Postcard from the Slope

PASTOR MEETER: MY LIFE IS MORE BEHIND ME THAN BEFORE ME

This is part of the Christmas Eve homily that Pastor Daniel Meeter read at week’s service. There’s usually a big crowd at the church on Christmas Eve and last week was no exception. 300 or more souls: Christian, Jewish, something else or nothing in particular. He encouraged me to come. The service is open to all. I didn’t make it but I did look into the church at around 7 p.m. as they were lighting the hundreds of candles. The sanctuary looked beautiful.

I found this on Pastor Meeter’s blog:

Two weeks ago I went to a hospital to see my mother’s oldest
sister, who had a stroke. She is 93. We always liked my Auntie Jo. One
summer I lived with her. So I put my collar on and got there early
before visiting hours. She recognized me and we talked a bit. I read
her some psalms and she dozed off. I sat there and watched her.

Suddenly on her aged face I saw the face of my grandpa, her father, from thirty-five years ago.

What
was it — her nose, her cheeks, her forehead? And then I saw my
grandma’s face as well, from twenty years ago. I had loved those
people, who were so long lost to me, and now I’d had a sudden and
passing glimpse of them.

I now have entered the last
third of my life. My life is more behind me than before me, and I
notice of late how often I think and speak about my grandparents. I
suspect I’m trying to keep connected with my own earlier self as it
recedes from me. I don’t want to be adrift in the world. A part of my
self is contained in my memory of their faces. But soon, I expect, I
will lose my Auntie Jo as well.

But with a baby, it’s
all about the future. There is no clinging to our histories. With a
baby it’s not about myself. A baby is all about itself, all new and
undeveloped. A baby is pure gift. Isn’t that the emotional reason for
Christmas presents? Because the quintessential gift is a baby. You have
to receive it, you have to accept it on its own terms, it’s not about
you, and it calls you forward.
Civics and Urban Life

THINGS TO LIKE ABOUT 2007

Like every year there are things to like and things not to like. Especially as you get older, stuff happens. People get sick. People die. There are personal and professional disappointments, as well as terrible world events (war in Iraq, Virginia Tech massacre, Benazir Bhutto’s assasination, the monks in Myanmar, wild fires…)

Life can be scary and sad.

Luckily there are always a few things to remember that make you feel good about things, our community and the world we live in. Ever since I started this blog, I make this list. Here’s 2004, 2005, and 2006.

–Wonderful family and friends

–OSFO’s new piano

–Trip to Opera Boston to hear Amy Burton in Mahagonny

—Writers at the Beach in Rehoboth, Maryland

—The Brooklyn Blogfest (and the subsequent Brooklyn Blogade)

—Weight Watchers meetings at the Montauk Club

–The planning of and the actual  Stoopendous Celebration on the summer solstice

—Cracker Barrel 2.0 by Greg Beyer in the New York Times

–Two weeks on Block Island at the Sea Breeze

–Dinners with The Moms

–Teens for Darfur at the Old Stone House

–Sag Harbor

–Louis and Capathia at the Metropolitan Room

–August in Tracy, California

-_Ducky’s 3rd birthday party

–Weekly meditation with Charlotte

—Brooklyn Reading Works at the Old Stone House

—Institute for Collaborative Education

–The nice doctors and nurses at Mt. Sinai Hospital

–Teen Spirit at the Bowery Poetry Club

—Tupelo Press

—The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, Ratatouille, Once, the Hoax, Across the Universe…

–Running the Turkey Trot on Thanksgiving

–More nice doctors and nurses at Mt. Sinai Hospital

–Shopping for Teen Spirit’s ukulele at Rudy’s Music Stop with Groovy Grandpa

–Buying a beautiful vintage 4-string banjo at Jalopy

–Returning the banjo at Jalopy (wrong kind of banjo)

—Fun Run on New Year’s Eve in Prospect Park (planned)

Civics and Urban Life

FUNERAL IN HER ABSENCE

This from New York 1:

Pakistani Americans are planning to hold a memorial today in honor of
Pakistani former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, who was killed Thursday
during a rally in her home country.

