A 12-year-old boy in my building is taking sitar lessons. Lately, he’s been practicing on the stoop. It’s quite a sight to see him out there sitting crossed leg like Ravi Shankar; his big, ornate  instrument that has  something like 40 strings. I asked him if he knows how to tune it and he said, "No." But his teacher can do that when necessary.  The first song he learned was "Paint it Black," the Rolling Stones song with that unmistakable sitar lick at the beginning.

Our budding sitarist can also pick out other tunes: Ode to Joy from Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony and Amazing Grace, for example. This evening, at dusk, he was playing duets with a girl from the building next door who plays the flute. It was an unexpected mingling of sounds: the sitar and the flute. But it really sounded quite nice.

When I went downstairs, I got a better look at their make-shift concert. He was sitting cross-legged on the sidewalk in front of our building with his instrument collecting money for Hurricane Katrina relief.

Two children next door were sitting on chairs in front of their buildings; a brother/sister guitar and flute duo.

It looked like both musical acts had raised quite a bit of money – there were lots of  dollar bills in their baskets. A street of music: in my 11 years on Third Street I’ve never seen a concert by children on the street.

I’ve known the sitar player since he was two. He used to play the violin. I think he even took clarinet lessons, too. A few years back he was really into top-40 radio to his parent’s chagrin. He’s traveled quite a bit with his parents and grandmother – to China and Europe, even Korea where he spent a summer with other kids from around the world. It’s amazing to watch kids grow up and see how they evolve. It really is.

An amazing thing.

This morning I heard the daughter of legendary sitarist Ravi Shankar, Anoushka Shankar, on National Public Radio. She’s just released a new album of world music and it sounds really interesting. It’s called Rise, and it was composed, produced, and arranged by Anoushka – with a group of virtuoso Eastern and Western musicians on a variety of both acoustic and electronic instruments.

I wanted to mention it to my neighbor, the budding sitarist, but I forgot. I’ll have to remember to do that one day.

September is the most exhausting month. The transition from the sluggish pace of summer  to the rah rah rah pace of fall is always draining. And this year it’s taking me longer than ever to get into the swing of things. Could be the humid, doggy weather we’ve been having. Or the intense allergy season that has me popping Claritin like candy and sneezing and itching all the time.

Worst of all, is the new morning schedule we’re on. Or should I say, my son is on. But of, course it means the whole family has to follow along, too. In order to arrive at his high school by 8:30 a.m. sharp, my son has to be out the door at 7:30. That means my husband’s cell phone alarm goes off at 6 a.m. He’s got it set to something called "Chinese Dance" and the sound of it really gets one of us out of bed fast to turn off the loud, annoying sound.

Once the alarm is off, we sometimes drift back to sleep, which can be very dangerous. On Monday, no one woke up until 7:30. Then we go into emergency mode -showerdressglassesbreakfastbookbagout – my husband has to drive my son to his school in Bay Ridge.

My husband usually goes into my son’s room, which is right next door to ours, to wake him up. "The weasels are coming," my husband says. That is code for: ‘I’m going to start tickling you.’  "The weasels are here. You better wake up," he says. This is a wake up game the two of them have been playing for years. Then the tickling begins and the yelping, the screaming. the "Stop it, dads. Stop it!" I’m not sure if he loves it or hates it. But I think some sort of male bonding is going on.

The tie is another key component of the new morning ritual. My husband has instructed my son not to tie his tie until he’s brushed his teeth or had breakfast – it’ll get dirty that way. This is how manly information is passed from generation to generation. Just before he leaves the apartment, my son stands in wait while my husband ties his tie.

Soon my son may learn how to tie it himself. But for now, he’s learning by watching his father engage in this ancient rite.

He’s still wearing that silver tie with the diagonal black stripes he wore the first day of school. Guess it’s his signature tie. Do you have to wash ties?  Better ask my husband about that.
Once he’s out the door, we take a short break until it’s time to wake my daughter up. Her commute is a bit shorter – PS 321 is right around the corner. But she hates to wake up…

September is the most exhausting month.

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Teens for New Orleans, a benefit concert on September 24, at the Old Stone House from 6-9 p.m., is really gathering steam. All proceeds from the event are going to the Jazz Foundation of America, which has set up an emergency fund for New Orleans musicians.

Cool and Unusual and their parents met last night for a major production meeting. A large group, we sat at the dining room table and went over all the production details: equipment, lights, load-in, line-up, food, security, clean up. There was a lot to go over and we managed to do it in a fairly efficient manner. The band is taking this rather ambitious endeavor quite seriously.

