Shiny New Things...I remember my new bicycle in 1956 under the Christmas tree. Creeping down the stairs at 6 am in my pajamas and seeing a new Schwinn with red bows gleaming under the tree. Even though it was snowing outside with three inches of hard ice caked on the driveway I wanted to get out there and ride it right away in my jammies. Then there was the rush of the“new” Buick- a huge green beast crouching by the curb on 110^th Street, ready to whip off to a meeting, go shopping at the Fairway, or go on a quick spin up to Montreal. During the first six months I used the car so much I put on twenty pounds. Or how about the excitement of a new computer, bringing it home in its box , unpacking and checking cables, components and programs, looking forward with excitement to the extreme capabilities of new programs which will instantly organize schedules, write briefs, download bank accounts and create numbered exhibits on CDs. Rummy and his friends down in DC must feel like this. Type the special code and leave a hand print on the door of a hidden security elevator hidden under the flag hanging behind a desk in the Secretary's office. The elevator box descends down, down, and then jogs sideways for several yards, opening finally into a featureless gray hallway. You walk down a short hallway into a glass booth which overlooks a vast cavern carved under neath the Potomac. The giant cave is filled with shiny new things- green camouflage painted canons on giant rubber wheels, ranked behind them are larger canons with sharp caterpillar treads, Beside them, stacked rows of blunt cylinders. The are painted grey on each one is an orange symbol of three joined triangles. A whole cave full of shiny new tactical nuclear weapons, just waiting to be tried out...

This moment of spring... riding a bicycle in the rain black shapes of the trees still visible behind a mist of green. Down in Riverside Park, the Daffodils are a sweet glade of yellow beneath the blossoming cherry trees along the Promenade. The Forsythia have held on wonderfully and cascade down a hill near 96^th street. Orange Quince bushes bloom along the pathway. Down by 80^th street there is a yellow Magnolia tree! The massive Magnolia tree on the grounds of St. Jone the Divine back by the greenhouse has been in full bloom for 10 days now. Its cousins on Broadway have just starting dropping satin petals. Even the Calary pears, which line side streets in the West 90's with white clouds have kept going longer than usual. In our garden, newly insured and open daily again, the first species Tulips have opened along with the early hybrids. Daffodils are putting on a show and the Crabapples are getting ready to pop. We planted frilly pansies out of the greenhouse a couple of weeks ago and they are strutting their stuff along the borders. Down our garden paths are lines of perfumed Hyacinths in shades of blue. The Lenten Rose, Hellebore, is still blooming in the Rock Garden joined by tiny blue Iris Reticulata. You can't escape it. Get off the subway at Park Place downtown, and City Hall park is a glare of spring blooms backed by soft green fuzzy trees. Driving up to Westchester along Route 100 I saw a mile long row of white Calary pears, translating a mundane suburban mall scape to the sublime.

Two shibboleths of faith fall in one week--- Holy Week is here and I am on the subway coming back from court wondering where the sheet music for “The Palms” has been misplaced. All the tenor soloists who used to sing it have been driven off or died over the years, so now I have it all to myself. In the back of the train are three middle aged subway construction workers with hard hats holding silly little orange flags. They are in a loud conversation about truth coming out. My ears prick up, as I wonder if they are discussing the dark side of our national politics, when one of the other men says “But it wasn’t written down right away, they waited hundreds of years,” then another says “How do we know how old these books are?” Then they begin to talk about carbon dating. One of the men gets exasperated and says “Well they must have known about this before- what about the book of “Judas”?” I jump in and say “There is no book of Judas” and they all look at me. Incredibly these three men have been talking about the news article about the dead sea scrolls which say that Jesus had approached Judas and asked him to betray him. Jesus was manipulative! Good Friday was suicide by cross! Are things quite the same? Does Holy week have the same feel to it? Even soot covered track workers down in the depths are talking about it. Who is the martyr here, the man who died terribly and ascended into heaven for everlasting honor and worship? Or the man who did his bidding, committed suicide, and is reviled for all time? So there it is, something to turn over while sitting in a darkened church listening to the Passion. The other shibboleth that fell was found in an innocuous little booklet, found in a box of books from Swann we were clearing out for resale. The pamphlet was titled “The Jews and Their Lies” and was written by Dr. Martin Luther. Translated and published by a Methodist group in 1927, it had a dark picture of Dr. Luther on the inside title page. Looking at the picture and reading the preface, it slowly dawned upon me that the author was The Martin Luther, not someone named after him. That person in Germany we celebrate on reformation Sunday. The contents of this little booklet consist of some of the most crushing racist condemnations of the Jews I have ever read in English, worthy of the worst propaganda of the Third Reich. So, Judas is raised up and Luther struck down, all in one week.

