a morning in the Bronx...

first trip back there in a long while. My bank has a Bronx branch, and I needed to make a deposit. Yes, the bank has other branches closer, but I wanted some excitement, so I went to the one in the Bronx. It is on Burnside Avenue, the totally Jewish area where my father was raised once he came to New York from Poland, and was Jewish middle class until the late sixties. At that point it quickly morphed into an all  black and Hispanic neighborhood, mostly working class. Now it remains that---saw no white people on my journey which began a few blocks south of Burnside, then continued a bit north after making my deposit. The side streets, Walton Avenue, Morris Avenue and Creston Avenue are crammed with apartment houses---my grandmother lived on Creston and I visited her there with my parents many times. The streets today were very quiet---most people at work, and probably lots of children in school. I would bet the streets are packed from 2:30 on. The atmosphere was pretty mellow on the commercial streets that I passed. After the bank, took the bus on Burnside that goes east on Tremont to 177th street, not too far from where I was raised. I was the only white person on the bus---fascinating trip--again Tremont is a strong commercial street, and things there seemed very mellow. Returned to the west side via the 2 train---had a nice Tuna Fish sandwich and coffee at the Greek Diner on 94th and Broadway, but oh those prices! $11.70 for sandwich, coffee and tax---before the tip. Where will this end..?
  So what to make of my journey into the Bronx? Would like to do more---maybe travel on one residential street near the Grand Concourse, (like Walton Avenue) for its whole 3or 4 miles. I am still
"destroyed" when I look at those art deco apartmant houses the represent the time of my childhood and adolescence. What do I think? That the world that I knew will miraculously return if I imagine it. That some young woman who I might have had a crush on---someone from Bronx Science--will miraculously return in her teen age form? How do you put the two world together...?
  Let's leave it at that---tomorrow I sub at Friends; my body is feeling better after two days of exhausting work. Not sure about tonight---tomorrow I have a ticket to Fern Hill, the play written by Michael Tucker--with six actors whom I have been following since 1977, when they were all playing young people or adolescents. Strange---will never forget the feeling I had after leaving Wendy Wasserstein's Uncommon Women and Others---I could not believe that something could have been that beautiful---that evening, a Sunday in October 1977, made me want to get back into theater. Two of those 'uncommon women" are in tomorrow's play. We will see what that will be like. Will report soon.