The line-up was determined early on: The Foundation Quintet, a jazz group, will open the show. Then Jake Gilford, comedian and M.C. will entertain the crowd followed by Modrocket, a grrrrl band  made up of students from NEST+M high school in Manhattan. Cool and Unusual is third up followed by Capsacicin (three members of StunGun). The show will end with Calibre, a band from Chappaqua, New York.

We also discussed signs, safety, ticket takers, hand stampers, trucking of equipment, and food set up and delivery. As one of the mom’s said, "It would have been so much easier to write a check. But this is really a great experience for all of us." 

That particular mom has been dubbed "momager" by her son in appreciation for her help in organizing this event.

If you are an individual or a business and are interested in donating baked goods, beverages, or other food items to the event please e-mail me: louise_crawford@yahoo.com Your help would be much appreciated.

Yesterday, I noticed that the flyers about the missing plaque honoring David Fontana are the only flyers on Seventh Avenue that haven’t been removed by the ‘committee to rid Park Slope of flyers.’

I papered Seventh Avenue last Friday with flyers about the  Brooklyn Reading Works reading this Thursday September 22 — few of those flyers are still up. My son also put flyers up around the nabe about the Teens for New Orleans Benefit on Saturday, September 24. He says that most of those were taken down, too.

But the blue flyers offering a reward for the return of the plaque, no questions asked, were stilll up. I saw quite a few of them this afternoon. And while I’m annoyed that my flyers are gone, I am relieved that the flyers about Dave’s plaque are still there.

On Tuesday, there was a front page article in the New York Daily News about the stolen plaque — a story that appeared in OTBKB last Thursday and Friday. It was weird to see that familiar picture of Dave on the cover of the News; it’s the image on his wake card – a wallet-sized, laminated card Marian Fontana had made for those who attended Dave’s wake at The Montauk Club – something I truly treasure.

There it was on the front page of the News with the story of the plaque, which said simply said: "In memory of Firefighter Dave Fontana,
1-0/17/63 – 9/11/01. Beloved husband, father, neighbor, artist, hero."

According to the Daily News, sometime between 1:15 p.m. and 3:15 p.m. on Sept. 12, the plaque disappeared from its spot under the tree.

"I’d like to believe that people aren’t that cruel, and that it was
just a stupid prank," Marian Fontana told the News. "Why anyone would want to take something like that is beyond my comprehension."

I couldn’t agree more. The story has really gathered momentum in the last few days. I received a polite e-mail from a reporter for the City Section of the New York Times. It was a little confusing but nice just the same:

"I’m e-mailing mostly to reverse (and apologize for the disturbance of) an earlier call. I’d been going to do something for the Times’s City Section about the missing plaque–but this was before my editors and I realized there was already some press coverage.  (The City Section, being a weekly, tends to steer clear of things covered in the dailies, esp. early in the week).  So my earlier messages, left at the two numbers listed on the flyer, are unfortunately moot.  (Though I would still like to have done a story.)  I wanted to apologize, and to say I really hope you get hold of the plaque.

 
The News reported that Marian visited the plaque on the fourth anniversary of 9/11 just over a week ago. She went to a ceremony with the families at Squad 1 and then went to the meadow in Prospect Park where Dave proposed to her. Afterwards, she went over to Fourth Street to check on their old apartment and see the tree with the plaque.

"Just put it back where it belongs," Marian said.

It really is the strangest thing that someone would steal a memorial plaque. I just can’t figure out why anyone would do it. But I agree with Marian: put it back where it belongs.

I hope those blue flyers with their offer of a reward for the safe return of the plaque stay where they are. Enough has been ripped off lately – let those flyers fly. And maybe they’ll help to restore the plaque to its rightful place. For Dave and Marian. For her neighbors on Fourth Street. For people of Park Slope.

Put it back where it belongs!

From Curbed.com

Behold! The new and improved Coney Island of the future, maybe. As we’ve said
before, shopping mall developer Thor Equities has been buying up land
along the Boardwalk like it’s going out of style (which it did, about
30 years ago), to much speculation as to what they’re up to and how it
will fit in with the city’s own redevelopment plans. New York magazine went to the source

At my 14-year-old son’s last check-up, his pediatrician, Dr. Edna Pytlak, delievered one of the best anti-drug and alcohol speeches I’ve ever heard.

It was the casualness of her delivery that was so disarming and my son really listened. "Be careful of teen parties in Park Slope," she said moments after asking him to jump up and down 30 times. "Kids are consuming toxic levels of alcohol," she added as she went about his 14-year check-up. "Some of my patients wound up in the hospital last year after drinking much too much. They nearly died."

