Saturday, October 24, 2020 - “Fictional Seeds Will Bear Fruit / Octavia E. Butler” by Rebecca Nison
“Pay close attention to what you choose to water,” writes Jaiya John. “It will grow.”
Williamsburg, Brooklyn
I’m wandering the wide streets cordoned off for pedestrians. The quiet is startling. Mask on, I’m all eyes, taking in what remains and what’s changed. At the corner, what was once a shop filled with tapestries and candles is all dark windows, empty space. I mourn this, recognizing there are losses behind this loss that I can barely imagine. I notice, too, the balconies, once vacant, that now bloom with tall plants. I notice windows packed with living green, leaves pressed to windows, seeking the taste and power of the sun. And I think of Octavia E. Butler.
In January of this year, I read Butler’s Parable of the Sower. Set between 2024 and 2027, Butler’s prophetic vision struck me in January as a terrifying possibility of the world to come. By now, I agree with Toshi Reagon, who recently co-wrote and co-produced the opera Octavia E. Butler’s Parable of the Sower, the first adaptation of this book for the stage: “This isn’t what our future has to be. What Butler gave us with her work was a blueprint on how to change our course.”
Lauren Oya Olamina, the young Black hyperempathic protagonist of Parable of the Sower, is rewriting the future of the world through the creation of a new belief system while she survives a devastating dystopia. This belief system, Earthseed, centers around inclusion, humanity, community, the inevitability of change, and our responsibility and power to shape that change. In my mind, it’s a modern-day wisdom text.
When the virus struck in March, I knew I’d need to prepare. I flipped through the pages of Butler’s book to remind myself of what Lauren Oya Olamina packs when she flees her walled community after the loss of her family. Among other things, she packs notebooks and seeds, both tools for possibility and sustenance.
On March Thirty-first, I planted cucumber, tomato, bibb lettuce, arugula, carrot, and zucchini seeds. Herbs too. I tended them daily. As they sprouted, I noticed their response to the sunlight, adapted their positions, found the best window spots for each tiny cup of soil and the roots I couldn’t see but trusted were growing. Some, though not all, survived the initial seeding and sprouted. As I learned from the first batch of seeds, I planted more, with greater skill this time. I sit now surrounded by a bed of bibb lettuce; basil growing high; a dying melon plant from which one teardrop-shaped fruit still grows; mint overflowing from its container; zucchini leaves which, with the help of my daily nursing, are healing from disease and trying to flower again; two cucumber plants nearly twice my height; and tomatoes ranging from marble to baseball-sized, soft green to bright red, sharing an ever-growing vine in all their different stages of fruiting and ripening.
I planted these seeds not only for myself, but in the hopes that I might learn enough to someday feed others who might need them. (I’ve been fortunate to give a number of zucchini and cucumbers away--even a jar or two of pickles.) I grew these to begin my elementary education in the land, to recognize the true work and time it takes for a seed to become sustenance, and to realign my perception of scarcity, possibility, and consumerism. From Octavia E. Butler’s fictional world, actual edible nourishment has grown. From the physical tending of the seeds and plants, I’ve learned many things. From the gift of Butler’s writing came the seeds and this food; from the gift of the experience sowing and tending these plants, I reflect on the responsibilities of writers and creators now. The questions expand: What tools are required to nourish growth so seeds may sprout with enough health to bear fruit? What environments and communities and creations will help us tend right growth? How much sunlight? How much water? What structures of support do we and our collective need? How to perceive the signs of dis-ease? How to help life heal? In which season and climate will we flourish? What seeds must be sown in this season, and how may I better learn to tend them?
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Friday, October 23, 2020 - Joseph Robinette Biden, Jr. & Kamala Devis Harris 2020. by Jordan Myers
There were several moments last night when chills came over me as I was watching the presidential debate between former Vice President Joe Biden and President (for now) Donald Trump.
One of those moments happened when Vice President Biden offered that the United States has a good relationship with the North Korea’s Kim Jong-Un, in a similar fashion as the United States had a good relationship with Adolf Hitler before Germany invaded Poland in 1939, which by most accounts, marked the beginning of World War II.
I can’t say whether the comparison is fair. I haven’t studied the history of WWII thoroughly, and I wasn’t there to experience the political and social climate in the United States toward the end of the 1930s. However, I can say that the temperature in my body must have dropped by five to ten degrees as Vice President Biden made this remark.
What I picked up on in that moment, as well as when Vice President Biden said that any foreign governments who interfere with elections in the United States –––– with our sovereignty ––– will pay, “they will pay,” was the great weight, power, and importance of holding office as the President of the United States. How easy it has been to forget that gravity over the last four years.
Without the outbreak of a lethal virus, the nation may not have been forced to deeply consider the importance and weight of the office once more; however, that opportunity is here now –––– and by the reports of the early voting numbers, a response is already being made.
I don’t know who will be elected ten days from now, or whether it may take even longer to find out the results from the election. I do know that I am voting for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. Here’s why:
There’s a passage from The New Yorker’s Talk of the Town section from September 2nd, 1939 below, which is followed by a look back at how the election of Herbert Hoover in 1928, followed by the election of Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1932, provides the framework for what’s at stake here and now, in 2020.
“There was a time when the mere nonexistence of war was enough. Not any more. The world is in the odd position of being intellectually opposed to war, spiritually committed to it. That is the leaden note. If war comes, it will be war, and no one wants that. If peace is restored, it will be another arrangement enlarging not simply the German boundary but the Hitler Dream. The world knows it can’t win.”
The President of the United States in 1939 was Franklin D. Roosevelt, who during the first term of his three term presidency (he was the last to hold office for three terms), ushered in the New Deal in 1933. With the new deal came forward-thinking economic protections which helped lift the country out of the Great Depression. Protections which, at the time were considered revolutionary, and by some accounts, unthinkable: unemployment relief, social security, and the establishment of the Securities and Exchange Commission, which monitored (and still monitors) publicly traded firms’ compliance with reporting requirements established by the Securities Act of 1933.
Although these sweeping changes didn’t make an impact right away –––– there would be a Second New Deal in 1935 –––– they did change the direction of the nation, and created the framework for many of the most pivotal functions of the United States’ Federal government and economy that are still active today.
But it didn’t have to be this way; it could have been different. Franklin D. Roosevelt was voted into office in 1932. And he ran as a Democrat against an incumbent Republican, Herbert Hoover. Here’s what the Electoral College’s map looked like on November 8th, 1932:
Franklin D. Roosevelt: Forty-two states, which added up to four hundred and seventy-two electoral votes.
Herbert Hoover: Six states, totaling fifty-nine electoral votes.
