Dining Out

There is a certain romanticism to dining under the stars, but not while peering through the elevated train tracks of the 7 train to see them. We were not at some quaint little restaurant tucked away in a quiet corner of Barcelona, but rather on Roosevelt Avenue at Casa Polo. Two delivery men were arguing over an electric bicycle, each with a bag of rapidly cooling dinner for some poor souls. Apparently, this was the prized steed with which to quickly deliver an order to its destination and return with the greatest of speed. Eventually one man won out and the other furiously took a less desired stallion from the mechanized stable.

 

Upon entering the velvet roped area we were quickly escorted to a table. It was set inside an enclosed area of partitions constructed of 2x4’s and plywood painted green with potted plants inserted in the top section at intervals to add to the ambiance. The aroma of blossoming flowers was eclipsed by the smell of traffic fumes, as the dining area was built in the street, to comply with the pandemic outdoor dining rules. The lovely paintings inside the restaurant were replaced with the spray paintings of a street artist.

 

Francisco our waiter arrived to introduce himself. He looked very skittish and nervous, his eyes darting around. His hair a dark brown was parted in the middle and he wore a handlebar mustache waxed at the ends and curled up in an arch. He proceeded to rattle off the day’s specials. We ordered drinks and Francisco handed us heavy jacketed menus then took off like a scared rabbit. At this point I noticed that the padded seat of my chair was wet, not having dried out from an early afternoon rain.

 

The 7 trains were rolling by at regular intervals as it was rush hour and even though it was a pandemic, they were abundant. DaDunk,DaDunk,DaDunk,DaDunk, Squeak, Scream,Shriek. Like a four step Foxtrot, the trains lumbered and danced down the track. Conversation was nearly impossible and required screaming to be heard and we eventually resorted to texting for communication. I opened the jacket of the menu to find a vast array of choices to pick from. A clear pocket inside the jacket included two papers, the first being a list of the daily specials that Francisco had told us of, followed by a Living Will. I thought that this was a curious paper to find there and it had no doubt been left mistakenly by a previous customer. I was about to alert the waiter when I realized that a business card was stapled onto the will with a picture of Francisco posed in an appreciative stance with a balloon caption inscribed, “Gracias.” A prudent man, Francisco had accounted for all possible outcomes and had made arrangements to secure his tip in case of any eventuality. Apparently, this was not the safest of dining arrangements, explaining Francisco’s nervous, shell shocked persona.

 

Bread and soup arrived now. Although there were no clouds in the sky, a light refreshing mist began to fall as another train rolled by and I realized that this was condensation from the train car’s air conditioning system working overtime. The street was a misty scene in an impressionist painting. Momentarily something flew past my nose and then soup splashed everywhere as my bowl split in half, the result of a large rusted bolt that had fallen from the tracks.  Francisco came running out, all apologies, cleaning me up with a towel and blotting the soup, while removing the shards from the table. I refused a second bowl and just ate my bread.

 

The second course was a salad and I munched away enjoying the dressing, wondering if the suspicious looking spice on it was either a low quality Paprika or a high-quality rust filtering down from the tracks.

 

Now I am the first one to agree that recycling is a good idea and healthier for the environment, but when a used match book and cigarette butt turned up buried deep in my salad, I knew environmentalism had gone too far, and the restaurant’s Michelin three-star rating was in serious jeopardy. Apparently a previous customer’s salad had been left unfinished, and with the increasing price of lettuce it was presumably wasteful to throw it away. In the future a quick check for matchbooks in one’s salad would be in order. I made a mental note.

 

Francisco covered his face, beside himself with embarrassment, and ran away with the salad. I could see him in the kitchen holding up the matchbook while yelling at the cook until his opponent turned on him with a meat cleaver.