She talked about the tragic drug overdose of a boy who’d just graduated from Brooklyn Friends in June and the kids who got alcohol poisoning in the PS 321 playground last Spring. She talked, my son listened. She has an easy authority and my son’s well-earned trust.

Dr. Pytlak appears, on first meeting, to be a cross between Mary Poppins and Miss Frizzle from the Magic School Bus books. But she is really so much more: a whip-smart physician, a great diagnostician, a common sense healer, and an always reliable partner in the event of an emergency.

"With all this IM-ing, kids who weren’t invited to the parties are showing up," Dr. Pytlak, the mother of two grown children, continued knowingly. "At one party, some kids came with heroin (that’s a felony, you know). Heroin is very, very dangerous. It’s very easy to overdose."

I think it was her matter-of-fact, non-judgemental manner that really got the message across. You could say that she used scare tactics but it wasn’t an outdated "Reefer Madness" message which is so easy for kids to discount. She speaks from experience using specific examples from the community we live in. She’s got the facts and she’s not afraid to use them. It doesn’t sound like platitudes or "Just Say No." She seems to understand where the kids are coming from. Like she’s one of the kids herself. But with authority and experience.

With her pretty floral aprons and her sing-songy voice, Dr. Pytlak is beloved by legions of Brooklyn children and parents. When we joined her practice in 1991, she was already a legend in these parts and it was close to impossible to get in. But Dr. Pytlak had just partnered with another great doctor (Brianne O’Connor) and she had room for families with newborns. I guess we got lucky and she has seen us through a host of medical emergencies.

Dr. Pytlak works hard to establish an easy relationship with her young patients and check- ups are fun; the kids actually look forward to them. On the walls of her office are the framed collages she makes of all the holiday photos she receives each year. The kids trust her and really listen to what she has to say. "Your mother and I, we might have had beer, maybe pot at parties," she said while looking in my son’s ears. "But we weren’t drinking alcohol the way these kids are. It’s really quite different."

Dr. Pytlak is a great partner to have during this scary teenage phase.  Somehow she makes it all feel so much less frightening. With her help, maybe we’ll all make it through.

The New York Daily News has this story, first reported in OTBKB last week, about the plaque in honor of David Fontana that was stolen; the headline reads: COWARDS INSULT A HERO!

Twisted pranksters ripped off a memorial plaque
for fallen 9/11 Firefighter Dave Fontana from outside his old Brooklyn
home – on the day after the fourth anniversary of his death.

"They took Daddy’s plaque?" a heartbroken Aidan Fontana, 9, asked his mother, Marian, at their new home in Staten Island. "Why?"

The 9-inch-by-12-inch bronze plaque – dedicated Dec. 22, 2002, to the
Squad 1 hero – had lain alongside the base of a tree in front of his
former Park Slope brownstone.

The simple message read, "In memory of Firefighter Dave Fontana,
1-0/17/63 – 9/11/01. Beloved husband, father, neighbor, artist, hero."

Its only anchor was a foot-long metal spike, as no one imagined it
would be a target for thieves in the generally crime-free neighborhood,
which is also home to Fontana’s firehouse.

But sometime between 1:15 p.m. and 3:15 p.m. on Sept. 12, the well-tended memorial disappeared.

"I’d like to believe that people aren’t that cruel, and that it was
just a stupid prank," said Marian Fontana, who got the troubling news
while speaking about her new book, "A Widow’s Walk," at the New York
Academy of Sciences.

"Why anyone would want to take something like that is beyond my comprehension," she said yesterday.

Fontana added that she had just visited the plaque on the solemn anniversary of the terror attacks.

After attending Mass with other widows and firefighters at her late
husband’s firehouse, Fontana went to the spot where he proposed to her
in Prospect Park and to their former home to pause at the plaque.

Fontana said she was disturbed by the theft – and urged whoever stole the plaque to "just put it back where it belongs."

Dave Fontana was an avid sculptor who originally signed up for the Fire Department to make time for his art.

He had even worked a 24-hour shift into the morning of Sept. 11, 2001,
sohe could meet Marian for aprivate viewing of the Whitney Museum’s
sculpture garden on their eighth wedding anniversary.

The friends who designed and created the plaque – former neighbor Sarah
Greene and former landlords Sally and Kevin O’Connell – have plastered
the area with flyers offering a $100 reward for its safe return.

But if necessary, they are already prepared to buy another one at a cost of nearly $1,000.

"It just makes us feel that all the goodwill that we all felt after
9/11 gets tossed out in a bucket," Greene said of the theft. "We’re
just incredulous that anyone could be so selfish or so uncaring."