Roosevelt’s trouncing of Hoover is a reflection of the county during the Great Depression. Americans had had enough; and it was evident that Hoover wasn’t getting the job done, and a change needed to be made. Thus, they voted accordingly.
But look at the map from 1928, wherein Hoover, who was then serving as the country’s Secretary of Commerce, and who had gained esteem for exhibiting exceptional business acumen, defeated New York’s Governor, the affable, slightly hardscrabble, though certainty honorable man for the people, Al Smith.
Herbert Hoover: Forty states, which added up to four hundred and forty-four electoral votes.
Al Smith: Eight states, totaling eighty-seven electoral votes.
The similarities between the 1928 election of the Republican, Hoover as President and the 2016 election of Donald Trump are easy to track. Both candidates ran campaigns as insurgents; decrying the ills of having career politicians in power, and particularly, those who had formerly held office in the State of New York –––Hillary Clinton as a senator and Al Smith as the governor –––– and emphasizing the need for a change.
Hoover, moreover, had the advantage of a historically solid economy –––– one famously regarded as the Roaring Twenties –––– which had not yet sunk into the Great Depression. And Americans voted accordingly, with Hoover winning in a landslide. Yet, look at these semblances between Hoover and Trump, with a debt owed to Wikipedia:
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Before the election:
“Hoover focused much of his attention on raising money, restructuring corporate organizations, and financing new ventures.[39] He specialized in rejuvenating troubled mining operations, taking a share of the profits in exchange for his technical and financial expertise.[40] Hoover thought of himself and his associates as "engineering doctors to sick concerns", and he earned a reputation as a "doctor of sick mines".[41] He made investments on every continent and had offices in San Francisco; London; New York City; Paris; Petrograd; and Mandalay, British Burma.[42] By 1914, Hoover was a very wealthy man, with an estimated personal fortune of $4 million (equivalent to $102.1 million in 2019).[43]”
Division based upon race:
“In the South, Hoover and the national party pursued a "lily-white" strategy, removing black Republicans from leadership positions in an attempt to curry favor with white Southerners.[132]”
After the election, and during Hoover’s Presidency:
“He appointed a Cabinet consisting largely of wealthy, business-oriented conservatives,[142] including Secretary of the Treasury Andrew Mellon.”
Muddied foreign relations:
“Over the objection of many economists, Hoover signed the Smoot–Hawley Tariff Act into law in June 1930.[162] Canada, France, and other nations retaliated by raising tariffs, resulting in a contraction of international trade and a worsening of the economy.”
Shifting blame:
“Hoover viewed the weak European economy as a major cause of economic troubles in the United States.”
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Were the United States not deeply entrenched in a pandemic, it’s uncertain whether Vice-President Biden and Senator Harris would have established the lead that they’ve built so far, yet, at least this much is clear: a nation of voters who have had enough of a tycoon who glorifies the breadth and depth of his business dealings (“I have bank accounts in a lot of places, including China”); divides people based on race (“stand back and stand by”); and shifts blame for a failing domestic economy based on foreign influences (“blame China”); have already demonstrated their ability to vote accordingly –––– and to swiftly, end emphatically, vote for change. Again, these were the numbers from 1932: Roosevelt -––– four hundred and seventy-two; Hoover: fifty-nine.
Can Vice President Biden and Senator Harris usher in sweeping economic and social changes at a level and to a degree that’s equivalent with the New Deal? It’s possible. Biden has made clear his commitment to transition away from fossil fuels and has emphasized the importance of green energy in order to create more jobs for the future; has hinted at significant relief for debt from student loans; and has called for an increase in the monitoring of and accountably for police departments all across the country. Also, he listens.
During last night’s debate, when he was asked whether he understood why parents of African-Americans have “the talk” about race relations in this country, he narrated the nuances and fine points of those conversations, and did so quite thoroughly, and accurately. His opponent then glossed over them. When asked the same question, his response was this: “Yes,” the President (for now) said, before comparing himself to Abraham Lincoln.
But what was about that moment during the debate, when Vice President Biden’s words gave me chills; when his invocation of Hitler’s Germany in 1939 felt within the realm of possibility. There must have been some reason why I felt those words so deftly; however, at present, I can’t trace the connection.
It’s true, World War II began with Germany’s invasion of Poland, in the autumn of 1939, which was six years into Roosevelt’s presidency. Hence, the historical tether between Hoover and Trump in this respect doesn’t quite take. But it doesn’t have to.
One man who is running for President of the United States this year has demonstrated that he has, and that he will, protect and honor the lives of Americans, as well as those who are new to the United States, and work to restore the nation’s reputation and standing in the world. And that man is Joe Biden.
And in a running mate and Vice President (in three months’ time) Kamala Harris, he has chosen a woman with vision, determination, heart, and perhaps, the ability to lead this country through the second half of this century’s revival of the Roaring Twenties.
All of this is to say, (1) Enough is enough; and (2) Give ‘em hell, Joe and Kamala!
Godspeed, and all of our best,
Curlew Quarterly
Thursday, October 22, 2020 - Five authors of Greenwich Village - as told by Kate Alsbury - Edgar Allan Poe
EDGAR ALLAN POE IN GREENWICH: THE UNCERTAINTY OF SUCCESS
Known for his eerie writing style and untimely death, Edgar Allan Poe spent several years of his short career in and around New York City, including the leafy streets of Greenwich Village.
He made brief trips to the city from Philadelphia and Baltimore during the 1830s. In 1837, he, his wife, and her mother moved to Sixth Avenue (Avenue of the Americas) and Waverly place. They shared the building with William Gowans, a well-known bookseller at the time, for around eight months. According to the journal The Bookman in “Old Booksellers of New York,” Gowans described Poe as “one of the most courteous, gentlemanly, and intelligent companions he had ever met with.”
The Poe family would move on to 113 1/2 Carmine Street, then head back to Philadelphia for several years. When Poe finally relocated to New York in the spring of 1844, he rented a room at 130 Greenwich (near where the World Trade Center now stands).
Though the actual building he stayed in is long gone, you can capture a feeling for the way things were at the time by walking a few blocks south and brushing aside the old brickwork of Trinity Church (it was the tallest building in the city when Poe was living there) and narrow side streets that run along other historic buildings in the area.
He became sub-editor for the Evening Mirror in the autumn of 1844, where one of his best loved poems, The Raven, was published in 1845.
It was around this time (1846) that he wrote critiques on the “Literati of New York” for The Lady’s Book. They were profitable for Lady’s Book, however, as you can imagine, the targets of those essays were often displeased.