The service will be held today between 1 and 3 p.m. at the Makki
Mosque on Coney Island Avenue between Foster Avenue and Avenue H in
Midwood, Brooklyn.

Organizers are calling it "A Funeral in Her Absence."

STUFF AND THINGS

WHAT ARE YOU DOING FOR NEW YEARS EVE?

!I’m not sure. But I’m thinking of doing this. For more information go to Slope Sports

2007-2008 NEW YEAR’S EVE FUN RUN
presented by
Brooklyn Road Runners Club and Slope Sports

3.3 MILE FUN RUN
Prospect Park, Brooklyn

DATE/TIME
   
Monday, December 31, 2007 —
11:15pm start

START/FINISH
Start/Finish Line is at the Grand Army Plaza entrance of Prospect Park

ENTRY FEE
   
$15 before December 30, 2007 for Brooklyn Road Runners Club members, $20 Non-members
Race Day: BRRC Members $20, $25 Non-members
No refunds and/or exchanges. Race will occur rain, snow or shine.

Civics and Urban Life

BYSTANDERS CHASE HIT-AND-RUN DRIVER IN BAY RIDGE

This from NY Metro:

Bystanders to a deadly car accident in Brooklyn leaped into action Friday when the driver tried to escape.

A group of witnesses to the hit-and-run crash said they chased the
motorist on foot and in vehicles, grabbed him and stuffed him into a
cab, which returned him to the scene of the crime.

"I was glad we got the bastard," Chris Blake, 41, of Bay Ridge, told
the Daily News. "He killed a guy. He was meant to get caught. He
deserves to go to jail."

The chase began at around 3:30 p.m. after a minivan making an illegal
U-turn struck and killed an elderly Brooklyn man as he carried
groceries across the street in the borough’s Sunset Park section.

   

Civics and Urban Life

LUNA PARK GAZETTE’S FEAR OF FLYING

I found this on Luna Park Gazette. I hope he had a good flight.

I’m what you might call a fearful flier, a first-class white-knuckle
loon who has left his hand prints in the cushions of a squadron of
passenger jets over the years.

The very thought of getting on to a plane makes my stomach turn upside down and inside out–all at the same time.

The
logical side of my brain tells me all about the statistics of car
crashes versus airline crashes but my neurotic side won’t answer the
door.

I wanted to do something positive, try and rid myself of
this irrational fear that has plagued me since I took my first flight
out to San Francisco nearly 30 years ago.

Civics and Urban Life

BILL DE BLASIO IN IOWA

The New York Observer reports that our man Bill de Blasio is in Iowa stumping for Hillary Clinton.

City Councilman Bill de Blasio of Brooklyn spent late 2003 and early
2004 traveling to Iowa as a volunteer to help his candidate at the
time, John Edwards, engineer a surprisingly strong showing in the
caucuses there.

Now he’s back in the Hawkeye state, helping fellow New Yorker
Hillary Clinton compete in what has become a tough contest. "I think
folks from Iowa, like people in New Hampshire, they’re used to people
coming in from the outside, probably more so than any other place in
the country," de Blasio told me earlier this week from the city of
Clinton (seriously), just north of Davenport.

"The outsiders are facilitators," he said.

De Blasio, who also managed Clinton’s 2000 Senate campaign, thinks
Iowa is significant for both New York candidates, but for different
reasons: "This could be a breakthrough moment for Hillary and a death
knell for Rudy.”

STUFF AND THINGS

ROCKY SULLIVAN’S PUB QUIZ

 
 
Just about every week I get an email about  Rocky Sullivan’s Thursday Night Quiz. This email was really long and fun (and with a great photo) so I decided to include it here. In February they’re doing an event called Quiz Don’t Destroy, an entire evening
dedicated to the battle over Bruce Ratner’s Atlantic Yards
project.  Pit your knowledge against teams from local newspapers,
bloggers and community groups. Watch out if Norm Oder of Atlantic Yards Report is there — he knows everything.

