Monday, September 7

To get started with my blogging, here are a few things that stuck with me from the long Labor Day weekend:

I took my dog, a book, and a blanket to Prospect Park Friday afternoon. It was what can only be described as a honey of a day - clear and warm, but not hot. Gorgeous. At the park, Winnie the dog attracted the attention of an adorable 15-month-old boy named Joe, who was at the age where he looked completely square, he was so well padded for his many falls. Joe and his mom Bonnie joined us on our blanket to brush Winnie, play with the leash and chat for a while. It felt like the most natural thing in the world to hang out with this perfect stranger and her kid for an hour or so. After living in small towns and rural areas for most of my life, I just love the fact that in Brooklyn I so often casually cross paths with people who I could easily see myself being friends with. I grew up feeling like kindred spirits were few and far between - and I still believe that true life-long friends are - but there's something so comforting about having chance encounters like this with perfectly nice, interesting people who I may never see again. It makes me feel like I've barely scratched the surface of all the great people there are to know here. They're a dime a dozen! And that's a great thing!

While the adorable blond-haired Joe played with Winnie's leash on the blanket, what looked like an older couple walked by. The man (who must have been in his 70s) stopped and said, "You'll never believe it, but my daughter used to have hair exactly that color." And then the woman said, "And look at it now, almost all gray!" They were father and daughter, walking in the park together on a Friday afternoon. I loved that moment, the fact that such a quick conversational exchange could carry the weight of generations, of time steamrolling on as it always does.

After Joe's interactions with Winnie devolved into him persistently rapping her on the head with her brush (she's so patient), Bonnie packed him up and headed home. Winnie (much relieved) and I hung out on the blanket and I read for a bit but kept getting distracted by what sounded like opera playing in the distance. Sitting up to investigate, I noticed a group of elderly men and women on benches on the other side of the sidewalk that snakes it's way through the Long Meadow. They probably live at the home on Prospect Park West where you can always see residents who have been brought out to get fresh air and sunshine. One of the men on the bench was singing to the rest of the group in a beautiful, sure tenor voice, his hands gesturing along with the lilting melody the way a conductor's might. He was singing as if it were the most natural thing in the world, merely a pastime, but nonetheless drawing a small crowd. When Winnie and I packed up to go home, we stopped and listened for a bit then headed on our way.

The streets are unbelievably quiet right now because of the holiday weekend. There's something really nice about that - when you're out on the street, there's an unmistakable calm, and when you're inside, the hush makes it feel like a snow day or something. I walked Winnie up Flatbush Avenue Sunday morning and I swear there could have been tumbleweeds.

This afternoon on the subway, a mom and her four kids (probably age 10-18) were bickering good-naturedly back and forth about who had eaten all of the cereal in the house. The two youngest ones finally fessed up to having taken out the Apple Jacks together. Their banter was straight out of a sitcom, but much funnier and more sincere.

I was reading on the couch this evening and heard a kitty meowing outside so I got up to check it out. There is a small colony of friendly but feral cats that live in an empty construction storage lot across from our building on the front side. As I got to the window, I saw two women in front of the fence with cat carriers. It looked like they were trying to take the cats away and I felt like shouting out the window that they couldn't take those kitties, because one of my favorite little routines of the neighborhood is hearing a man who comes to feed them whistle for the cats around 7pm every day. He has this great distinctive "Wee who hee who" whistle. The cats come running to him (and I go running to the window) and he feeds them and loves all over them. So my initial thought was, "Somebody has to stop them! How sad would the whistling man be if he came to feed them and the kitties never came?!" But then I realized that the girls were actually releasing two of the junkyard kitties from carriers back under the fence. I guess they took them to the vet or got them fixed! Whew, what a relief (ironically in a way, since they are strays!). But I just feel really happy that they are taken care of by people in the neighborhood.