“A Campaign Song” was likely written during his stay in Greenwich. A complete manuscript may not exist, but the following was recounted by one of Poe’s artist friends, Gabriel Harrison, and published in the New York Times Saturday Review in 1899:
See the White Eagle soaring aloft to the sky,
Wakening the broad welkin with his loud battle cry;
Then here’s the White Eagle, full daring is he,
As he sails on his pinions o’er valley and sea.
Poe and Harrison first met in a tea and tobacco store Harrison owned at 568 Broadway, on the corner of Prince Street. He recalls the first time Poe came into the store: “a small man with a large head looking rather wistfully at some beautiful plugs of tobacco . . . he entered and asked the price, made no move to buy, and started to leave . . . I was struck by . . . his manner, by his voice and by his fine articulation . . . so I offered the man a piece of tobacco. He accepted, thanked me and departed. Two or three weeks afterwards he came in again. At the time I happened to be in the throes of composing a campaign song for the White Eagle Club, a political organization of which I was President . . . I began to explain the matter to him . . . ‘Let me have your pencil,’ he said . . . In about fifteen minutes . . . I saw written a song of five stanzas with chorus . . ."
After a brief trip to the Upper West Side (or the countryside as it was then) they were back on Greenwich Street at 154. Later, they would move on to 85 Amity Street (which would become 85 West 3rd Street) just south of Washington Square. He believed the park’s fresh air and quiet demeanor might help restore the failing health of his wife. Arguably the most famous of his houses, the building was partly destroyed in 2001 when New York University decided to expand their law school. Due to the efforts of preservationists, the facade still remains.
No doubt his lengthy stays in the Financial District inspired “Epigram For Wall street” which appeared in the Evening Mirror:
I’ll tell you a plan for gaining wealth,
Better than banking, trade or leases —
Take a bank note and fold it up,
And then you will find your money in creases!
This wonderful plan, without danger or loss,
Keeps your cash in your hands, where nothing can trouble it;
And every time that you fold it across,
’Tis as plain as the light of the day that you double it!
This is decidedly one of the best jeux d’esprit we have met in a year. Who did it? — who?
Lectures at the New York Historical Society were a hit. One was on the subject of “Poets and Poetry of America.” His remarks and criticisms hurled at popular members of New York’s literary world drew quite a bit of attention.
He wrote about the experience a few days later: "In the late lecture on the 'Poets and Poetry of America,' delivered before an audience made up chiefly of editors and their connections, I took occasion to speak what I know to be the truth, and I endeavored so to speak it that there should be no chance of misunderstanding what it was I intended to say.”
The success of these lectures led him further afield, invited to speak in Boston. After leaving the Evening Mirror he became one of three joint-editors (and later sole editor) at the Broadway Journal.
His time in New York had a defining impact on his career, publishing some of his most celebrated works during this time, like “The Raven and Other Poems,” along with “Tales,” which included “The Murders in the Rue Morgue.” Despite their success and the good company of New York’s high-society, he remained relatively poor. Even when his popularity in Europe soared, he was constantly plagued by his wife’s ill health.
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Kate Alsbury is a writer and marketing consultant. Her creative work has appeared in journals like Frogpond and Modern Haiku, along with several anthologies.
Wednesday, October 21, 2020 - Spinning Alive by Rahil Najafabadi
Spinning Alive
I’m standing on the grass at Central Park, but I’ll soon be gone. It is a temporary step. One I will forget about in a short while. I don’t know what I’m looking for; early morning, bare headed and before all the people have come and crowded the bit of Earth that feels like home.
I’m on one of the small bridges and I feel funny. All I can sense is a funny feeling, like something’s stirring in me. But now I feel a draft of wind that is temporarily reminding me that I’m alive and alone. I walk alone. I think of the unhappiness that is taking over my steps. I want something to make me feel alive like I really, truly am. Yet to feel life is different from living it with a funny feeling.
I can see the green that reassures me of my liveliness. The signs are all there: my feet carrying me down a path, the coldness of my skin against the willful draft of wind, and the greenery that just won’t fade. My smile and liveliness have faded long before it has bloomed. Perhaps I’m senseless. Still, something is missing, and I can sense its lack of existence from the imbalance between the Earth and me.
I reach the boats and there is no one there but me. I stand near them by the edge of the grass and it feels like they are all pointed to me; the funny little boats. What if I just got on one and started paddling away? What could stop me?
Nothing; no one. It doesn’t matter as much as I think. One boat away from the other boats, still the world will keep spinning. Again, it’s my own head spinning. Thinking about matters so small, the world oversees them within each spin. I know one little spin will stir everything within. I move toward the circled hues. Not so green, they are colored blues. Life feels uneasy, dizzy and colorful in this state: on the edge of the grass, on a boat, in a place I shouldn’t wait. Even the thought of these funny feelings shakes my life again. I won’t stay on the grass, and I won’t get on that boat. I’m only waiting. My new life is hiding between the blades of grass and it has sunk below the boats that spin.
I’m walking. I’m waiting. I have no clue of what’s ahead, even though I’ve gone down this path alone for quite a lifetime. This journey no longer feels like a stroll in the park on a chilly, lonely day. The right way to say it is to sing it: I’ve let the world present life to me in its own spinning ways. I don’t picture the railroad I run through anymore. I’ve been waiting for a gift, a chance, a change or two that’s been long overdue; and there’s nothing I can do about it.
I go toward the fountain. I like seeing brides and grooms taking pictures here. They go along, not destined but decided upon the steps they take. We all walk on the same soil one way and a million others. I know I want a life as lively as these trees. I know I want it because I can see the beauty and feel it too. I walk, only this time, I walk toward the life that makes me smile again. To move toward a hidden thing that’s also everywhere is like spinning around. I like spinning around. I’m stepping down. I’m at the fountain, I dip my fingers into the green water. It covers my fingertips in life. The drops of life drip down as I spiral, dance, and step away. Each step continues to mark my liveliness. I’m spinning. The green drops of color circle me. I’m a fountain of my own, flowing with life like a boat set free where it belongs. I am alive and I feel it spinning within me.
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Rahil Najafabadi is a multimedia artist and writer from Rocky Hill, Connecticut. Most of her work includes the elements of her hometown in setting, theme, and style. She hopes to live in New York and pursue a career in creative writing.
Tuesday, October 20, 2020 - “Brooklyn Smells like a forest today” by Elizabeth Lerman
Brooklyn smells like a forest today.
The rain has latched onto the leaves, erupting
in a wet green that reminds me of softer places.
At night it is sometimes so quiet it shocks me and
when I am outside by myself on a warm, dark evening like this
and I can hear the wind and the crickets, the crackling embers
of my cigarette and the familiar crowing of the cicadas,
I sit back and smile at all the sweet signs of summer.