 

I should have left at this point but this experience had gone way beyond dining, and had turned into dinner theater! If I ended the night hungry, it would still be an entertaining night out and well worth the price of admission. Just then a large delivery truck pulled up and I found myself eyeball to eyeball with the greasy axle of a huge tire, above which chickens in wooden cages squawked loudly, sensing that they were approaching their doom. I imagined they were saying “Take the other crates, I don’t think I would taste good today,” in a fluent chicken. From way up in the cab, the driver yelled down to me “Hey Papi, do you think these sticks and plants can protect you? This truck could crush you like a bug!”

 

“Gracias, Gracias, Yo Se,Yo Se, I am becoming increasingly aware of that”, I uttered, struggling with my high school Spanish.

 

“Ok man, good luck. You’re going to like my chickens, they are the best, mucho bueno!” exclaimed the driver.

 

I waved to him as he pulled in by the fire hydrant to unload the condemned. From the corner of my eye I could see a pigeon up in the rafters of the train trestle suspiciously eyeing my water glass like the Red Baron calculating an attack on a WW1 British fighter plane. This was my cue to leave since I didn’t care for mixed drinks. I paid Francisco who was all apologies as usual, and headed to McDonalds for some Chicken McNuggets, a safe although less than fine dining experience.

 

Jim

August 2020

"Don't Do it, Rich"

   My sister, 3 ½ years older than I, and always much wiser than I, told me that it was a wasp.  A very dangerous wasp that had a large stinger that can hurt you very badly.  She was 8 ½ to my 5. 

   In my juvenile wisdom and still existing stupidity, I knew I had to prove my sister wrong and to show her that I was a big boy and was in charge of myself.  I was a young and magnificently brilliant kindergartener.  This wasp was no match for me.  We can be friends.

   After dismissing repeated warnings from Loretta about the wasp, which I recall was the size of a small bird, I acted upon the keen judgment that most five-year old’s lack.  As Loretta said, “Don’t do it, Rich, don’t touch it, it’s gonna sting you,” I guided my little index finger toward the busy hovering wasp.  As my finger approached the point of no return, I spoke these words as I touched the not so social wasp, “You’re my friend.”

   ZOT!!!  I was stung!!!  I followed the terrifically painful sting with a blood curdling, “WAAAAAAAAHHHHH!!!!” as my head nearly exploded with pain.  My sister, who loved me unconditionally, instead of giving me a snide “Told you so,” ran me inside to my Mother who, in an instant, removed the stinger, which might as well have been a railroad spike.  She held me and told me that it will hurt for a while and put ice on it to reduce the swelling and then gently applied the remedy of the day, the red “Mercurochrome.”  Anyone over 50 may recall such a wonder product.

   These many years later it is obvious that I lived to tell the tale.  My sister loves the story of her younger brother’s misadventures with nature and of her strong warnings and emergency actions.  My Donna says that it was proof of my, albeit misguided, but kindness and purity of my heart in thinking that I could befriend a freakin’ wasp with a railroad spike stinger.  The pain is gone.  When I think of it, I laugh.

“You’re my friend!”

Richard M.

August 14, 2020

Tom Sawyer, East River Voyager

          On a mid-summer morning in 1967 an inflatable canvas raft paddled by two boys rounded the bend of the East River at the northwest corner of Queens. As the watercraft passed the huge towering smokestacks of the Con Edison power plant on 20^th Avenue in Astoria, Marine Terrace came into view. Built about twenty years earlier, what was once a functional if spartan garden apartment community for young working class families had deteriorated in the age of Fun City into two sections, a mis-managed , littered, semi-grassless, non-public housing project west of 21^st Street, and a still clean quiet orderly section east of 21^st Street.

            A modest makeshift one-acre cove at the junction of Shore Boulevard and 20^th Avenue just outside the westernmost Con Ed entrance provided a safe harbor to make land. With the East River, technically an estuary, not a river, in a slack water state, a two-hour time span between tides, the current was at a momentary standstill flowing neither north nor south. The usually treacherous waterway, now as calm as a pond allowed for an easy beaching of the boys’ air-filled raft.