With Rivka Bukowsky

The teen scene on Seventh Avenue has a different vibe, a different cast of characters, this fall. Last year’s high school freshmen (now sophmores) are still hanging out in front of the PS 321 playground but they no longer seem to be crowding outside the Mojo patio. They seem a little less hyper, a little less out to prove that they’re cool. I think they’ve  settled into their teenage selves and are a little more calm.

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This year’s freshmen are just beginning to flex their high school muscles. Many have claimed the Mojo patio as a hang-out for themselves. I’ve noticed some of them next to Rite Aid, others on the north/east corner of Third Street, and on the corner of 2nd Street. I also know that Longs Meadow in Prospect Park has become something of a meeting place. (I used to hang out in Central Park when I was in high school but somehow this is a little bit scarier. Everything is when it’s your kid and not you.)

Dispersed to public and private high schools all over the city, this year’s freshman are reconnecting with their old friends in locations all over the Slope. There’s so much to adjust to the first few weeks of high school. So there must be comfort in being with the old familiar. But it’s the good-old-days with a difference. Some of them have a bit more independence – they’ve got Metrocards, money, more mobility – and they’re pushing the envelope whenever they can.

So far,  I am not sensing a hyperness in them like last year’s teens but they are re-inventing themselves and actively declaring new identities.

There’s something about the other Slope kids that brings comfort and confidence. Maybe it reminds them of when they were the oldest kids at their old schools, when they ruled the roost of their little universe. They come back together as if to say, "I know I’m moving on, but I’m not ready to let go of what’s here. Not yet anyway."

Yesterday, I walked up and down Seventh Avenue from 3rd to 9th Streets taping BROOKLYN READING WORKS flyers onto lamp posts, mailboxes and bulletin boards. And now I am just crossing my fingers that no one has torn them down. Yet.

My husband said that Magic Tape isn’t the right kind of tape to use. "Just look at the other flyers on the Avenue." I did and I saw that most people use a very thick and sticky kind of tape. I guess I have a lot to learn about papering the Avenue.

But I’ll hope for the best. Even if the flyers only stay up for a few hours, a lot of people will see them. A woman who saw me taping a flyer up asked for one of the flyers to give to a friend who is a writer. Just walking down the street with a flyer can be an effective form of advertising. Maybe I should wear a sandwich board or something.

I know it’s probably just a matter of hours before someone tapes over my flyers or tears them down. My husband thinks I should ask shopkeepers to put the flyer in their windows. I did go into stores that have community bulletin boards and put my flyers there. I put one in Seventh Avenue Books, Barnes and Noble, the Chocolate Bar, Starbucks and other shops. I also gave one to Catherine at Community Books and hopefully she’ll put it in her window.

It’ll be interesting to see how many people turn up for the show. Needless to say, I am hoping for a big turnout on Thursday for the first BROOKLYN READING WORKS of the year with novelist Sheila Kohler and poet Matthew Zapruder. It should be a wonderful evening.

Sheila Kohler has published five novels, including Crossways, and three
collections of short stories. Her novel Cracks was chosen by New York
Newsday and Library Journal as one of the best books of 1999. A native
of South Africa, she makes her home in New York City and teaches at
Bennington College.

Poet Matthew Zapruder is the author of American Linden, winner of the
Tupelo Press Editors’ Prize. His poems have appeared in many literary
magazines and journals, including The Boston Review, Fence, Crowd,
Jubilat, Both, Harvard Review, The New Republic and The New Yorker.

I know there are people in Park Slope who think that the lamp posts of Park Slope should be flyerless. They actually tear flyers off of lamp posts.

I saw one of these "activists" once. He had an angry look in his eyes as he ripped flyers off of of lamp posts and threw the offending flyers into trash bins. I didn’t speak with him, but I’ve heard that these anti-flyer people think that flyers make the Avenue look messy; that they take away from the landmark quality of the neighborhood.

It can be quite frustrating when you’ve papered the Avenue with, say, stoop sale posters and hours later your flyers are gone.

Personally, I think lamp posts full of flyers communicate a vital community with an abundance of activities. I certainly don’t think it diminishes the historic style of the neighborhood. One of the fun things about living around here is reading the various flyers that people put up. Stoop sales, writing groups, babysitters, readings, political gatherings, etc. It’s all part of life in the Slope.

Today my son and his friends will be papering the neighborhood with TEENS FOR NEW ORLEANS flyers with information about their benefit concert next Saturday, September 24 from 6-9 p.m. at the Old Stone House. All proceeds from the concert goes to the Jazz Foundation of America, which is helping musicians in New Orleans.

BROOKLYN READING WORKS and TEENS FOR NEW ORLEANS are both at The Old Stone House in JJ Byrne Park on Fifth Avenue between 3rd and 4th Streets.