- August 20th, 2020
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Elizabeth Lerman is a creative writer based in New York City. A graduate from the University of Vermont, where she earned her B.A in Film Studies and English Literature, Elizabeth is passionate about forging strong female voices and diverse narratives. In her writing she focuses on the significance of small moments and the space they hold in both her thoughts and those of her characters. Elizabeth currently lives in Brooklyn where she is working, slowly but surely, on her first novel.
Monday, October 19, 2020 - Eleven notes. by Jordan Myers
The fountain is still on in Washington Square Park.
There’s a new bike lane up Sixth Avenue. It’s been repainted north of Thirty-fourth Street.
Third Avenue’s newly-repaved.
People are sitting down in restaurants and eating inside again.
Two bands, one playing rock and the other playing jazz were performing in Tompkins Square Park yesterday. They were just far enough away from each other that their separate sounds didn’t blend together; but they were close.
I spent an hour last night watching CNN’s Election Night coverage from 2000 for nostalgia’s sake: “Breaking News: Presidential race too close to call.” Florida was called for Gore way too early. I forgot all about Ralph Nader.
Broadway, between Twenty-third Street and Union Square is blocked off for pedestrian traffic, and has been for months now.
Broadway theaters announced last week that they’ll remain closed until next May; what’s another seven months.
The roaring twenties; and everything still remains possible.
Two weeks from tomorrow ––––– pins and needles.
To do list: vote; Biden and Harris.
Sunday, October 18, 2020. by Jordan Myers
Only walk up First Avenue in October. No matter what; watch the sun set over Tompkins Square Park. Dress warm.
Saturday - October 17, 2020 - “The People’s Court” by Kellie Coppi
Thank You, Judge Milian.
I’m a girl with long hair. Long, straight hair. Arms heavy to try and braid it, hair. Hour and a half to curl it, hair. But I like my hair. And I like convenience, so what the heck, I figure I’ll get a permanent. Don’t do it, it’ll ruin your hair. I can hear my mother’s voice in my ear. Don’t do it.
But I did it.
I went to the salon I’d gone to for years. A little pricey, but reliable. Got in at 11:30am. Cut, wash, curl. That’s odd, she put in 15 rollers? I’m an amateur and I at least use 30. Whatever, she’s a professional. I hold my tongue. First mistake.
I sit there in the chair and read. Twenty minutes goes by and I’m told to go over to the sinks. Don’t wash your hair after a perm. I mean, even Legally Blonde told us all that when we were going up. What happens next? My head is covered in soap from the shampoo that drips across my forehead. She’s a professional, this has got to be some kind of chemical balancing element. Second mistake.
Voila! How do you like it? The stylist asks me as she picks up a handful of limp, wet straight hair. It looks like what it looks like after I wash it at home. Yes, yes, but that is because it takes time to set. Three days. In three days wash it, scrunch it, and it’ll look beautiful. Okay, I trust you. Third mistake.
I leave. I’ve watched enough “People’s Court” to know to document everything. One photo every few hours. That’s all it takes to so from “permed hair” to flat mess. That’s all it takes for four hundred dollars to gradually dissipate into thin air with no results. I call that evening.
“Hello, my hair has no curls, and you know I mentioned I wasn’t too fond of it in the salon.”
Don’t worry, don’t worry, in three days it’ll be okay.
Day One. “Hello, it’s me again. I woke up and it’s a flat mess. I have photographs.”
Are you using the gel you bought from us?
“For fifty dollars I better damn well be.”
Okay, just wait.
Photographic evidence.
Day Two. “Hello, remember me? Nothing’s changed for the better.”
Oh I see.
“Can I speak to the owner?”
She will be in tomorrow.
“Great, I’ll see you then.”
Photograph.
Day Three. The big reveal! I can finally wash my hair to spring to life my gorgeous Goldilocks. Wash. Scrunch. Photograph. Nothing. But I did have three days worth of phone records.
I leave. I head back to the salon and sit in the waiting room. An older woman approaches me, very apologetically for making me wait. I show her my wet tangles of long, straight hair.
Come upstairs and let’s talk.
I follow her lead.
I’m very sorry, during your appointment my receptionist was calling me stating that your stylist did not put in enough rollers, and she shampooed the chemical out of your hair. You’ve been a long time customer and I want to make you happy. I’ll give you your money back but I want to make sure you remain our client. Or we can re-do the perm. It’s up to you.
I smile. “Thank you, you know, I don’t want you to think I changed my mind about the perm, so I’d really honestly just like it redone properly. I’d be happy to give someone else the opportunity to re-do it.”
Oh that’s so wonderful, let me bring you down to our perm professional for a consultation. The woman who did your hair is good, but she’s not as seasoned. I’ll need to speak with her.
“Okay thank you. And, not to be odd, but I’d want to be sure that the new stylist won’t take offense for no tip.”
No worries, I’ve already told your first stylist to give the money to the new one. As a matter of fact, since the perm can’t be redone for a few weeks, stop by every week for some complementary blow outs and product for maintenance. My apologies.
“I don’t live that close but if I’m in the area, I’ll keep it in mind. I’m really just grateful to be getting a proper perm soon. Can I please have everything in writing?”
Yes, absolutely. See you in four weeks for a complementary perm.
My “People’s Court” skills again shined through. It seemed like I had done the right thing. I gave them the opportunity to rectify the situation and I left happy. My week was looking better.
Until it wasn’t. Two weeks later I called to say I was going to come in for some product. No answer. Another day goes by. No answer. I stop by on the one day I’m in the area and approach a different receptionist.
Oh, the owner is out of town. But you can’t get any product.
But because of the prior discussion and written communication, I was told that I could.
No, sorry.
I called the owner. “Hi, there must be some mistake, I’m here now and I’m being told I cannot get some product for maintenance?”
No, you never took us up on the offer to get touch ups and we actually didn’t do anything wrong.
“What? I’m sorry, I’m confused.”
I spoke with the stylist again, and she actually didn’t do anything wrong.
“But what about our entire conversation? What about our written agreement?”
No, sorry. We’re not at fault.
It was like an alternate reality just sprung up out of nowhere.
“Okay, I don’t know how comfortable I feel at this point to continue to get a complementary perm from you folks since this is turning into a bizarre encounter. At this point, I’d just like my money back.”
No, we didn’t do anything wrong.
“You said you originally were going to give me my money back, does that mean you would have reversed the charges on me after I left?”
No, but I won’t give you your money back now.
I was in shock.
Okay, let me send my business partner there to assess your hair. I reluctantly agree. I wait. He arrives.