King George... Here in New York, I have always thought the Upper West Side looks similar to some of the older parts of Frankfort. Sometimes I walk down Broadway and imagine what it would be like if trucks were parked along the side streets and people herded out of their apartments into the trucks in the middle of the night. My guess is it would be done by troops, while the regular NYC Police stood by. We would be taken to Riverside park where the train comes out of the tunnel and herded into train cars. Or maybe they would put us on special express Number 1 trains to 242 street. Then we could be herded into Van Cortland Park to wait for transit to the camps in Greene County. When the facilities in Greene County filled up, they could truck us out Route 17 to the Otselic Valley, the nearest really isolated area to New York City. I lived in Heidelberg for roughly 9 years in the 1960's and 70's. I looked German, spoke German, and usually passed for Dutch or Danish. I worked at the Opera Company, and spent a lot of time around people who had worked there twenty or thirty years. They talked about the war and years preceding it a lot, the way my parents talked about the depression at the dinner table when I was a child. Just so, whenever we were all sitting around during a break or after a rehearsal, at dinner, or out for drinks, the subject would tend towards those confusing years when everything had been turned upside down. Unnoticed, I sat in the background listening to the stories. No one took the ideas of the Third Reich seriously at first. By the time they began to realize what was going on they were frightened for their lives. If the Government could take the assistant conductor in the middle of the night, the government could take any one of them away.. Whenever a Government gives itself the prerogative to set aside basic human rights at will, we are on a path that changes the relationship between the government and the people. What can be justified in one instance can be justified in all instances. If you can justify rounding up one group of people and placing them in concentration camps without an indictment, a list of specific charges, or an attorney, you can justify rounding up another unpopular group of individuals. If a government can set aside rules against torture for one person then it can basically select anyone out of the population for the same treatment on any “urgent” basis whatsoever. This is what my German friends realized too late, that to the Government, individuals are all the same, and once the rules re set aside for one individual, they have basically set aside the rules for us all.

Snow Day...I just looked across the street from my window to check the snow and saw a neighbor returning home after a Sunday afternoon out. It’s about 4 pm and the man is dressed in a mid-length woolen coat with a woolen hat and is pulling a sled. I vaguely recognize him as a fairly stodgy middle aged man. He is covered with snow and looks happy. I start to wonder- I’ve never seen him with a female companion or children, so was he out sledding alone? The sled is one of the “American Flyer” type sleds with the little metal runners and a wooden slat at the top for steering. It’s been years since I’ve been sledding. The last time was in the Alps near Garmisch with my son. The hill was steep and snowy and we went over a teeth rattling bump at the end of the ride. I think about Riverside park and where a solitary adult could go to enjoy a quick sled run. Riverside park is more like Delaware Park in Buffalo than the Alps. In Riverside park there are potential sled runs between the upper walkways down to the main promenade just above the Soccer fields. This being New York, an adult could probably go sledding in Riverside park without raising any eyebrows. In Buffalo no one sledded after their 20th birthday, unless they were there with their kids. I stopped sledding when I became a “big girl”and took up Ice Skating.