            The younger of the two small craft adventurers, ten-year old Tom Sawyer of Port Jefferson Station, Long Island was eager to come ashore after three hours of early morning paddling since the World’s Fair Marina. The apparent strangeness of this spot baffled him, but the sight of three boys around his age skipping stones from the rocky river bank just beyond the cove was reassuring.

            “Huck, let’s make land here. Those boys over yonder can tell us where we are and what this place is exactly.”

            “This is the East River, Tom,” answered his somewhat older mate. “My Pap used to spin some mighty tales about these waters. You know, he once worked in the Brooklyn Navy Yard.”

            “I thought you said he was a painter?”

            “He was. He used to paint ships’ hulls. Did you know there’s sunken ships down at the bottom somewhere? One’s an English war ship from the Revolutionary War with a treasure chest full of gold. Pap said look out for the whirlpools between here and that old railroad bridge. Let your boat spin in a whirlpool three times while singing “Won’t You Let Me Take You on a Sea Cruise.” If you don’t get stuck in the whirlpool it means the captain’s ghost is sending you off with a warning- just forget about the gold! They don’t call it Hell Gate for nothing.”

            “I ain’t afeard, if that’s what you think. It’s just that I can feel blisters forming on my hands and I ain’t got any of Aunt Polly’s balm.” So, the boys steered their raft towards the shore, taking advantage of the brief period where the waterway was without a current.

            The three boys noticing the spectacle by this time, stood dumbfoundedly staring as Tom and Huck beached their raft, although this gravely mixture of pebbles, stones, shells, and bits of broken glass, remnants of smashed soda and beer bottles topped by mossy seaweed draped boulders slightly sloping for about thirty feet up to an eight foot high concrete seawall with a sewer pipe protruding at the bottom, was not a beach in any true sense of the word. Earlier that year a slightly intoxicated fugitive from South Carolina speeding down 20^th Avenue had driven a stolen car right over the seawall and into the river. Miraculously, he was not badly hurt, but was promptly extradited back to South Carolina to complete his sentence with additional time added on. This spot was no Jones Beach, that’s for sure.

            The curious stone skipping spectators approached our two river rafters who with a bit of teamwork carried their still inflated craft to the top of the riverbank bypassing the seawall which would have been impossible to climb. The first one, Joe, a ten-year old rather tall for his age sporting what was once a crew cut, but had since grown out humorously asked, “Hey, what are you, pirates or something?”

            “No, we ain’t pirates. We’re just two adventurous voyagers,” boasted Tom even though he actually did envision himself and Huck as Long Island buccaneers of a sort.

            “Whataya gonna do with your raft?” inquired Sam, the second ten-year old, not quite as tall as the first. “You can’t just leave it here if you’re exploring the neighborhood. Someone will snatch it.” What Sam really wanted was to have a try at paddling the raft himself, but certainly not in the notorious East River.

            “If you leave it here on the rocks, the rats will walk off with it like shoplifters in a department store,” added Mark, the shortest of the shore standing trio, expecting laughs that never came.

            Tom and Huck and their friendly landlubber lookouts discussed a number of safe hiding places- a vacant first floor apartment here on Shore Boulevard that they could climb into from the clotheslines, the roof over 20-24 19^th Street, a courtyard basement between 18^th and 19^th Street, or the garages on 20^th Avenue. Hiding the raft in the apartment was too conspicuous. They could easily be spotted. It was also dangerous. And, they’d have to deflate it first. The basement was also risky, and Injun Joe the maintenance man might find the raft and sell it. The roof was daring, but climbing three flights of stairs with a raft was not a good idea. So, the boys settled on the empty garage figuring no one would see them going in or out. And they wouldn’t have to deflate it. Marine Terrace included three rows of garages at the end of each block. Two rows faced each other with a driveway between them. The third row sat on 20^th Avenue facing Con Edison. This row of garages was hidden from view even from nosy neighbors in third floor apartments. It was deserted with no courtyards or houses. Mothers often warned their kids not to play down there, but boys do not always listen to their mothers. The garages had a certain appeal to Tom and Huck- especially Huck.