You have a perm.
“Excuse me?”
You have a perm.
There was no greeting, nothing of logical significance.
As I held up my straight hair, I asked, “Where? Where is the perm?”
Your hair cannot take a perm, so that is your perm.
“You just told me I have a perm, then you said I can’t take a perm, and your partner told me that she’d do a complementary perm in two weeks. I’m confused.”
You won’t be getting a free perm from us.
“I already have an appointment.”
Not for a perm.
“What? So now you’re telling me I gave you four hundred dollars, your stylist messed up my perm, your receptionist confirmed the error, your business partner admitted, apologized, tried to give me my money back but instead we compromised on a complementary re-do, and you’re now telling me that has all gone out the window?”
We didn’t do anything wrong.
“What kind of illogical reasoning is this?”
You never should have done a perm. It doesn’t work with your hair.
“It was done incorrectly, which is what your staff admitted to and which is why I was given the written opportunity to do it again in a few weeks.”
No.
“No?”
No.
You know what? I don’t like you.
“Excuse me?”
I don’t like you.
His tone angrier and louder each time.
I don’t like you.
And he walked out.
I called the owner, tried to plead my case again, using the only logic that seemed to be in the room.
No, we did nothing wrong. You get nothing now.
I’m just as baffled as you are. I called my credit card company. Opened a dispute. Explained the aggression. Provided my photographic documentation. Provided my written proof of apology and anticipated complementary services. I got my money back.
They made a permanent mistake trying to argue with someone who had all their ducks in a row. It seems as if outside of the courtroom small business owners like to push their luck with customers. I asked the credit card company if the credit card had to essentially eat the money or if the salon gave it back. I was told the salon reversed the charges, which is an admittance of guilt (or at least a desire to not get into bed with me on “The People’s Court.”)
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Kellie Coppi, EDD grew up on Long Island and always dreamed of living in New York City. After getting accepted Early Admissions into NYU Tisch, that dream was achieved. But now, she has another dream, to move back to Long Island to be closer to family and out of the hustle and bustle. With a fondness for everything Victorian and Turn of the century, Kellie finds time to delve into nostalgia when she's not writing about people and the lack of common sense that too frequently permeates today's world. Give her a dog and a book and she's set.
Friday - October 16, 2020 - On this day in history: The Black Power Salute - Olympic Stadium - Mexico, City 1968 - Part 1 of 2. by Jordan Myers
Mexico City, Mexico - October 16, 1968
While Tommie Smith’s and John Carlos’ names may not be easily-recognizable, two of their decisions during the medal ceremony for the 200 meter event of the 1968 Olympics in Mexico City have forever carved out a place in history. While Part 1 of this piece focuses on the two most visible decisions that Smith and Carlos carried out on that evening, Part 2 will look more closely at decisions that were made both before as well as the after the actual ceremony.
These are the two decisions to which I’m referring: (1) The decision to place black gloves on their hands during the medal ceremony; and (2) The decision to ball their hands up into fists and thereafter raise those fists into the air while the Star Spangled Banner played.
Following an NBA season where players gathered to decide whether to actually continue playing basketball during a time in the United States where calls for racial justice have been demanded –––– more fervently, and more consistently –––– than they have, perhaps, since the 1960s and 1970s, Smith’s and Carlos’ Black Power Salute marked one of the earliest, and certainly, one of the most emblematic depictions of athletes engaging with racial and social justice issues.
Here’s what we know: a lot happened in 1968. Protests against the Vietnam War were being held all across the country. Robert F. Kennedy was assassinated, on June 5th. And just one hundred and ninety-five days before Smith and Carlos’ race, Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated in Memphis, TN, on April 4th.
And by the way, there was also an election that year. Less than a month after the Black Power Salute, Richard Nixon defeated Hubert Humphrey. Humphrey had secured the democratic nomination only following the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy –––– who was likely to have been the candidate, had he not lost his life five months earlier.
These are the facts from the track of Olympic Stadium from the morning of October 16th, 1968: Tommie Smith, from Clarksville, Texas, placed first, setting a world record in the 200m at 19.83 seconds; an Australian, Peter Norman, placed second; and the Harlem-born John Carlos, placed third.
The race, of approximately twenty-seconds, can still be revisited. And while it’s impossible to revisit the political, racial, and social discourse in America –––– which was growing more tumultuous each year of the 1960s, reaching a tipping point in 1968; memories of and lessons from that year, and particularly, the energy and essence of that night ––––– now fifty-two years ago, can still be felt. No, it’s not only that echoes from that night in Mexico City in 1968 can still be felt, but even more so: it’s that those memories and lessons have now become impossible to ignore.
Thursday - October 15, 2020 - Five authors of Greenwich Village - as told by Kate Alsbury - Mark Twain
THE ADVENTURES OF MARK TWAIN IN GREENWICH
Remembered for his life on the Mississippi and southern wit, Mark Twain spent a considerable amount of time in New York City, particularly Greenwich Village. Entertaining a wide circle of visionary friends, he was a frequent visitor at Nikola Tesla’s Greenwich laboratory, the first of which was on Grand Street, the second on South Fifth Avenue.
Mark Twain's house in downtown Manhattan still attracts the most attention. He lived at 14 West 10th Street (supposedly haunted) from 1900 to 1901. Twain and his wife left the house in part for the benefit Twain’s wife, having been in ill-health on and off for years, found the upkeep of such a large home taxing. They moved upstate to the Adirondacks, then to Riverdale-on-the Hudson, seeking the restorative qualities of country life.
Twain would return to New York in 1904, taking a house at 21 Fifth Avenue and 9th Street, and remaining there until the summer of 1908. The building was demolished in the 1950s.
He visited Greenwich before moving to New York semi-permanently in 1900. On one occasion, he met with Robert Louis Stevenson (who was in town for a short time) in Washington Square Park, according to Emily Kies Folpe’s book, It Happened In Washington Square Park. Settling on a park bench, they chatted for nearly five hours.
A CLUB
Early in 1906, a small group of young writers and settlement workers with socialist ideals bought a mansion on 3 Fifth Avenue, north of Washington Square. Originally meant as a cooperative housing agreement that would provide everyone with a convenient place to live and work, it quickly drew the attention of the press. The acquisition of this prime piece of New York real estate for unknown purposes was considered so irregular and at odds with ‘acceptable culture’ that reporters descended upon club members. When asked what the society was to be, Howard Brubaker, its president said, “Oh, just call it a club.” It then became known popularly as “A Club,” and was an important addition to the neighborhood, even though it only lasted a few years. When interviewed, members gave conflicting reasons for its founding. As self-described “radicals,” one member already had an idea the club might become a place to promote political movements. Many were already working on activities assisting the Russian Revolution.