Greetings, Pub-Quiz Ball-Drop Buffs…Tonight’s the last Rocky Sullivan’s Pub Quiz of 2007. Thanks to all of you who’ve made it down to Rocky’s for our Thursday night Quiz, to you who’ve almost made it, and to you who, by gumby, will one of these days.  We’ve been at it every Thursday
since mid-September.  Well, not Thanksgiving night, but all the
others.  We’ve churned out eight rounds every week — questions, photos
and music.  You’ve taken home lots of prizes, except the ones you
fluidically imbibed and left behind at Rocky’s.

A prize is a prize, no matter how long it’s in your pocession. We’re just beginning.  2008 is the Year of the Quiz, according to
the Journal of American Cultural Sciences*.  It’s also the year of the
U.S. presidential election, the Beijing Summer Olympics, and a year planning on leaping for pure joy.
On that last note, 2008’s leap day — February 29th — is the day
after a Rocky Sullivan’s Pub Quiz.  Hence, more February to crow
about your team’s success the previous night.
Oh…2008’s also the year that Bruce Ratner’s Atlantic Yards
project collapses under the weight of community opposition, an unkind
economy, legal beagles shining lights into dark corners, and the
project’s own disconnected hubris.
Further into the future, be sure to mark your calendars for the
Quiz Event of the New Year: January 17, when along with Develop Don’t
Destroy Brooklyn, we present QUIZ DON’T DESTROY — an entire evening
dedicated to the battle over Bruce Ratner’s disastrous Atlantic Yards
project.  Pit your knowledge against teams from local newspapers,
bloggers and community groups.  Arrive early for good seats.
Postcard from the Slope

HELPING TO FIX WHAT’S BROKEN IN AMERICAN SOCIETY

Consider making a donation to the Petra Foundation:

       The Petra Foundation was established in 1988 to sustain the trajectory of Petra Tölle Shattuck‘s
life by honoring the kind of people she most admired – unsung
individuals making distinctive contributions to the rights, autonomy
and dignity of others.

Each year since then, through a national search and nomination process, the Petra Foundation has recognized such leaders as Petra Fellows.

Often
at risk and without the safety net of personal privilege or
institutional support, Petra Fellows fight poverty, discrimination,
environmental degradation and violence. They work in prisons and police
departments, labor unions and migrant worker camps, health clinics,
housing projects, family farms and public schools – wherever people
lack the resources, education, connections or clout to participate
fully in American society. Armed with the fierce passion for justice
that inspired Petra Shattuck, they are fixing what’s broken in American
society.

      

Civics and Urban Life

JOIN THE ‘GOOD BYE CONEY ISLAND’ FLICKR PAGE

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I found this on the Brooklyn Museum blog.

I am very excited that Patrick Amsellem, curator of photography, is working  with us on a web project in conjunction with the Goodbye Coney Island?  exhibition he curated in the Luce Visible Storage-Study Center.  We have created a Goodbye Coney Island? Flickr group
which photographers can join and submit their best photo of Coney
Island. From this pool Patrick will select four photos to feature in
his posts on our blog throughout the run of the show.

This idea came about because the other day I joined Patrick for a discussion of Goodbye Coney Island?
and he spoke about the popularity of Coney Island throughout the years
as a subject for both American and International photographers. I am a
casual photographer, and his comment reminded me how much I enjoy going
to Coney Island to take pictures with my Polaroid, Holga and digital
cameras. Every time I am there I see countless other photographers
strolling the boardwalk in search of the perfect shot to capture the
Coney Island’s essence. What a better way to pay homage to this fabled
part of New York, I thought, than to engage some of the photographers
in our community in conjunction with this exhibition of more than fifty
photographs from the Brooklyn Museum’s holdings that traces its
evolution over the past 125 years. We look forward to seeing the
photographs everyone will choose to post!

To participate please join the Goodbye Coney Island? group on Flickr:  (more…)

STUFF AND THINGS

YOU HAVE TO SEE THIS MOVIE:

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The Diving Bell and the Butterfly.

