referral in mid-January and
will be flying off to Perm soon after.

I cried later in the day when I learned about the earthquake and Pacific
Tsunami that killed 25,000 people, a third of them children (note: the number would, of course, rise. This was written on December 27th 2004).

This cruel
and sudden act of nature, unthinkable in all its brutality, is said to
be one of the worst natural disasters in recent history. And all those
children.

There were more tears when I read a comment
on my sister’s blog, Mamainwaiting, from Udge, in response to a wistful post called "Happy
Chrismakah:

"For what it’s
worth, most self-describing Christians have no more connection to the
original meaning and symbolism of Christmas than you experienced. I
think one could rename it "Solstice Festival" without any major loss of
meaning.

Such meaning as there still is in Christmas, is
contained in the rituals of being kind to and thoughtful of each other,
of showing generosity and tolerance, of recognizing and indulging in
the (over-)abundance of our physical world.

Few religions require more than that.

Happy Chrismakah to you and yours, and may your next Chrismakah be as a threesome."

I appreciated Udge’s spiritual reflections. But I was really touched by
his wish that my sister’s next Chrismakah be as a threesome. I had to sit still for a few moments to savor that one – and
just let the tears fall.

The final flood occurred at the
multiplex during "Spanlish," the fun new Jim Brooks movie with
Tea Leoni and Adam Sandler. Sandler portrays a sensitive, loving
father. It was during the scene toward the end where Sandler tells his teenage
daughter how much he loves her…

I really lost it that time. Sandler is incredible, as is the girl who plays his daughter. 

It was that kind of day. A day full of tears: for new life, inexplicable death, tears of appreciation and tears of love.

That kind of day.

Another one from me.

My friend Toby and I (see Write About the Strike #5) drove out to Coney Island to get my babysitteandsomuchmore from her apartment building. She was feeling like a captive in her own home and wanted to come in to work. And Toby is thinking about starting a company called, Toby Taxi.

The ride out was pretty easy. We took Seventh Avenue to the Prospect Expressway, which had only light traffic. Surf Avenue was virtually empty, the boarded up amusement park looked particularly picturesque.

Babysitterandandsomuchmore had a little trouble getting into the back seat of Toby’s SUV, due  to a leg injury, but we managed to get her in. The drive back was pretty easy. We listened to WNYC and heard that the strike may be over:

It seems that the state mediators have devised a preliminary framework for a settlement of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority contract dispute that would allow strikers to return to work later today, the chief mediator said.

It is not clear when members of Transit Workers Union would return to work to get subways and buses running again. The union’s executive board must first accept the settlement framework, although mediators said the union’s leaders had agreed to ask the executive board to approve the recommendations.

Babysitterandsomuchmore breathed a sigh of relief from the back of the car. The Prospect Expressway was quite crowded on the way back, as was 8th and 7th Avenues in Park Slope. After 11 am, when there’s no 4-in-a-car regulations, everyone takes out their cars.

What a mess. But hope is on the way. It just remains to be see how long it will take to get the subways and buses up and running.

I will publish reports from readers about the transit strike. Send me your stories via comments or email (louisecrawford@gmail.com) and I will publish them here. What I’m looking for: human interest, commuting nightmares, smart solutions, bike stories, walking, car pooling, coping. Here is one from FAMDOC. I don’t know who he is but he is a loyal reader and commenter:

The celebratory atmosphere extended from the Slope to the Brooklyn
Bridge this morning, where walkers and bikers seemed unfazed by the
inconveniences the strike created. Midspan was Mayor Marty (Brooklyn
Borough President Marty Markowitz) on a bullhorn, telling us how great
and resilient Brooklynites are (and on the way home this evening, there
he was again, proclaiming, "welcome back to Brooklyn."

You gotta love the guy. Tireless in his enthusiasm for Brooklyn, his
website even proclaims that all he ever wanted to be was BP).

The return trip was cheeful, but far more crowded. Bikers were forced
by cops and the density of the crowd to dismount and walk. Weaving my
way back to the Slope via 3rd Ave, I realized how on my guard I must be
if I am going to live through this strike on a bicycly. Every block
presented new challenges, in the way of potholes, parked cars pulling
away from the curb unexpectedly and moving vehicles driving without
regard for pedestrians and bikers. Back home, a hot shower and a cup of
tea for my achy, previously untaxed muscles.