            The five boys, Tom, Huck, Joe, Sam, and Mark were on their way. Little did they know that their summer adventure was just beginning.

Steve T.

August 2020

On Lake Buel

 

The dull green house on Lake Buel was worn and old. Its ‘50s wood style paneled interior, the sagging colonial sofas and crocheted afghans did not bring Ralph Lauren thoughts to mind. The first floor was unexceptional: a kitchen, living room and an enclosed wooden porch. What it lacked in Architectural Digest detail, it made up for in the view of the lake. Walk in through the cracked front door and look across the long linoleum kitchen floor to the wall of windows. There it was: the sparkling lake framed in a canopy of trees, with an opposite shoreline defined by the blue-green of the Berkshire Hills. An intake of breath, followed by a slight release behind my shoulder blades. Here was my restorative elixir. The fresh country air, the light lapping of the lake, floated up and caressed me. The promise of a few days, full with culture, nature and friendship, cleared the city-induced busyness inside my brain. The most onerous obligation would be to trudge up the steep stairs with my pack of clothes and place fresh linens on my assigned bed.

 

There were eight of us each weekend. We began as strangers, “interviewed” at a small New York City apartment in the spring. During the summer, we became Berkshire buddies and robust friends. In the fall, most of the friendships faded, some lingered through the winter, and still others developed into decades-long bonds. No marriages were born in the house, although some members did get married, just not to each other. Most of us, already in our 30’s and 40’s were consummate singles. 

 

We enjoyed picnic concerts on the lawn at Tanglewood, with melodies and chords dancing on the evening breezes and constellations twinkling above our outstretched bodies. An occasional bird would accompany the maestros and their interpretations of Bach or Bernstein, Saint-Saens or Stravinsky. No matter how wonderful the performance, the evening would unfortunately always end with the group of us burdened with the weight of chairs, blankets, and picnic detritus, on a trek down the huge parking lots’ dark, dew-slick hills to find our cars, and the sometime hour long bottleneck to exit the property.

 

Some of us attended the small-stage ballets at Jacob’s Pillow, watched the dancers’ bodies up close, sweat seeping through their leotards, legs thrusting upwards and outward, toes en pointe, jumps landing with an exact thud.  The original air-cooled, barn-like structure was roughhewn and intimate. I missed it when an air conditioned, faux barn-like structure replaced it.

 

We visited numerous small museums, my favorite the Francis and Sterling Clark Institute. It was my home-away-from-home museum, where I could commune with world-class art in a building in the middle of a cow field, in a small college town, far away from the big city museums. Remington’s and Homer’s, Sargent’s and Whistler’s, Renoir’s and Degas’ were lovingly placed and hidden up here in the safety of the Berkshire Hills, to protect them from destruction should New York City have been attacked in WWII.  The museum building and grounds have been gracefully updated, but they are only a beautiful setting for a jewel of a collection. You will be as astonished, as I was, to see Monet’s little geese paddling around, Renoir’s view of Venice, Degas’ Little Dancer posing in her tutu at the end of a hall, the multitude of Impressionist paintings hung in a center gallery, like the main event in a Tiffany ring.  The Clarke is a bucket list treasure not to be missed.

 

Yes, there were other cultural events like indoor and outdoor theater, jazz spots, craft fairs, small concerts, and good chow and cuisine. But the Berkshires is most famous for the physical loveliness of its hills and streams, trees and waterfalls. My housemates and I swam on muddy-bottomed Lake Buel, canoed down to the beaver dam, played sweaty games of tennis, and hiked through the shadowy pine forests. The Audubon Trail, the Appalachian Trail, Monument Mountain, Greylock called to the sturdier hikers among us. Some of us just lounged on the wooden deck, in the company of a good book, crossword puzzle and our other housemates.