I loved it! It is depressing but not as depressing as it sounds — a film about a French man (who was the editor of Elle Magazine) who suffers a stroke and is left with locked-in syndrome. He can’t speak and can only blink one eye to communicate yes or no. Amazingly, he writes a book this way. Directed by Julian Schnabel, it’s an amazing work of art, a great story, too. We saw it at BAM

Postcard from the Slope

MERRY CHRISTMAS JAKE

I had a nice talk with Jake this evening. Jake is the panhandler who stands in front of Ace Supermarket on Seventh Avenue and Berkeley Place. He has a lovely smile and a pleasant personality. Jake said this is a tough Christmas for him because his 95-year-old mother died a few weeks ago. She lived in South Carolina. That’s where Jake grew up. On a farm. He thinks about going back to South Carolina but he  likes the pace of New York City he said. "It’s too slow down there," he said. "Too slow."

Richard Grayson

COMMUNITY PUBLISHING PARTY AT VOX POP

Here’s somethng new from author Richard Grayson, one of the Park Slope 100. He’s been busy teachng, like, 7 classes at 4 colleges. And he’s on hs way out of town. But he did take the tme to write about ths interestng gathering at Vox Pop.

Wednesday Evening at Vox Pop: Publish Yourself & Community Publishing Party by Rchard Grayson

On Wednesday evening, I went to Vox Pop, the amazing coffee bar/bookstore/performance space/community center and now instant-publishing center on Cortelyou Road by Stratford Road in America’s most diverse neighborhood, Brooklyn’s Ditmas Park. 

In 1966, when I was 15 I started hanging out around there because of my weekly sessions just up the block with my friendly neighborhood psychiatrist, Dr. Abbott A. Lippman, who got his medical degree from NYU during World War I and who grew orchids and taught me how to swallow pills without water. 

I’ve always loved the neighborhood, even before Sander Hicks brought Vox Pop there and lots of other exciting places lined Cortelyou Road. 

Apparently lots of other people like the neighborhood too.  To celebrate Publish Yourself, Vox Pop’s new community book printing and publishing center around the corner from the coffee bar, they’ve published What I Love About This Neighborhood, a 48-page paperback featuring “a collection of memories” by residents of Ditmas Park/Flatbush and other Brooklynites.

Leading off the collection is contributor Marty Markowitz, whom I first met at Brooklyn College back in the 1970s when he was head of the Graduate Students Organization which had its office where I hung out with other undergrad student government/newspaper/radical types, and who went on to become a community organizer, state senator and Brooklyn Borough President for the past six years.

Marty was on hand for the party, though a bit late because former President Bill Clinton had asked Marty to introduce him at a fundraiser that evening.  His reminiscence of Flatbush and Ditmas Park resonated with me, although I’m kind of shocked that Marty actually managed to eat the dish called “the Kitchen Sink” at the old Jahn’s ice cream parlor on Church off Flatbush back in our day. 

The other contributors to What I Love About This Neighborhood share memories of the neighborhood, which now features groceries and eateries from the far ends of planet earth.  Oldtimers who can recall stores I used to go in during the 1960s and 1970s and newcomers from rural America and even Manhattan all have distinctive voices, and all share their love of Ditmas Park/Flatbush and similar-but-distinct Brooklyn neighborhoods.  I wonder if the Glenn Feingold who describes eating his way through Windsor Terrace (“If you want to eat tofu, go to L.A. and meditate”) is my old friend whom I last recall driving home from Brooklyn College to his parents’ apartment in Bergen Beach in, oh, about 1974. . .

Sander, founder of Soft Skull Press, showed me around the Publish Yourself store.  It’s a print-on-demand micropublisher, and the bookmaster Gabriel Stuart let me watch the magic as he produced a professional-looking paperback with his InstaPrinter machine within a few minutes.

Around the store are many paperbacks published there, and all look as good as the much more expensive small press paperbacks I used to see at our New York Small Press Book Fairs thirty years ago.  If you’re interested in publishing a book, Sander told me his prices are better than those of some of the more established POD firms.  Check out the websitefor more info.

Thanks to Sander, Gabriel, and the other great people associated with Vox Pop and Publish Yourself for a fine evening and a nice little book about Brooklyn.

Now I’m leaving Brooklyn, heading out west for some holiday tofu and meditation

.