Residents of Fourth Street between Sixth and Seventh Avenues in Park Slope still can’t figure out why a memorial plaque in honor of Lt. David Fontana, one of eleven
firefighters from Squad 1 who died on 9/11 at the World
Trade Center, was stolen.

In 2002, the plaque was placed on a tree in front of the Fourth Street brownstone where David, Marian, and Aidan
Fontana used to live. There was a small dedication ceremony around
Christmas of that year. "We invited Squad 1 over for a little
dedication. Some kids from my son’s chorus at MS 51 stood on the stoop
and sang a couple of song," writes Sarah Greene in an e-mail to
OTBKB. "My husband, Bill, talked about how we planted that tree a few
years before, and when he watered it some mornings, Dave would come out
and they’d chat. So we thought of it as ‘Dave’s tree’."

This weekend there are plans to hang flyers all over the Slope. A reward of $100 is being offered for the plaque’s return.

The plaque, which reads, "In Memory of Firefighter Dave Fontana –
Beloved Husband, Father, Neighbor, Artist, Hero," was discovered
missing on the afternoon of Wednesday, September 13th. "It was there in
the morning because my husband watered the tree around 10 a.m," writes
Greene.  "But Liz O’Connell noticed it was missing in the afternoon."

Anther Fourth Street resident wrote e-mails to MS 51, as well as to Larry Woodbridge, the administrator for the John Jay building. "I spoke with the evening custodian at John Jay, someone from the Grecian Coffee Shop, and mentioned it at the Bagel Shop this morning. I also spoke with someone from the management company across the street from the tree –she said they will certainly keep their eyes and ears open and said they would be glad to make a donation for a replacement," she wrote in an e-mail to Ms. Greene. "The mood on the block is sad."

No one can quite figure out why someone would steal the plaque in honorlocal Park Slope hero. Perhaps someone wanted a 9/11 souvenir.
The theft could possibly be connected to the publicity surrounding the
recent publication of Marian Fontana’s book" A WIDOW’S WALK: A MEMOIR OF 9/11. Or it might have been a school prank – there are two
schools within blocks of the plaque.

If you have any information about the missing plaque, contact: Sarah Greene at
sarahgreene@nyc.rr.com or louise_crawford@yahoo.com

"Why do hurricanes always have girl names?" My daughter asks while watching the President on TV.

I try to explain that they alternate names – boy, girl, boy, girl. But it does seem like some of the worst have been women’s names: Camille, Betsy, Gloria, and now Katrina.

Today my daughter came home with a raging fever. At dismissal, she said she had a headache and promptly took a nap when we got home (a very unusual thing, I might add). She woke up feeling like a furnace and the electronic ear thermometer revealed that her temperature was 102.8.

Immediately, we launched into "sick child mode."  I gave her 2 teaspoons of Motrin, heated up Progresso Chicken Noodle Soup, and served it to her on a tray in bed.

After a little while, her fever went down and I let her lie on the living room couch and watch a show called The O.C, which I think is a very popular show on Fox. It’s a pretty awful Southern California soap opera, but it’s also kind of fun in its awfulness.

That’s over now and she seems to be getting her energy back. She keeps asking if she’s going to school tomorrow and I keep telling her that she will be staying home and that she might even be going to see her doctor if her symptoms persist.

Reassured, she goes back to watching a Simpsons Video on DVD (she got bored of W and turned him off). I go into the kitchen to listen to the President speak from New Orleans. Seventeen days after Katrina, he’s trying to win back the nation after the debacle of Katrina and convince people that he’s firmly in charge. While not exactly contrite, he did say that "four years after 9/11, Americans do have the right to expect more."

I know that the Motrin is responsible for lowering my daughters fever so I expect her high temperature to return later this evening. Like most moms, I have a good deal of experience with high temperatures and other childhood sickness. I am not looking forward to seeing her all droopy and hot. But it comes with the territory. Of being a mother, that is. We take care of our own in the best of times and the worst. That’s all part of the job.

I came across this list of books, mostly fiction with some non-fiction and poetry sprinkled in, that was compiled by the Brooklyn Public Library on the web. It’s hardly comprehensive but there’s some great stuff here. Please add your own and send them to me.

Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, Michael Chabon
Farming of Bones, Edwidge Danticat
Snow in August: a novel , Pete Hamill
Disappearing Acts, Terry McMillan
My Name is Asher Lev, Chaim Potok
Push: a novel, Sapphire
John Henry Days: a novel, Colson Whitehead
Complete Poems of Marianne Moore
Leaves of Grass, Walt Whitman
Fires in the Mirror, Anna Deavere Smith
When Brooklyn Was the World, Elliott Willensky

Young Adults:
Life Is Funny, E.R. Frank
Annie on the Mind, Nancy Garden
Spellbound, Janet McDonald
Fresh Girl, Jaira Placide
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, Betty Smith
When I Was Puerto Rican, Esmeralda Santiago

Juvenile:
Big Jimmy

My son’s band, COOL AND UNUSUAL PUNISHMENT, has decided to do something very cool and unusual. They are organizing a benefit concert to raise money for the Jazz Foundation of America, a group that is providing aid to th musicians of New Orleans.

The concert will be on SEPTEMBER 24, from 6-9 pm at THE OLD STONE HOUSE in Park Slope. Admission is $10 for adults and $5 for anyone under 18 and seniors.  There will be refreshments, t-shirts, and plenty of other opportunities at the show to contribute money.

The concert line-up is still being developed but it looks like COOL AND UNUSUAL PUNISHMENT will be joined by Mod Rocket and the Foundation Quintet. Comedian Jacb Guilford will be he MC. More details as soon as I know them.

Mark your calendars and tell everyone you know about the show. The benefit concert is in The Old Stone House in JJ Byrne Park. Fifth Avenue between 3rd and 4th Streets.

For directions to The Old  Stone House go here. All other inquiries can be directed to me at louise_crawford@yahoo.com until further notice.

A memorial plaque in honor of Lt. David Fontana, one of the firefighters from Squad 1 in Park Slope who died on 9/11 at the World Trade Center, has been stolen. 

It was placed there in 2002 by friends and neighbors on the tree in front of the Fourth Street brownstone where David, Marian, and Aidan Fontana used to live. There was a small dedication ceremony around Christmas of that year. "We invited Squad 1 over for a little dedication. Some kids from my son’s chorus at MS51 stood on the stoop and sang a couple of song. songs," writes Sarah Greene in an e-mail to OTBKB. "My husband, Bill,  talked about how we planted that tree a few years before, and when he watered it some mornings, Dave would come out and they’d chat. So we thought of it as ‘Dave’s tree’."

The plaque, which reads, "In Memory of Firefighter Dave Fontana – Beloved Husband, Father, Neighbor, Artist, Hero," was discovered missing on the afternoon of Wednesday, September 13th. "It was there in the morning because my husband watered the tree around 10 a.m," writes Greene.  "But Liz O’Connell noticed it was missing in the afternoon."

The missing plaque has been reported to the police. "But somehow I doubt they will put a detective on the case," writes Sarah. She and her neighbors are putting up signs this weekend offering a $100 reward for its return. The value was placed at $800.00 but Greene thinks that it will cost close to $1000. to replace it.

No one can quite figure out why someone would steal the plaque which honors a local Park Slope hero. Perhaps someone wanted a 9/11 souvenir. The theft could be connected to the publicity surrounding the publication of Marian Fontana’s just-published memoir: "A Widow’s Walk: A Memoir of 9/11." Or it might have been a school prank – there are two schools near the location of the plaque. The principals of both schools were notified of the missing plaque.

If you have any information about the missing plaque, contact: Sarah Greene at
sarahgreene@nyc.rr.com or louise_crawford@yahoo.com

Remember, you heard it here first. So here’s the deal. A new film called THE SQUID AND THE WHALE, described by New York Magazine as the Park Slopiest of movies, opens in October. But there’s a sneak preview of it at the BAM ROSE CINEMA on September 29th.

The film, which I haven’t seen yet, has been described as a moving autobiographical account of growing up in 1986 Park Slope. It stars Jeff Daniels as a writer in what’s been described as a career defining role. His marriage to Laura Linney dissolves, disrupting the lives of their two sons. Apparently the film is full of authentic Brooklyn details and locations. I remember seing film trucks with this movie’s wierd name on it and thinking: WTF?

This Sundance Award

As One Strip Goes Stodgy, Another One Goes Hip
by Lisa Selin Davis

Thirty years ago, as the arrival of affluent professionals in search of good schools, gorgeous brownstones and a sense of community began transforming working-class Park Slope, the businesses sprouting along Seventh Avenue seemed a perfect reflection of the tastes and passions of the new residents.

Fifth Avenue is growing as edgy as Seventh once was.

"My experience with retail and Park Slope in the 1970’s was that a person owned a shop because they were selling something they loved," said Fonda Sara, who opened Zuzu’s Petals, a flower shop and nursery, on Seventh Avenue near Berkeley Place in 1971.