In April of 1906, Russian writer and enigmatic leader of the 1905 Russian Revolution, Maxim Gorky caused a stir when he arrived in New York. He’d become a Marxist while living in St. Petersburg, never officially joining Lenin’s party, but given the go-ahead by Lenin to head off on an American excursion in hope of raising money and enthusiasm for the cause.
A banquet-style celebration was planned in Gorky’s honor. Made possible in part by The Society of American Friends of Russian Freedom, of which Mark Twain was a member. It was founded in the 1890s by anti-tsar reformers and activists.
Twain along with other literary figures of the time, like William Dean Howells, chaired a committee that was to be responsible for hosting it. The reception was planned to take place at the A club shortly after Gorky’s arrival.
Everything was going smoothly, but that was about to change drastically. An article ran in New York World revealing that Madame Andreyeva, the woman Gorky was traveling with, was not his wife, and he was in fact, married to another woman.
Even though it was already fairly well-known that they had a long-standing common-law marriage, it didn’t save Gorky or Twain from embarrassment. The celebration was cancelled, and many of the committee members, including Twain, resigned. Denied accommodation by three hotels, Gorky and Andreyeva found themselves wandering the streets on a rainy night. They asked the A Club to take them in. They remained there for several days, kept away from the press until they could escape to safer places with others sympathetic to their plight.
SPEECHES, APPEARANCES, AND OTHER WORKS
He gave several speeches during his time in the city. One was at the Waldorf Astoria for the annual New York Press Club Dinner in 1906. But this wasn’t his first time in the grand ballroom of New York’s “unofficial palace.”
An even more illustrious moment in 1900 gave him the opportunity to introduce a young Winston Churchill, visiting America after escaping from a prisoner-of-war camp in Africa. During his introduction he remarked, “I think England sinned in getting into a war in South Africa which she could have avoided without loss of credit or dignity just as I think we have sinned in crowding ourselves into a war in the Philippines on the same terms. "
He gave another speech, this time on the “Disappearance of Literature” at a dinner hosted by the Nineteenth Century Club at Sherry’s on Fifth Avenue. It was famous for holding an extravagant dinner dreamt up by industrialist Cornelius Kingsley Garrison Billings where horses were brought to the fourth floor of the building to create the illustrious sense of a countryside outing.
The third was just before the Christmas of 1907 at the New York Engineers’ Club.
While some of his most significant publications were already behind him, he was still busy with essays, speeches, and other public appearances which included “A Salutation Speech From the Nineteenth Century to the Twentieth” and “To the Person Sitting in Darkness,” airing his thoughts on the boxer rebellion, from his collection of anti-imperialist writings. “Edmund Burke on Croker and Tammany” was given as a speech before publication in 1901.
Mark Twain's short stories remain popular. One, “A Double Barrelled Detective Story” published in 1902, chronicles the wildly popular exploits of Sherlock Holmes as he explores the American West with classic Twain exuberance.
Even though Twain’s time in New York was sporadic, he made the most of it. Filling his days and nights with conversation and entertainment, rubbing shoulders with the cream of New York society, from writers and businessmen like the Carnegies to future Prime Ministers.
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Kate Alsbury is a writer and marketing consultant. Her creative work has appeared in journals like Frogpond and Modern Haiku, along with several anthologies.
Tuesday, October 13, 2020 - “Trouble” by Elizabeth Lerman
I read for hours on end, curled in a chair by the window. I read Joyce Carol Oates and reveled in the masterful horror of her words, in the girls she birthed on the page and the doom that surrounded them. Doom and panic and pain and still they shone bright as themselves, letting their cracked minds run and run with their thoughts, not worrying once what their family or friends had to say about them. They got into trouble, big trouble, car trouble, boy trouble, man trouble, old man trouble, arson, murder, suicide, depression, desperation, any kind of trouble they could get their hands on. Their kind of trouble made mine look so safe and pleasant, my legs pulled up to my chest in my big chair, the nurses monitoring me less than the others because really, I was no trouble. Maybe that's what I regret, being no trouble at all.
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Elizabeth Lerman is a creative writer based in New York City. A graduate from the University of Vermont, where she earned her B.A in Film Studies and English Literature, Elizabeth is passionate about forging strong female voices and diverse narratives. In her writing she focuses on the significance of small moments and the space they hold in both her thoughts and those of her characters. Elizabeth currently lives in Brooklyn where she is working, slowly but surely, on her first novel.
Monday, October 12, 2020 - Indigenous Peoples Day. by Jordan Myers
To date, at least nine cities, towns, and counties in New York State have adopted Indigenous Peoples Day in place of Columbus Day. These locales include:
Akron/Newstead –––– Ithaca ––––– Lewiston ––––– Rhinebeck –––– Rochester ––––
Southampton’s school board ––––– Tompkins County ––––– Triangle –––– and Woodstock.
For now, New York City has yet to do the same; or has yet to adopt a formal stance embracing the celebration of both. In an already contentious year –––– socially, politically, economically and otherwise –––– debates surrounding the importance of naming federal and state holidays have recently been given more attention and light.
As recently as this past June, amidst nationwide as well as local demands to remove statues of Confederate Civil War generals and leaders who defended segregation and slavery, Governor Cuomo and Mayor de Blasio expressed a desire for Columbus Circle to retain its name, along with a desire for the circle’s seventy-six foot monument of the the Italian explorer to remain.
However, in the Autumn of 2017, Mayor de Blasio did appoint a commission to look into it, by arranging a “ninety-day review of all symbols of hate on city property.” In January of 2018, the commissions’ findings gave the Christopher Columbus statue the green light; however, there would be two caveats:
(1) “De Blasio also added a curveball to the Columbus decision – decreeing that the city will commission a new monument to recognize the contributions of Indigenous peoples,” and
(2) “[B]owing to public outrage about how Columbus treated Native Americans, the mayor ordered the creation of new historical markers around the statue ‘explaining the history of Columbus.’”*
While de Blasio may or may not still be receiving the cold shoulder from the Columbus Citizens Foundation for the commissions’ caveats from January of 2018; about a month later, Southamptons, New York’s school board moved away from its temporary three year solution: “No School” day.
This year, the Indigenous Peoples Day two-day celebration on Randall’s Island has been cancelled due to Covid-19. It would have been the sixth annual.
Even so, the prevalence and history of the Indigenous People who occupied New York, New York long before the settlers from the Netherlands and England arrived cannot be overlooked. The island is called Manhattan, which by almost all accounts, is a word of the Lenape people, the city’s original inhabitants. A few more historical notes on the Indigenous Peoples who have called these lands home, well before the Duke of York arrived, below.