 

From the old wooden deck, we could drink in the beauty of the lake-- the misty still mornings when nothing on the lake seemed to move, the lapping waters of the day with bright, hard reflections of sunlight, the soft rustle of the leaves, the peep of the birds. No concrete and steel cathedrals of commerce lorded over us from the workplaces we escaped. Instead, the trees bent close and hovered near, providing us with dappled shade. The ground was littered with pine cones and the movement of squirrels and little chipmunks. An occasional egret would land across the lake. Sometimes the neighborhood Labrador would pad over, and not so subtly eye one of our sandwiches.

 

As the sun set, silhouettes of birds swooped gracefully from the treetops across the sky in pure poetry. It was several summer seasons before one of my housemates suggested to me that they were bats.  I prefer to think they were chimney swifts. In the Berkshires all things were objects of beauty for me.

 

Saturday nights were often spent at the Triplex movie theater in town. Occasionally we’d play a round of miniature golf behind the bowling alley where they had the only two-story miniature golf course I had ever seen. On rainy nights, we wrapped ourselves up in afghans and cozy conversations, the thrum of the rain accompanying the music on the stereo with the DooWops, or Debussy, or Duke Ellington. There were chatty games of Scrabble at the kitchen table and quiet long reads in front of the fireplace. On warm evenings just reclining on the deck next to the dark water, under the shining constellations was enough, so long as it was enjoyed before the mosquitoes and no-see-ums reasserted their territory. The lake’s ducks had gone to sleep, but the frogs were up and conducting their own symphony. At the end of the summer the crickets chirped, announcing the approach of the next season. It was easy for a human to breathe and be sustained.

 

Speaking of sustenance, a major component in the life of the share house was food. Each weekend, two people shopped and cooked for the rest of us. Often the shopping trip required a trip to The Price Chopper, Guido’s, Taft Farm, and some specialty shop in town. It could get complicated. As the years progressed, more and more special dietary and preferential concerns were considered, to comical results. “Who bought those bananas?” “They’re so green!” “They’re too yellow!” They’re bruised.” “Who’s going to eat such big bananas? Have to cut them in half.” “What are those tiny things? Bananas?” There were at least three varieties of cold cereal. One weekend we realized we had 7 different kinds of dairy products in the fridge: whipping cream for Steve’s cake, half-and- half for Barry’s coffee, whole milk, 2%, 1%, skim and Lactaid. We lined them up for a picture that reflected a portrait of us more than any group picture would have. No wonder we weren't married.

 

The highlight of the weekend was often the communal Saturday night dinner. The two shoppers cooked, and the rest of us pitched in to prepare the salad, set the table, and uncork the wine.  The weekend chefs gifted us with elaborate Chinese banquets, Italian specialties, lobster spreads, and beloved family dishes. Every meal was served up with sides of laughter, bumped elbows, and shared stories. The dinners were always balanced, lo-fat, healthy and delicious, but followed by a cholesterol-busting crusted fruit pie baked fresh from Taft Farms, topped with a generous dollop of creamy Häagen-Dazs ice cream. The meal was completed with a perfectly percolated, thickly brewed coffee (caf and decaf, but never flavored) courtesy of our resident coffee aficionado and brew-meister.

 

All weekend we ate together, we played together, we communed together. At the end of the weekend we stowed our belongings in the trunks of our cars, said our companionable good-byes, to drive home in the traffic and return to the demands and deadlines, politics and pressures of our jobs. We knew that somewhere in the Bronx we would be hit with a brick wall of heat and humidity.

 

Just before heading to my car, I always snuck a private walk around to the back of the familiar green house, took a long look at the lake and a deep breath of air. . . an ampule to bolster me during the work week ahead. Then, I tramped back to the car, drove down the gravelly dirt road and onto Route 57, the trees, the lake and the green house in the rear-view mirror.