In 1974, Ms. Sara moved across the street from her original location, but after a fire last summer wiped out her home of 30 years, she could not find an affordable storefront on Seventh Avenue. In November, she moved to Fifth Avenue near Fifth Street, joining small shops like Under the Pig Antiques and Galaxy Comics in making the leap from Seventh Avenue to Fifth.

As chain stores continue to replace small businesses along Seventh Avenue, its hip, younger sibling, Fifth Avenue, is becoming what its older brother once was: a home for entrepreneurial adventurers, many of whom, forced out by rising rents, have set up shop two blocks west and a world away.

According to Kenneth Adams, president of the Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce, rents on Fifth Avenue are roughly $30 to $40 per square foot, half the rate along Seventh Avenue, which, with Montague Street in Brooklyn Heights, commands the highest commercial rents in the borough. As a result, few retailers can afford a Seventh Avenue address.

"You’re not going to get more indigenous, unique neighborhood retail when asking rents are in the $100-per-square-foot range," Mr. Adams said. "That’s going to lock out most neighborhood enterprises, and lock in regional chains like banks and real estate offices."

Of course, some old-school Park Slope businesses endure along Seventh Avenue, among them Tarzian hardware, an 80-year resident whose proprietors own their building. And southern Seventh Avenue, below Ninth Street, is home to small, hip businesses like the boutique Bird that would feel just as at home in Williamsburg.

Chain stores began arriving on Seventh Avenue in 1997, when Rite Aid and Barnes & Noble established beachheads, and continued with the arrival of cellphone shops and chain restaurants like Subway, which could pay many times the rent that a small business could. (Small businesses like botanicas and bodegas, which have survived for years on Fifth Avenue, may fall to a similar fate, as chains like Dunkin’ Donuts make their way along the street, and rents there begin to rise.)

Some shoppers have adjusted their ways accordingly. "I never go to Seventh Avenue," said Lisa Bowstead, who with Bob Ipcar runs the Web site smalltownbrooklyn.com, which tracks businesses along the borough’s main streets. "There’s just nothing there for me." Ms. Sara added: "Part of the culture of Park Slope was Seventh Avenue. Going downtown to a small store, kibitzing with the owner – you were connected to them."

Meanwhile, Fifth Avenue is welcoming Seventh Avenue refugees, people like Troy Files, owner of Under the Pig, who moved last summer to a 300-square-foot storefront near Fifth Street that is half the size of his former location. Though he acknowledges that Fifth Avenue has much less foot traffic, he says he is glad he made the move. "Fifth Avenue still has a little bit of edginess, a little bit more of a fun crowd," he explained. And he understands why his former landlord raised his rent. "If you could get $2,000 to rent to a mom-and-pop or $4,000 for a chain store," he said, "what would you choose?"

Still, business continues to boom along Seventh Avenue. "You can grouch about how the old neighborhood has changed," Mr. Ipcar said. "But basically the community is still very much alive."

Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company

Lisa Selin Davis will be reading at Brooklyn Reading Works at The Old Stone House on Thursday, December 15, 2005 at 8 p.m. For more information go here.

It was just a matter of time. The other shoe has dropped and it doesn’t feel very good: the reality of Sonya is settling in and my daughter is having some difficulty adjusting to this sea change in her life.

My daughter has spent much of the past year looking forward to Sonya’s arrival. Even before my sister got the referral from the orphanage in Perm, Russia, my daughter has been looking forward to her new cousin.

Once we got the photos, though, my daughter really attached to her. Big time. She lovingly named her Ducky because the receiving blanket she was photographed in had little ducks pictured on it.

After my sister’s first trip to Russia, we had pictures of Sonya in the orphanage and that’s when the longing for Sonya began. From May through the end of August, my daughter  couldn’t pass a clothing or toy shop without wanting to buy something for Sonya.

When my sister, her husband and Sonya returned to Brooklyn from Russia on August 28thit was almost unbearable to remain on vacation in California until August 30th so desperate were we all to meet Sonya. Particularly my daughter, who was chanting: "I want to see Ducky. I want to see Ducky." the whole time.

And it was love at first sight. From the moment they laid eyes on one another, Sonya and my daughter really hit it off. That very first night they met, my daughter was in Sonya’s crib, snuggling up with her and kissing her big cheeks. My daughter delighted in feeding her, pushing her in her stroller, giving Sonya her sippy-cup. They’ve already spent countless hours in the Third Street Playground and on the streets of Seventh Avenue.

I asked my  sister yesterday, "So how do you like having two kids?"

Well, the other shoe has dropped: My daughter has discovered the flip side of a new baby in the family. It sucks the attention right out of a room. "Oh she’s so cute!" "She’s adorable!" "She looks like she’s been here forever." "Look at those cheeks."

You get the idea.

