Archive for the ‘Yonkers’ Category
A bookish boy returns home
Yes, I was a bookish boy. And I was a baseball boy, first baseman and outfield in the Park Hill Little League. That’s why, when I was 9 years old and discovered the majestic old main branch of the Yonkers, N.Y., Public Library, at the corner of North Broadway and Nepperhan, I naturally gravitated to [...]
Filed under: Book talk, books, DiGiovanni, Fiction, writing, Yonkers | 1 Comment
Tags: "Rip", books, Brooklyn Dodgers, Carnegie library, childhood reading, New York Giants, New York Yankees, Nicholas DiGiovanni, Nodine Hill, old Yonkers library, Yonkers, Yonkers Public Library
Got some things to talk about, here beside the rising tide… The title of this post — of course! — is from the song “Uncle John’s Band” by the Grateful Dead. Let me take you down ’cause I’m going to… I’ve been staying recently in my old hometown of Yonkers, N.Y. A time to mourn… [...]
Filed under: aging, Beatles, Bob Dylan, death, DiGiovanni, Man has premonition of own death, Pete Seeger, Tom Waits, Yonkers | 1 Comment
Tags: "Turn Turn Turn", Beatles, Bob Dylan, death, funeral songs, funerals, Grateful Dead, mausoleums, memorial services, Pete Seeger, Tom Waits
Night (and day) of the iguana
Seen on the street in Yonkers this morning, right there in plain sight, right there in the gutter: a BIG dead green lizard, which (not being a lizard expert) I’m guessing was someone’s escaped or discarded pet — perhaps an iguana. I looked at the dead lizard and had an epiphany…a realization…an awareness… I thought: [...]
Filed under: Humor, Nature, Pets, Yonkers | 4 Comments
Tags: iguana, lizards, Yonkers
Little Sarah Palin
Some of you have asked if I was surprised when Sarah Palin became governor of Alaska and then ran for vice president of the United States and then became a Fox News commentator. Was I surprised? You betcha! I mean, who wouldn’t be surprised? After all, this is little Sarah Palin, the cute and spunky [...]
Filed under: Humor, Politics, Sarah Palin, Yonkers | 2 Comments
Tags: Fox News, Hillary Clinton, John McCain, Politics, Sarah Palin, satire, Yonkers
He turned on City Lights
Some of my favorite and most cherished books are part of the Pocket Poets series published by the legendary San-Francisco-based City Lights Books — founded by Beat poet Lawrence Ferlinghetti, who turns 90 years old today — March 24, 2009 — and just happens to be a native of Yonkers, N.Y., my old hometown! Visit [...]
Filed under: Book talk, books, Poetry, Yonkers | 1 Comment
A party for Pete
Yes, I’m talkin’ Pete Seeger. No, I’m not talkin’ about the Communist Party or the Wobblies or any of those sorts of parties and movements. I’m talking about how there will be a movement of about 19,000 people into Madison Square Garden on Sunday, May 3, when dozens of great musicians will gather to celebrate [...]
Filed under: Delaware Valley Poetry Festival, Music, Nature, Pete Seeger, Pete Seeger, Three chords and the truth, Yonkers | 1 Comment
Tags: Ani DiFranco, Arlo Guthrie, Bela Fleck, Ben Harper, Billy Bragg, Bruce Cockburn, Bruce Springsteen, Clearwater, Dar Williams, Dave Matthews, Eddie Vedder, Emmylou Harris, Hudson River, Joan Baez, John Mellencamp, Kate and Anna McGarrigle, Kris Kristofferson, Pete Seeger, Pete's grandson Tao Rodriguez-Seeger, Ramblin' Jack, Richie Havens, Seeger's 90th, Steve Earle, Taj Mahal, Tom Paxton, Toshi Reagon, Wobblies
Be it ever so humble…
Why does it make me just a bit melancholy to read that the old Mulford Gardens public-housing projects in Yonkers, N.Y, is finally being demolished? Because I grew up in Yonkers. And because I lived in the Mulford Gardens complex with my parents and my sister — we moved there when I was four years [...]
Filed under: DiGiovanni, Yonkers | 11 Comments
Tags: Ashburton Avenue, Getty Square, Grant Park, housing projects, Hudson River, Mulford Gardens, New York, Nodinee Hill, Oakland Cemetery, Palisades cliffs, public housing, Saw Mill River Parkway, St. Jospeh's seminary, Westchester County, Yonkers
Huckleberry friends
Yes, I’m sentimental. For instance, I just heard Bruce Springsteen’s “Independence Day,” in which a son is telling his father that he’s leaving home, that it’s the only way to end their constant quarrels, that maybe the problem is that they’re too different from each other — and too much alike. So I found myself [...]
Filed under: Bob Dylan, Music, Yonkers | 1 Comment
Tags: "Breakfast at Tifanny's", "Breakfast at Tiffany's", "Independence Day", "Moon River", "Uncle John's Band", Andy Williams, Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, buckdancer's choice, Grateful Dead, Huckeberry Finn, Mantovani, Mark Twain, Nigger Jim, Nodine Hill, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Yonkers
Pax et bonum
Approaching the winter of my discontent, I find myself thinking more often about the springtime of my life, and yes, you’re right, that sounds disturbingly like one of John-Boy’s mawkish opening voice-overs for “The Waltons,” and so I’ll get a grip right now and get right to my point: I never knew the name of [...]
Filed under: Religion, Yonkers | 1 Comment
Tags: "Pax et bonum", Catholic schools, Latin Mass, Linden Street, Missionary Franciscan Sisters, Our Lady of Mount Carmel-St. Anthony, Park Hill, St. Francis of Assisi, Waverly Street, Willow Street, Yonkers
The secret artist
I talked to my mother on the phone last night and she said: “I have a surprise for you.” ——————- My father died six years ago, just in his late 60s. He was in declining health for the last 10 years of his life, and retired early, and during those final years he did a [...]
Filed under: Art, Yonkers | 1 Comment