Marsha

August 2020

Dear Mom

                                                                             August, 2020

                             A week before my birthday

 

Dear Mom

 

It’s hard to believe that it’s been 45 years since you are gone. Yet you are still with me. Your love was so strong, so steady that I still can feel it coursing through my body and my mind. Now that’s staying power. I look down at my hands and my nails and they look just like yours. Sometimes I catch myself clasping my hands in front me, exactly as you did.  I used to pass the mirror and get a glimpse of you, but I am now eight years older than you were when you passed. I’ll never know what you would have looked like at my age. My girth has thickened so much it surprises me when I look down. We both started out as skinny girls and found ourselves to be padded women. Of course, the cancer certainly whittled a lot of that away on you at the end. I am lucky that I have inherited your complexion and skin tone. Grandma was wrong. It wasn’t the ice-cube face wash before bed that keeps the skin beautiful. It’s genes, and probably my natural aversion to sun tanning. Thank you for the smile, and the brown eyes that can sometimes look soulful.

 

More important is what you contributed to the inside of me.  I think Roberta is more like you in temperament that I am. I have Daddy’s quick anger, which you’ll be happy to know has calmed down over the years, but still flashes from time to time. Dad could tell a good joke, but it was your ability to laugh at yourself and at life that I cherish and carry inside me.  A card I bought reads: “Those who can laugh at themselves, will never run out of things to laugh about.”  You brought me up steady and responsible, able to stand on my own.

 

          I know you were scared for me when I became diabetic that summer I turned 12. Hey, I’m still here.  Remember the care with which you boiled the glass syringes and metal needles, and how Mrs. O’Dowd would come next door and help me take the shots? You’d be amazed at all the changes there are now. I am wearing a pump, which includes a reservoir of DNA manufactured insulin, a mini computer that calculates and delivers varying micro amounts of background insulin and insulin for when I eat. It even communicates with a little sensor that picks up my glucose readings every five minutes and makes adjustments.  Are you overwhelmed by the technology? The words I am using?  I’m pretty amazed too.

 

The point is, although I am not married, which I know is something you very much wanted for me, I am leading a good life. It’s not extravagant, but it is good. I’ve travelled. I’ve read. I’ve worked.  I have friends and family. I have pets you said I couldn’t have until I had a place of my own. Surprise:  they are not dogs, but two luscious, loving cats.

          Most important, I am still growing and developing. As to the question you always asked me when I nervously finished a paper or took a test, *Did you do the best you could?”-- I was never quite sure of my answer. Well, I am surer now. I believe I have. Thanks Mom.

 

Love you forever,

Marsha

 

P.S. My room is still messy.

 

Marsha

August 2020

Letter to an Old Friend

 

Dear MS. Olivia Orange Tree,

Greetings,

                O.M.G. what a year, first with the pandemic and now a hurricane! I am thankful that you were spared the violence of this maelstrom in your sunny grove in Indian River, Florida. Ever since we were separated as seedlings at the nursery, I have mourned our uncoupling. Somehow the years have gotten away from us, each putting down roots in very different places.

 

 We were not so lucky here this time in our usually quiet conservative tree lined streets of New York City. I may be going out on a limb here, but this storm was one of the worst that I have experienced in my many years, going all the way back to a seedling.

 

I knew we were in trouble when the omen of seagulls flying overhead were spotted escaping the roiling, angry sea. The smell of salt was in the air as the ocean whipped up into a frenzy like a giant bowl of cream.

 

The sky turned grey and gusts of wind began roaring down the street like an angry lion. Huge, copious rain drops fell. Garbage cans began rolling and banging, clinking and clanging as if a percussionist had gone on a mad rampage running around his orchestra pit.

 

          All the trees instinctively began to stretch their roots, coiling and intertwining with their closest neighbors as the tallest trees stretched out comforting bows and reassuring their smaller compatriots with support to face the oncoming onslaught. Old offenses were forgotten as the tall trees embraced their neighbors, even across the street. Mable Maple was too withered to withstand the gusts, becoming uprooted and falling dead on the spot. Next, I was slapped in the face with wet leaves, then slammed by a weaponized airborne lawn chair. My old friend Bing, lost all his cherries and circumstances were not peachy for the peach trees down the block as they were pitted against the elements. We all held on tightly to each other countering the wind even as we mourned the loss of Mable. Birds flew through the air haphazardly chasing the remnants of their nests. Bushy and Bucky Squirrel, my tenants, sat frozen in terror wondering what they would do for winter stores as the immature nuts were stripped from the trees and scattered to the four winds to rot.