But the worst part is this: my daughter feels like she’s been replaced. Her beloved aunt now has her own child and for my daughter it feels like hell. Granted, my sister probably spoiled the be-jesus out of my daughter. And she continues to shower her with attention and compliments on her being such a great cousin. But for a sensitive young 8-year old, it feels like she’s out and the new kid is in.

It hit hard today. The baby scratched my daughter’s eyelid by accident. Very, very lightly. Apparently nobody noticed. "And you were staring right at me," my daughter cried. But we sure did notice when my daughter punched Sonya’s little foot. "What are you doing?" my sister shouted with barely concealed anger.

My daughter walked away in a huff and it took hours for her to calm down.  "Nobody cared that the baby scratched me. Nobody cares about me anymore!" She’s very angry right now and full of pain. She told my sister, "I had to blow my nose twelve times because I was crying so much."

I remember when my daughter was born in 1997. On the third or fourth day of her life, my son, who was then five and a half, called me on the phone (from another room in the apartment) and shouted "I hate you!" and hung up. He called again a moment later: "I love you!" slam. These alternating cries of love and hate  continued for about twenty calls. It was hugely painful but also deeply understandable.

It’s an earth shattering event when a new baby comes into a family and it brings about a complete realignment of relationships. I know my daughter will adjust to her new cousin and adjust to the fact that she’s not the youngest person in the family anymore. She will eventually learn that there’s more than enough love to go around.

More than enough. But for now, her pain is real. And we can all relate to that jealousy and that hurt; that sense that we’ve been pushed away in favor of someone new. It may not be rational but boy is it real.

For fun, I went through New York Magazine’s FALL PREVIEW issue and circled everything Brooklyn in it.

On a first, quick read, it seemed that the borough (let alone any borough other than Manhattan) didn’t come up very much.  So I thought, hey, let’s see how many times the County of Kings is mentioned.

Out of well over 100 listings throughout the magazine including an Event-a-Day calendar, movie, theater, music, art, and restaurant sections, Brooklyn (groovy, hipper-than-hip Brooklyn),  come up exactly thirteen times. And that includes two mentions of THE SQUID AND THE WHALE. So let’s call it twelve.

Well, that pissed me off a little, though it is NEW YORK’S perogative to write about all the Manhattan events that they want to. But I spent my $3.99 hoping to hear about the fall in Brooklyn, too. Silly me. It’s called New York Magazine.  And everyone knows New York means Manhattan.

So here are the big thirteen and in order:

1. On October 2: Across the Narrows Concert on Staten and Coney Islands with Oasis, Jet, and the Doves as headliners.

2. On October 5: THE SQUID AND THE WHALE with Jeff Daniels opens, described by New York as the Park Slopiest movie of the year.

3. On October 11: The BAM Next Wave Festival mounts a ballet version of RAISE THE RED LANTERN.

4. October 15: Art Under the Bridge Festival in Dumbo

Okay, that’s it – IT – for the Day-by-Day Event calendar (for September through November).

5. Opening September 16: EVERYTHING IS ILLUMINATED opens. The film, based on the book, by Park Sloper Jonathan Safran Foer, stars Elijah Wood and was directed by Liev Schreiber.

6. STAY, Marc Foster’s drama in which a Brooklyn Bridge car crash bonds Naomi Watts, Ewan McGregor, and Ryan Gosling opens in October,.

7. THE SQUID AND THE WHALE with Jeff Daniels as a bad novelist and even worse father is mentioned twice in the movie section.

8. PROTOCOLS OF ZION, a documentary aout the resurgance of anti-semitism was directed by Brooklyn native, Marc Levin. Opens October 21 – not sure where.

9. In the book section, only Myla Goldberg’s new WICKETT’S REMEDY (Doubleday) made the list.  In that article, the Brooklyn band the Decemberists is mentioned for recording a song called "Song for Myla Goldberg."

10. Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, a Brooklyn band turned overnight sensation plays at the Bowery Bar on September,  9th.

11. Williamsburg’s Stellastarr comes out with a new album called HARMONIES FOR THE HAUNTED.

12. Another Brooklyn band, The Mendoza Line releases their new disc: FULL OF LIGHT AND FULL OF FIRE.

13. And in the restauarant section, there was exactly 1 mention of a Brooklyn restaurant and it’s called: Anthony’s at 462A Seventh Avenue in Park Slope. According to New York Magazine: "The Nick’s Pizza crew and a bona fide Neapolitan pizzaiolo plant a thin crust flag in the South Slope. C’est Tout!

There’s gotta be more going on in Brooklyn than this.  Stay tuned for OTBKB’s Fall PREVIEW.