[This has been such an eventful week already, I thought it necessary to bisect it.]
Monday, March 8, 2021
We ran an errand on Saturday which took us to my old neighborhood in Brooklyn, called City Line, because it was the eastern border of the city of Brooklyn until it joined New York in 1898. It allowed me to show my young bride major landmarks of my youth. We started with 2798 Pitkin Avenue, where I lived 12½
of my first 13 years. It is half of one pair of four pairs of two-story, two-family houses separated by three driveways. They all remain, their stucco exteriors now covered by various tones of aluminum siding. They all seemed neat and trim, with the exception of 2798, whose front porch and yard were covered with trash. The next door neighbor spoke no more English than I spoke Spanish, so I didn't learn whether the mess was chronic or merely the result of renovations underway.
The neighborhood itself, once Italian-American and Eastern European Jewish, was predominantly Hispanic as evidenced by the stores along Pitkin Avenue, although a storefront mosque sat two blocks away, at the corner where "Goodfellas" took place in real life. Another obvious change in demographics was the Sutter Avenue shul, where my brother and I had out Bar Mitzvahs.
The building appears to have no overt sign of its previous incarnation. We found another significant change at 997 Belmont Avenue, the Brooklyn home of the Goldenberg clan when it left the Lower East Side. The family bought the new building (with what I can't imagine) around WWI, a grocery store downstairs, with living space behind and above. My beloved grandmother Esther Malka ran the store until the early 1950s, then a widow, with only two of her 6 children living at home, she rented the store and the downstairs apartment to a Jewish family, who bought the whole property in 1965. Now, the storefront has been bricked over and the whole space turned to residential purposes.
. . .
Speaking of old neighborhoods, the weekend real estate section reported that "February’s
priciest closing took place in the West Village, where a brand-new
duplex penthouse at 90 Morton Street, a boutique condominium conversion,
was acquired for just under $25 million."
Once upon a time, I lived at 55 Morton Street, in a studio apartment equipped with a hand-crafted Murphy bed, a non-working fireplace and a non-working air conditioner. I paid $105 monthly, later raised to $115, and shared occupancy with several families of roaches. The math fascinates me; 55 Morton Street is to 90 Morton Street as $115 is not to ~$25 million.
This juxtaposition of 90 Morton Street and 55 Morton Street reminded me of "Dead End," a 1937 potboiler, starring Sylvia Sidney and Joel McCrea, with Humphrey Bogart in the supporting role of "Baby Face" Martin.
It is set along the East River, on what is now the very exclusive Sutton Place. Ritzy high-rise apartment buildings face grubby tenements. Some of the characters interact, for better or worse, across the divide. One lasting cultural contribution of the movie was the introduction of the Dead End Kids, then the East Side Kids, finally rebranded the Bowery Boys, led by Leo Gorcey and Huntz Hall.
. . .
Moving from the digital to the analog, I strongly recommend the column by Ginia Belllafante about Woody Allen and his movie "Manhattan" specifically. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/
I loved so much about the movie, the music, the cinematography, the subplots, its satirical character, BUT. From the first, I hated the romance between the 42-year old man and the 17-year old high school girl at the heart of the movie. I didn't package my reaction as ethics or morality; you simply don't go there. Isaac, stick to your own kind, adult New York women with an edge and, yes, experience the frustration that often accompanies such relationships. Bedazzling a teenager with your wit and wisdom doesn't elevate you. Quite the contrary.
Tuesday, March 9, 2021
This headline was the opposite of what I would guess: "We Expect 300,000 Fewer Births Than Usual This Year."
Here's the experts' logic: "When the labor market is weak, aggregate birthrates: decline; when the
labor market improves, birthrates improve. At the individual level,
there is also a well-documented link between changes in income and
births: When income increases, people often expand their families; when
people experience job or income loss, they have fewer children."
My simple-minded thought is that you have to do something besides watching Netflix all the time.
. . .
The Yiddish term for an unkempt person is schlub. At first glance, it might apply to Stewart-Allen Clark, pastor of the 1st General Baptist Church in Malden, Missouri, but see for yourself as he offers guidance on grooming and appearance. https://m.facebook.com/reagan.
. . .
The temperature reached into the 60s this afternoon as Michael Ratner and I celebrated our peak, if not complete, Covid-19 immunity by driving to Nathan's Famous, 1310 Surf Avenue, Coney Island. Our goal, their prototypical plat du jour, hot dogs and French fries.
We chose Nathan's even before seeing the weather forecast, because we recollected that you usually stood outside there to eat under all conditions, a caution that we wanted to maintain in these infectious times.
The fact that it turned out to be an unseasonably warm day indicated that we were in harmony with the Universe. The hot dogs were good ($4.75), the French fries very good ($4.25 large order). The ride was very good, the company excellent.
. . .
When I read about efforts to democratize the New York City school system and particularly open the doors to Stuyvesant and other elite high schools, I have to wonder if I'm not just the guy who pulls the ladder up behind me once I've climbed aboard. https://nyti.ms/30pgkQH
While I am convinced that the Department of Education (no longer the Board of Education) has worked hard and sincerely to provide equal access to these schools, the results are woeful. The current demographic breakdown of the Stuyvesant student body is:
| Race | # |
% |
|---|---|---|
| Amer. Indian |
4 | 0.1 |
| Asian |
2359 | 71.7 |
| Hispanic | 94 | 2.9 |
| Black | 40 | 1.2 |
| White | 791 | 24.1 |
Disproportionate impact is a firm principle in our civil rights jurisprudence derived from Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of
1964 and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. However, the (more conservative members of the) United States Supreme Court ruled that the disproportionate racial impact of a civil service employment test may be ignored
if it is job related and consistent with business
necessity, or if there did not exist an equally valid, less-discriminatory
alternative. Ricci v. DeStefano, 557 U.S. 557 (2009).
Whether New York City should have academically elite schools is a political question, not a legal one. If yes, my position, tests are a necessity; if no, maybe pressure by the mostly
Asian
displaced students and their parents would lead to the sorely needed improvements throughout our educational system. I've always believed that Stuyvesant is a symptom, not a cause.
I lived in most of Brownsville-East Flatbush as I am sure others we knew did the same. Roaches were special...
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