Civics and Urban Life

HOLIDAY IDEAS FROM PARK SLOPE PARENTS

Park Slope Parents posted some great holiday activities to know about for Sunday, December 23, 2007:

Prospect Park. Ice Skating at Wollman Rink

Grand Central Holiday Train Show

The Station At Citigroup Center

Christmas Trees For Sale By Local Boy Scouts in JJ Byrne Park

Prospect Park – Lefferts Historic House Quilt Exhibit & Workshops
&
More!

The Red Balloon & White Main At BAM: 1 p.m. daily.

Prospect Park Audubon Center – Discover Tours

Civics and Urban Life

SPIRITO RESTAURANT FOR SALE

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For $250,000 you can have an attractive Italian restaurant on 9th Street in Park Slope.

Spirito restaurant, a well-reviewed restaurant on 9th Street between 5th and 4th Avenues, seems to be for sale. An OTBKB reader sent me this tip. I walk by the restaurant often when I am on 9th Street and have been meaning to try it. Here’s what New York Magazine had to say about it.

What happens when three Italian expats (two of them restaurateurs, one a D.J.) get to know each other through their children’s school? They open a nice Italian restaurant, of course. That’s how Pierluigi Palazzo (owner of Gnocco and Perbacco in the East Village), Giovanni Caveggia (formerly a co-owner of Gradisca), and Mariano Franzese (one of the founders of Turntables on the Hudson) came to open Spirito in Park Slope. To keep it all in the (Italian) family, so to speak, they hooked up with Claudio Cristofoli of Cipriani Downtown to concoct a trattoria menu of classic and modern Italian dishes like bucatini all’amatriciana and prosciutto di Parma with fresh mango. There’s a piatti del giorno list, too, including Saturday’s polpettine (little meatballs with mashed potatoes), which must have been devised with the kids in mind. — Rob Patronite and Robin Raisfeld

Spirito for sale:

http://www.restaurants-for-sale.com/newsite/rro/listingview.asp?id=8980

Postcard from the Slope

WOMEN’S DIVORCE GROUP FORMING IN PARK SLOPE

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Marianne Gunther, a friend and fave of OTBKB, is starting a divorce group that will combine support with art therapy exercises. Read all about it in this week’s PS I Love You column in the Brooklyn Paper by another friend and fave, Wendy Ponte.

According to Gunther, divorce is a true grief process and people who are going through it need to experience all the stages of grieving, just as if someone dear had died. Unfortunately, most people sidestep those feelings and translate them into anger or diffuse the feelings with litigation.

“How do you make your life about more than this?” asks Gunther. “I’m not going to spend the rest of my days reacting to my ex-husband, so how can I mourn the loss and move on?”

When Gunther herself divorced back in 2001, she belonged to a women’s support group in Park Slope that saved her sanity. That group, which met at the Brooklyn Society for Ethical Culture, no longer exists. So she met with the director and offered to start up a new group.

This group will meet once a week at the Ethical Culture building on Prospect Park West, between First and Second streets. Women will get together and, guided by Gunther, support each other, get practical information and referrals, and use art-therapy techniques to both process and contain their feelings. The fee for each meeting is $25. If you are interested in joining this group, call (347) 628-9279 or e-mail listeningart@yahoo.com

Civics and Urban Life

XMAS EVE AT OLD FIRST

For weeks, Pastor Daniel Meeter has been preparing for the Christmas Eve service at Old First. I hear it’s quite the event with gorgeous music. He tells me that the church fills with over 300 people. He encouraged me to come. I wish I could go but I’m having my father and stepmother over for Christmas Eve. Here are the details if you’re looking for something to do on Christmas Eve:

The Christmas Eve service at Old First, 7:30 PM will include candlelight, Lessons and Carols,Dr. Daniel Meeter, preaching on The Gift of Peace, festive Music For Organ and Brass, the Great Hymns and Carols, and congregational singing. Featured performers: Aleeza Meir, organist, the “Akida” from the Torah, sung by Emma Goldberg Liu, Nathan Warner, trumpet, Anneke El Hassani, soprano, Julia Hurn, soprano, Brian Nesby, counter-tenor, and Jeff Spurgeon, baritone.

Serving Park Slope and Beyond