Summer

It sometimes hits me how strange it is to be living back in Brooklyn where I was born some 60 years ago. I left Brooklyn when I was 19 and moved to Manhattan or “the city” as we called it. I left Brooklyn and then after living in the city for 31 years I moved back to the borough that I was born in. I did not leave Manhattan willingly, (does anyone?) but that is another story. This story is about summer in Brooklyn. I really hate the summer, but as a boy in Brooklyn I loved it. Of course the big number one reason was no school. As a boy growing up in Brooklyn in the early 50’s we had no air conditioning just some lazy fans. My father’s luncheonette 2 blocks away was comfortably air conditioned as the signs use to say and I would love it when I walked in and was hit with a cold blast of air conditioned air coming from the huge machine that took up a whole corner of the store and nearly reached the ceiling. But now here I am back in Brooklyn and living in a neat clean safe and quiet place and that’s what I like about this part of Brooklyn. The water is three blocks away and the splendid Bridge looms over the neighborhood. I live on a tree-lined block. The trees are big and old and they lean over my street and cause me some stress when there is a big storm. These are wonderful thick trees and offer a leafy green view and a nice welcome after a smelly hot subway ride. Sometimes I open the cheap blinds in the spare bedroom that is my small studio and is also where I keep most of my books for sale and stare at those trees. In the fall and winter these trees offer up an equally nice show. The summer here smells much sweeter by which I mean nicer than in Manhattan. Me and Howard often talk about how much Brooklyn, the Brooklyn of our youth has changed. I landed on my feet after a terrible time and wound up in this Brooklyn neighborhood that is nice but also very dull. But maybe that’s what I was looking for or at least needing. I looked at other areas outside of Brooklyn and they came up wanting. I found this place by luck and I might wind up living the rest of my days here. Me and my friend Howard grew up living right next door to each other in plain over the store apartments and both our apartments were the same in layout. My bedroom was his bedroom. “I have six beautiful rooms for 62.00 a month my mother liked to say” Growing up in Brooklyn with Howard during the summers we would usually just hang out in front of his house. This was bare hanging out. Our street had a very long wide sidewalk. At one one end of the block was a small grocery and on the other end a firehouse. The sun had a lot of room to heat us on that street so we mostly took refuge in movies the library, long walks and we would hang out in Howard’s small bedroom which was identical to mine except for the décor. By small I mean small. The room was really no bigger than a walk in closet. We thought maybe it had been a dressing room or maybe it was at one time used as a nursery, as it was right off the large bedroom that our parents slept in. Surprisingly the room had its own small walk in closet and room for a bed and a dresser and that was that. It also had a locked door that at one time led to the hallway of the building. Everyone had an opinion about the former use of this “closet” & the door to the hallway. Judging by the drawing that I did of my room and the door to the hallway, the space held more things than just a bed and a dresser. We would play games mostly board games sitting on Howard’s bed like Pokeno, which was a favorite of mine, or we would set up a bridge table in his grandmother’s bedroom. One summer a cousin and me taught ourselves how to play chess by reading a book, and later on I also taught Howard this game. When we would play I would always beat him. One much later summer “M” and me spent the whole season playing chess every night and reading Agatha Christie novels. “M” hated the game and only played with me because he was madly in love. Night after night we would play, he would loose and swear that he would never play chess again. But of course the next night I got the game set up and we played. We never hung out in my house. This was a place to get away from, and not somewhere that I would bring friends. So really in truth Howard never spent any time at all in my house. Now of course we talk about it, but never was this brought up at the time. He just accepted that a big part of our friendship would revolve in his little room. So one summer, maybe it was the one when my mother decided to spray the living room badly scared furniture antique white with gold trimming and I covered my blue bedroom walls with contact sheet stars that we discovered Judge Crater. To be continued