How long will we tolerate this? And for those of us who run our own
businesses, dependent upon customers, clients, patients, how long can
we tolerate this without going broke? In some strange way, for this
small-business owner in lower Manhattan, there are certain reminders of
mid to late September, 2001.

In sleep begins creativity.

At least that was the case with my friend Toby Fox, who is often awake in the middle of the night remembering every detail of her elaborate dreams.

Last year, when she couldn’t go back to sleep, she began to record them in her  on-line dream diary, Sleeping Bunnies.

Sharing her dreams with an on-line community, her blog became an  opportunity to invite friends and strangers to offer interpretations and comments.

To illustrate these dream narratives, Toby, an award winning graphic designer and magazine art director at Saveur, Garden Design, and Offspring, used her Palm Treo cell phone to create photographs. In the quiet time before dawn, she choreographed close encounters between her daughter’s Barbies, Play Mobil Toys, and Polly Pockets.

These beautiful and strange photographs with their soft focus, and blurry, impressionistic colors take the viewer into the secret life of dolls in a subconscious landscape that is somewhere between night and day.

Like dreams, these dolls enact a vaguely erotic life as they interact with other toys, stare  thoughtfully into space, and express deep wells of longing with their plastic eyes.

A point-of-entry into the into emotional logic of Toby’s dreams, the photographs both illustrate and elaborate on the text. Written in a straightforward, matter-of-fact style, her words depict surprising leaps of time, space, and reality.

It is the confluence of the text and the photos that best express Toby’s willingness to look deeply at her dreams and honor the symbolic language and insight they provide.

She will be displaying these photographs she calls "Bunny Thoughts" at the PS 321 Holiday Craft Fair. Prints will be available for purchase. 11 a.m. – 4 p.m. 180 Seventh Avenue. Park Slope, Brooklyn.

Husband has convinced me that it would be a tad Nixonian to delete Monday’s post, "Diapering Ducky." Cover-ups are right up there with diapering babies in cafes. So I’ve decided NOT to delete the post.

But I do feel baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaad.

And I feel kind of stupid for sharing that little faux pas with the world. I guess I’ve  grown so used to writing about my life in the Borough of Kings, it just seemed like a natural (yes,  natural) thing to write about it.

Well. Live and learn.

I guess diapering Ducky in the window of the cafe wasn’t such a great idea. I knew that. I really did. But it was one of thse things that just, well, happened. And god knows it’s not going to happen again.

And I’ve learned something in the process:  Diapers are the last taboo. People are really disgusted by it. I guess I’ve lost sight of that as I’ve been around so many babies and their diapers in the last 14 years, since giving birth to my son.

When you’re a parent you get so immune to it. It’s just not that disgusting a thing. It’s a little baby’s "output" shall we say. A part of life as natural as breast feeding.

God, I hope Barbara Walters doesn’t get wind (yes wind) of this. I’ll be like the woman who breastfed her baby on an airplane who got savaged on "The View." Somehow I don’t think legions of breastfeeding mothers are going to defend diapering in public. Or will they? It’s just not as "wholesome" an activity.

Most parents have had to diaper their little offspring in odd places at odd times. It may be the last taboo, but it happens all the time. Now don’t  get me wrong, I’m not saying that doing it in a cafe whose bathroom was out- of-order was the right, or particulary pleasant thing to do.

But I’ve diapered babies on airplanes, in cars, at friend’s houses (those who did and didn’t  have children) sitting on the streets of New York and San Francisco, in the hallways of apartments and office buildings, in the playground, parks, at the beach, in every kind of public bathroom you can imagine, on boats, at Yosemite National Park…

We moms and dads are quite proficient at doing it quickly and in a sanitary way. Ya got your antiseptic baby wipes, diaper pads, plastic bags for disposing, hand sanitizers…Yada Yada.

If you’ve never diapered a baby it may seem disgusting. But if you have, it’s really not that bad. And at risk of sounding like a Park Slope stereotype (which I probably am) it can actually be quite cute. Kootchy koo and all that. God knows, it’s a many-times-daily fact of life with a baby.  It better be cute.

As I write these things, I can almost hear the hideous comments I am going to get…

Husband just reminded me that in China, when he visited in 1987, he noticed that the children didn’t wear diapers, they wore pants with a hole in the behind. When they had to go, their parents just held  them out in the street…

Ready, aim…

You’ve gotta have a tough skin when you’re a blogger. You write something and people  get very judgemental. But I can handle it, I really can. I wouldn’t be doing this if I was looking for anyone’s approval now would I?

Do you still like me?