*CBS2 Exclusive: “Columbus Statue Will Stay In Place, But With Caveats” - January 11, 2018.
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One of a Native American people living near the Ottawa River in Canada, 1620s, from French Algonquin, perhaps a contraction of Algoumequin, from Micmac algoomeaking "at the place of spearing fish and eels." But Bright suggests Maliseet (Algonquian) elægomogwik "they are our relatives or allies."
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The area near Canarsie was originally settled by the Canarse Native Americans. The community's name is adapted from a Lenape word meaning "fenced area."
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“The neigborhood and its eponymous canal are thought to be named after a long-passed resident and Native American chief, the Canarsee sachem Gouwane. The late leader’s name is often translated as “sleep” or “the sleeper.”
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The name Manhattan derives from the Munsee Lenape language term manaháhtaan (where manah- means "gather", -aht- means "bow", and -aan is an abstract element used to form verb stems). The Lenape word has been translated as "the place where we get bows" or "place for gathering the (wood to make) bows."
According to a Munsee tradition recorded in the 19th century, the island was named so for a grove of hickory trees at the lower end that was considered ideal for the making of bows. It was first recorded in writing as Manna-hata, in the 1609 logbook of Robert Juet, an officer on Henry Hudson's yacht Halve Maen (Half Moon).
A 1610 map depicts the name as Manna-hata, twice, on both the west and east sides of the Mauritius River (later named the Hudson River). Alternative folk etymologies include "island of many hills",[46] "the island where we all became intoxicated" and simply "island", as well as a phrase descriptive of the whirlpool at Hell Gate.
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The name "Rockaway" may have meant "place of sands" in the Munsee language of the Native American Lenape who occupied this area at the time of European contact in the early 17th century. Other spellings include Requarkie, and Rechouwakie.
Sunday, October 11, 2020 - MoJoosh: “Tea experience for you to define and redefine.”
Forthcoming for Issue No. 8 - 2020: a look at the work and life of Ting; the founder and owner of MoJoosh. Hers is a journey that began in Shanghai, and over the last five years, has made and deepened its roots in Park Slope, Brooklyn.
Saturday, October 10, 2020 - On this day in New York History: The “tuxedo” jacket premiers - Tuxedo, New York - 1886. by Jordan Myers
The Original Tuxedo Club - Image from the Museum of the City of New York
If you lived in or around New York City in the year 1886, and were of the ilk of people who enjoyed activities, occasions and events that would best be described as high-society, then you would likely have known of a town approximately sixty miles north-east of Midtown Manhattan: Tuxedo, New York.
The most telling account of the history of Tuxedo’s founding can be found by way of Tuxedo Park Fine Homes. Of note, many of the earliest tennis matches ever played in the United States are believed to have been played in Tuxedo. Despite the region’s rich and intriguing history, the founding of Tuxedo, like the founding of the United States, carries with it a tragedy of colonization and displacement. Tuxedo Fine Park Homes’ historical essay brings a bit of this history to light.
Tuxedo was an uninhabited wilderness between two great Indian nations, the Algonquin to the east and south, and the Six Nations to the north and west. Every year warriors from each nation would slink away into mountains between them to hunt the elk, deer and turkeys, which lived there in large numbers. Today, only two traces of the Indians remain, the smoke stains their fires left on the rocks in secluded ravines, and the name they gave the lake –––– Ptucksepo. The first white settlers attempted to convert this into such Anglicisms as Duck Sider or Duck Cedar, but eventually the Indian name won out, as Tuxedo.
If you ran in the crowd of people who knew about and visited Tuxedo, then you also, most assuredly, were aware of Tuxedo’s Autumn Ball, the first of which took place in October of 1886. The event, according to Tuxedo Park Fine Homes (and backed by a search of the New York Times’ archives) “was covered by all of the New York society pages,” and was where “generations of American girls thought of the Ball as the most important place to make their debuts.”
While the town, Tuxedo, New York, is relatively well-known by those who live in the greater New York City region, as well as stretches of the eastern seaboard, including the Hudson Valley, Upstate, and even New England, the fact is that the popularity of the term, “tuxedo jacket,” far surpasses the prevalence of the town.
Here’s why: at the first annual Autumn Ball there was a certain guest, Mr. James Potter, who had recently visited the Prince of Wales. While abroad, upon being invited to the Prince’s country estate in Sandringham, Mr. Potter received a fashion tip, as such: “Prior to going [to the Prince’s country estate], Mr. Potter asked the Prince what he should wear for dinner. The Prince replied that he had adopted a short jacket in the place of a tailcoat for dinner in the country and that if Mr. Potter went to his tailor in London, he could get a similar jacket made. Mr. Potter did as the Prince suggested.”
When Mr. Potter returned to Tuxedo, New York and appeared at the first Autumn Ball in October, 1886, he did so donning a newly-tailored, less-formal, and short-tailed dinner jacket, the type of which would become known as the tuxedo. It definitely was a hit.
W. Anthler Cottage (1886) - Tuxedo, Park - designed by Bruce Price, an American architect who designed the original Tuxedo Club (also above).
Friday, October 9, 2020 - Postcards from New York - Walking the West Village with Arthur Russel. by Jordan Myers
Hello! It’s been a while since I’ve written but here’s this: earlier this evening I spent an hour and a half walking around the West Village with Arthur Russell. We’ll publish two of his poems, along with an interview in Issue No. 8 - 2020, which is due out this December.
With Arthur, early on during our walk we stood outside HB Studio on Bank Street and he told me about his acting days. An hour later he described commuting into Manhattan from Sheepshead Bay to watch the Knicks play at the Garden in the 1970’s. One night, during a playoff game, a guy named Lew Alcindor, who was playing for the Bucks, sat down on the side of the court, and away from his team, during a timeout. There was something about the way Lew was sitting –––– away and disinterested, despite the gravity of the moment, that Arthur said he’d always remember.
Thursday - October 8, 2020 - Five authors of Greenwich Village, as told by Kate Alsbury: Willa Cather.
Each Thursday this month we’ll feature a piece from Kate Alsbury’s collection of snapshot historical essays of five authors who made their work, as well as their name, in Greenwich Village. This week’s feature looks back at Willa Cather’s time living, writing, and working in and around Washington Square Park; last week was a look back at John Updike’s house on West Thirteenth Street.
All of our best,
Curlew Quarterly
Willa in Washington Square
One of the most prominent women writers of Greenwich Village, Willa Cather spent decades of her life in New York City. Known for her romantic style focusing on the hardships of the American West, she isn’t typically thought of as a New Yorker. Born in countrified Virginia in 1873, she found a refreshing change in some of the city’s most coveted real estate: Washington Square.
