Welcome Back to Brooklyn

        We left Pittsburgh in our new car, a Ford Focus, and drove across Pennsylvania to Dobbs Ferry for dinner with Mark Stern. After two days and nights there, we drove to Brooklyn. In the afternoon, we used the opportunity to see Tom Keough before dinner at the Szechuan restaurant in Bensonhurst with Leona’s library friends, then we drove to our next night in Days Inn, Hicksville. 

   

I know Tom Keough from my years with the NYC IWW GMB. He came to the fund-raiser for Starbucks workers union that I organized and we became close after that. Though he never came to any monthly meetings, he went to strikes and picket lines and was always there with his hand-drawn comics to posters, Wobbly City, fliers, and to lend moral support. His wife, Connie Norgren, I initially met through Brooklyn Parents for Peace. When they moved offices from near Kingsborough Community College to Park Slope and changed their name to Brooklyn for Peace, Connie was one of my first contacts there. I didn't know at the time she was related to  Tom. A

month ago, I learned she was a poet, too; Tom sent me an e-mail reminder that she would be reading her poems on a show on WBAI-FM radio. When I mentioned this at our visit she gave me a copy of a collection of poems she'd written. Tom gave me an autographed copy of Wobblies Graphic History that has contributions from him. It was the second autographed copy I had; the first was gifted to an unworthy student-activist recipient in Taipei.

      Szechuan dinner that evening with Leona's former library colleagues was delicious. Before our Szechuan dinner, I made sure to stop across the street and get the best Italian pastries from divine Villabate Alba which we ate for dessert in the motel room in Hicksville.

     Sunday morning, we re-packed the luggage, put it back into the Ford Focus, and drove 10 miles to West Babylon to visit Mom and the Zekowskys’ final resting place. We also paid respects to Ethel and Julian Rosenberg at Wellwood before driving nearby to New Montefiore to visit Uncle Joe's final resting place.

 From there, it is an hour to our hotel in Marine Park.  We didn’t see Jay that day and so we had more time in Brooklyn to have lunch at the Ginza and explore, even go to the bank instead of Tuesday. We made it by 3pm to TD Bank to transfer some money to Taiwan and then I drove  a mile up Coney Island Avenue to "Here's a Book Store" where I found  Columbus and the Quest for Jerusalem by Carol Delaney and A Tear and a Smile and Nymphs of the Valley by Kahlil Gibran for $23. I would have loved to go out with Jimmy Kanakas tonight but he was swamped.

   In the evening, we drove to Nathan's Coney Island; she had a $13 lobster bun, we shared six little stone clams for $16, and I had $4 hot dogs, fries and soda. It was over $44. Afterwards we got a half dozen Dunkin Donuts $7 before heading back to the Marine Park hotel. Ugh!

Monday morning started out with us doing the laundry near the hotel. I then drove to near the Avenue U Station to park the car for an evening with my former FDR colleagues at the Sahara, and accompanied Leona on the train to the library. I went ahead to Union Square to Best Buy for CD/ DVD’s and Strand for a 50 cent Mosquitoes by W. 

Faulkner before having a street chicken gyro at a vest pocket park. After walking around St. Mark's Place looking for a used record shop (none) I found the street vender near the Revolving Cube who sets out LP's from his van; I found Earth by Jefferson Starship for $5. I then headed back to Brooklyn.

   Magid was the first to arrive; I hadn’t seen him since I retired five years earlier. Oleksandr, my old Bread & Roses Club student came again for the third time I visited Brooklyn. Michael came next followed by Kathy. As I was telling my friends how on this trip I had missed three friends and gained three, Jimmy Kanakis showed up, one of the Grateful Dead brought back to life. The evening was complete. I didn’t have to drive to pick Leona up in Park Slope because after her dinner ended, she got on the subway and took it back to Ave. U to meet me at the Sahara!

      Tuesday was our last day of the trip.  On our last day, we stayed in our hotel room until check-out, brought our bags downstairs, and headed out. It was a rainy day; the first bad weather in NY. I drove Leona to a lunch engagement with Ingrid at Junior’s but did not join them. I dropped her off and was going to try to have DiFara pizza for lunch, maybe stop off at Barnes & Noble Park Slope when Ariel answered my e-mail!

      The rain was falling in drips and drabs. Ariel met me at the Park Slope Barnes & Noble. After walking and chatting about some of my favorite books and authors downstairs, we sat to have a small lunch at Starbucks. He said he had a tutoring assignment from 3-6pm and I suggested we meet afterwards for dinner at Joe’s and made plans to see each other wrapped around Leona's plans with Ingrid and at the library.

      After Ariel left, I went back to the car to rest then walked back to Barnes & Noble. For the first time during our three week trip, it had gotten cool out; I wore my sweatshirt.

On my way back down 5^th Street, I noticed a black object on a pillar of a wrought iron brownstone gate. When I got closer I saw the word “Bessie” on the spine. I opened to the title page and my heart jumped into my mouth; it was a biography of Bessie Smith! Within the book were a few scraps of paper and the book itself was slightly water-damaged. I took it with me and carried it into Barnes & Noble. Inside, I perused the shelves again and took photos of a few books I might be interested in reading one day. In the 50% off bin, I found Sherlock Holmes FAQ.

     Back in the Ford Focus, I relaxed until I got a text from Leona to pick her up at 5:30 at the library. Before I went, I stopped off at Connie and Tom Keough’s place on 16^th Street to bring a copy of Forgotten People of Taiwan to them. After saying hello and goodbye to Frank and Tiger and Jay at the GAP back entrance, we went to pick up Ariel from his tutoring job on Ft. Hamilton Pkwy-62^nd St. and headed to Joe’s.

It was quite a bonus spending the last day in New York with Ariel, lunch and dinner, and it was great eating again at Joe’s. At dinner, Ariel opened up to me and Leona about his situation.

After a wonderful dinner, we dropped Ariel off at the ‘N’ train and headed back to the hotel on E. 49^th St. to pick up our luggage and drive to the car rental return at JFK.

 Everything went sweetly; car returned, we were second on the EVA check-in line and went through security check quickly without grief. I had my last beer, a Coney Island Mermaid beer, and headed back to Taiwan satisfied that we had had a great trip.