 

Suddenly I felt hot air pushing up against my bark like a hair dryer on high speed. Wet leaves kept slapping me in the face as a tornado twisted and twirled, shimmied and slid, warbled, whistled and whinnied, flying down the block like a freight train accumulating debris as it proceeded. Worms, caterpillars and ants shivered in their nests afraid of the wind and rain. Aluminum siding was ripped off the houses like dislodged helicopter propellers slicing and cutting all in their path. Trees were uprooted and sidewalks overturned as the trees fell like ships tearing at their moorings.

 

As quickly as it had come it was gone, leaving behind its carnage like an uninvited relative overstaying their assumed welcome. As things calmed down and everyone had time to assess the damage, I realized that my right limb was broken beyond repair and I could expect it to be cut off after diagnosis by the tree surgeon. Other than losing much of my canopy and my roots showing, a travesty for the lady trees, I was ok and would survive.

 

Like an arboreal death row, we were all battered and beaten, awaiting the decision of our judge and jury, the executioners of the Parks Department with their hated orange vests, hard hats, goggles, masks and chainsaws looking like inhuman monsters. We all stood at attention putting our best root forward trying to look healthy and strong for their peering eyes. A green check mark spray painted on the trunk was a pardon from the Governor, or in this case The Commissioner of the Parks Department, and the hope for a continued life for many years to come. A red x however signified certain death at the hands of the executioners. Two trucks were parked on the street one for logs going to the mill, and the other for logs to be burned. The muncher stood at the side to mulch the remnants.

 

When my turn came the surgeon checked me very carefully inspecting my roots and bark while looking for Longhorn Beatles. I passed my physical with flying colors! However, my right limb was beyond repair. As a bittersweet side-note my limb was put on the truck going to the Parks Department mill and then on to the carpenter shop to be turned into park benches since I was oak. I always say, “It’s good to be hardwood!” My limb would take on a reincarnated life in a new form, providing comfort and support. The bench would be installed next year on Friday April 30,2021, Arbor Day, the biggest celebration of the arboreal calendar.

 

But enough about me, I have rambled on about my experiences and troubles. I hope the rest of the year is kind to you and your orange blossoms are beautiful, while your oranges grow big and juicy! Have a great harvest and do write back when you can please.

 

Branching out to you in spirit,

Arthur Oak Tree

Jim

August 2020

Dragonfly

The dazzle of its wings is what I noticed first, then there were two of them, dragonflies. Do they bite, I wonder? if they do, I don’t know why I bob and weave around them.

There is a dragonfly sanctuary in the United Kingdom; I wish I could go there and hold a dragonfly in my hand, even though I would be really scared.

Dragonflies come in all kinds of colors. The ones in NY are mostly blue, but I am just guessing because I have never seen one stay still long enough for me to really check its colors.

I have read that dragonflies can be blue, green, purple, brown and sometimes red. The females have a golden-brown color.

In the United States, the rarest dragonfly is called the Hein’s Emerald

Dragonflies live mostly in the Midwest and are on the endangered species list.  It is illegal to kill, harm, harass or collect dragonflies according to the US Fish and Wildlife Service.

It is said that seeing a dragonfly is good luck and as soon as you see it, make a wish and it will come true.

Some dragonflies migrate just like birds; they go from Cuba to Canada, but they are so small they are hard to track.

Dragonflies live near water so they eat mosquitoes, fish, bees, beetles, moths, butterflies, other insects and their larvae, sometimes tadpoles and sometimes each other if they are hungry enough. Yucky. I guess they are not picky eaters.

In the meantime, here in NYC, in this hot summer, dragonflies are very common. I will try to take a picture of one next time if he graces me by holding still enough for me to get my phone camera out.

  

Carry on dear dragonflies, I will look for you in the skies for the rest of the summer.

Georgia P.

8.1.20