But New York wasn’t her first stop. She’d already experienced life in ‘small’ America and other large cities before settling here. When she was young, she moved with her family from Virginia to Nebraska, hoping to escape what some might have seen as oppressive conservatism, remaining there to study. In the 1890s, she returned to the East Coast, spending ten years in Pittsburgh as an editor and teacher before coming to New York at thirty-two.
A boarding house at 60 Washington Square South became her home for the next few years, possibly inspiring her story “Coming, Aphrodite!” –– the only one of her stories set in Greenwich. It follows two young artists (and a Boston bull terrier named Ceasar III) over a brief period as they struggle with their careers and society. She captures an idle afternoon moment near the park beautifully:
“After lunch Hedger strolled about the Square for the dog's health and watched the stages pull out; — that was almost the very last summer of the old horse stages on Fifth Avenue. The fountain had but lately begun operations for the season and was throwing up a mist of rainbow water which now and then blew south…”
The city’s character finds its way into several of Cather’s stories, like “My Mortal Enemy,” but doesn’t usually feature prominently.
Described as “Youngish, buoyant, not tall, rather square,” by a fellow writer, she was one in a league of artists who were attracted to the neighborhood by the desire to amend some of the same struggles her characters faced. Parts of the Village still offered affordable rent with easy access to restaurants and entertainment, and of course, the camaraderie of fellow artists.
The area supported creative professionals attempting to build a respectable career in their craft while supporting themselves with ‘jobbing’ roles as editors or magazine contributors. Diversity had not completely left the neighborhood yet. It was home to others seeking refuge of a different kind, lodging communities of working-class immigrants from Italy and other European countries. Her sympathy for them would become evident while she was editor at McClure’s Magazine.
After a dispute between one of the magazine’s founders and senior staff, she was offered the job she would remain at for the next six or seven years. She found herself quickly promoted to managing editor. Under her editorship, an exposé piece ran drawing attention to the plight of an Italian family living on Macdougal Street, authored by Elizabeth Shepley Sergeant and entitled, "Toilers of the Tenements.”
April Twilights, a collection of poetry divulging her love of nature, was published in 1903. A few years later in 1905, The Troll Garden, a collection of short stories, (some of which appeared in McClure’s) was published.
Strongly influenced by Village writers like Henry James, she would include essays about Stephen Crane, Mark Twain, William Dean Howells, and Edgar Allan Poe in a book, “A Collection of Stories, Reviews, and Essays,” published in 1908 — mostly written before she arrived in Greenwich.
The essays take the form of praise and criticism alike. She said of Poe: “In a careless reading one cannot realize the wonderful literary art, the cunning devices, the masterly effects that those entrancing tales conceal. They are simple and direct enough to delight us when we are children, subtle and artistic enough to be our marvel when we are old.”
Her first novel, Alexander’s Bridge, ran as a serial in McClure’s before being printed as a novel in 1912.
Over the years, her permanent residence wouldn’t stray far from Greenwich, residing at 82 Washington Place, 5 Bank Street (1913-1927), and 35 Fifth Avenue, until finally heading uptown to Park Avenue later in life.
It isn’t difficult to imagine why Washington Square Park provided an uncommonly enticing place of respite for those looking to elude the drudgery and stifling scenes so commonplace. Especially to Cather and others accustomed to seeking the company of nature in strenuous times.
Living in the Village on and off for decades, she wasn’t a stranger to travel, visiting the Southwest and Québec. Her love for Greenwich and the west seems well matched. Dividing her time between the two, she found the struggles of rural life a stronger driver for storytelling.
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Kate Alsbury is a writer and marketing consultant. Her creative work has appeared in journals like Frogpond and Modern Haiku, along with several anthologies.
Wednesday, October 7, 2020 - City facades: The Warwick Hotel - 65 West 54th Street (between Sixth & Fifth). by Jordan Myers
After closing indefinitely the week of March 23rd, on September 8th, Midtown’s Warwick Hotel opened its doors to guests once more. The “Midtown is Ready” flag that’s hanging above Sixth Avenue references the work of the Avenue of the Americas Association, and was installed sometime after the city went on pause this past spring, likely in late July, or early August.
Even so, with commercial office buildings operating at a small percentage of their capacity; Broadway theaters still closed; and tourism in the city being brought to a nearly complete halt, the questions remain: (1) What might become of Midtown Manhattan now; and (2) Is the city actually ready?
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*The original publication of this Daily expressed that the “Midtown is Ready” flag was hung before New York City went on pause; however, the subsequent sighting of a nearby sign, also from the A.O.A.A., which reads “We’ve Missed You” has revealed that the signs were installed after the city went on pause.
Tuesday, October 6, 2020 - “Florabama” by Elizabeth Lerman.
We are somewhere in Alabama when I realize that I am never happier than in these in-between moments. In the car driving past Lillian, through the fields and farms, we swerve off the main road, lured in by the siren of an antique shop. When our fingers smell enough like dust and the sweetness of our sporadity has paid off, the Loves ring up our finds. We talk to them about Hemingway and Greenwich Village and the best way to kill a gator. I buy a book and three old letters addressed to a woman named Shirley, the musk of the yellowed paper promising a peak into another time. They tell us about a beach locals go to, they say to mention their name to the bartender and they recommend we get rum in our bushwackers. We fall into an easy like with the Loves and wonder about their life together while we cross into Florida. I am light off the local cocktail and the backseat of her car feels so safe to me, with the two of them singing country music and me not minding it for once, the bliss burns strong and my head is lost in a blooming glory of green, smiling seventy miles an hour.
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Elizabeth Lerman is a creative writer based in New York City. A graduate from the University of Vermont, where she earned her B.A in Film Studies and English Literature, Elizabeth is passionate about forging strong female voices and diverse narratives. In her writing she focuses on the significance of small moments and the space they hold in both her thoughts and those of her characters. Elizabeth currently lives in Brooklyn where she is working, slowly but surely, on her first novel.
Monday - October 5, 2020 - The Bird & Branch - 359 West 45th Street (between 8th and 9th avenue). by Jordan Myers
It’s simple. Start your day with a matcha latte and a slice of banana walnut bread. Sit on the bench in front of Bird & Branch. Take your time. No one besides yourself will hurry you along. Take as long as you need. You can take a sip of the matcha latte before taking a bite of the banana walnut bread, or vice-versa; the feeling of calm and peace and serenity will find its way into your heart and mind all the same. And if it’s the first Monday morning of October, even better.