Forty years...one of my longest friendships slipped away unnoticed at the end of 2005- Tony Depauw, the week day manager of Gryphon Books , and lately, Westsider Books, passed away in his apartment at the end of November or early December. We're not sure exactly because he lay undiscovered for several weeks. Tony was the bald guy with a black fringe of hair and a mustache who was a fixture at the front desk as you came into the book store. He was there everyday Monday through Friday and spent his days pointing customers in the right direction for research, chatting with people about their book needs and interests, ringing up sales and packing up mail order purchases. If you ever visited the Gryphon, (now Westsider Books), the used books store on Broadway next to Staples at 81st street, if it was during the week you have met Tony and had a conversation. I had many conversations with Tony, cause he lived in my household for almost twenty years. He took a European out from the Army in Heidelberg about 1965, and got a job in the map shop at headquarters US Army Europe, USAREUR, on Roemer Strasse. His job was located in the Adjutant General's office where Richard, my first husband worked on contingency plans. Richard invited Tony over when my son was an infant in1967, when we were still living over the "Snookeloch" ( the Student Prince bar of "drink drink drink" fame) on Haspelgasse in Heidelberg. We were already fast friends when Neal Armstrong walked on the moon, and watched it together on a grainy little German TV. I was performing in German Opera and Special Services Army productions and got Tony involved in back stage work at the US Road Side Theater shows. After our move into a bigger apartment he came home with Richard every day, ate dinner with us and basically moved in. We played Scrabble or MilleBorne almost every night for five years. When Richard rented a garden from the City out on the Rhineplain Tony became one of my loyal garden slaves, coming out to the garden on his bike every day after work to help pull the witches grass, plant, and pick strawberries and later, cherries. We all had bicycles, and in 1970 we took off on a train for France with our bikes for a trip through Normandy. Tony was our map man, and he brought big old army ordnance maps for the trip. They showed altitudes, so he made sure we avoided all the hills, except at Avranches, which is basically located on the top of a hill. Tony also know all the history of the battles, so we got a blow by blow description of what happened at every rest stop location. Staying at pensions or small hotels we found along the way, we ate picnic lunches with food from the local Charcutierie. At night we had the best food of our lives. The next year, in 1971, we got a summer place in Altneudorf in the Odenwald with a friend who was a TV News producer for Southern Germany TV. Tony came in for a share and we went up every weekend. We took hikes, had big BBQs every Sunday, and planted a big garden with seeds I ordered from Stoke's through the APO. I had squash if every description and, of course, American corn. Tony worked on his compost heap. It was the most scientific compost heap ever built, and no one was permitted to touch it. Finally, Tony got a government job in Maryland at the Social Securities Administration, so we said good bye at the Frankfort Airport in 1975. A year later I came back and got my place in New York . Tony was the first person I visited, and he started coming up every other weekend to go to theater in New York. He moved up here permanently in 1978, taking up residence in our maid's room. After looking for a government job in the City, he followed his dream and got a job as Technical Director at Shelter West Theater on VanDam street. I was doing a lot of theater then, Barry and I were together, and Tristan got into Bronx Science. When he wasn't working, Tony took a welding course (which he talked about constantly) and got really interested in "how to do it" books. He also collected odd things from the street for the theater, and by 1988 we started looking for a new apartment for him. It was just around that time that he left Shelter West during a financial crisis, and got the job at Gryphon Books, where he stayed until this past November

Forty years...one of my longest friendships slipped away unnoticed at the end of 2005- Tony Depauw, the week day manager of Gryphon Books , and lately, Westsider Books, passed away in his apartment at the end of November or early December. We're not sure exactly because he lay undiscovered for several weeks. Tony was the bald guy with a black fringe of hair and a mustache who was a fixture at the front desk as you came into the book store. He was there everyday Monday through Friday and spent his days pointing customers in the right direction for research, chatting with people about their book needs and interests, ringing up sales and packing up mail order purchases. If you ever visited the Gryphon, (now Westsider Books), the used books store on Broadway next to Staples at 81st street, if it was during the week you have met Tony and had a conversation. I had many conversations with Tony, cause he lived in my household for almost twenty years. He took a European out from the Army in Heidelberg about 1965, and got a job in the map shop at headquarters US Army Europe, USAREUR, on Roemer Strasse. His job was located in the Adjutant General's office where Richard, my first husband worked on contingency plans. Richard invited Tony over when my son was an infant in1967, when we were still living over the "Snookeloch" ( the Student Prince bar of "drink drink drink" fame) on Haspelgasse in Heidelberg. We were already fast friends when Neal Armstrong walked on the moon, and watched it together on a grainy little German TV. I was performing in German Opera and Special Services Army productions and got Tony involved in back stage work at the US Road Side Theater shows. After our move into a bigger apartment he came home with Richard every day, ate dinner with us and basically moved in. We played Scrabble or MilleBorne almost every night for five years. When Richard rented a garden from the City out on the Rhineplain Tony became one of my loyal garden slaves, coming out to the garden on his bike every day after work to help pull the witches grass, plant, and pick strawberries and later, cherries. We all had bicycles, and in 1970 we took off on a train for France with our bikes for a trip through Normandy. Tony was our map man, and he brought big old army ordnance maps for the trip. They showed altitudes, so he made sure we avoided all the hills, except at Avranches, which is basically located on the top of a hill. Tony also know all the history of the battles, so we got a blow by blow description of what happened at every rest stop location. Staying at pensions or small hotels we found along the way, we ate picnic lunches with food from the local Charcutierie. At night we had the best food of our lives. The next year, in 1971, we got a summer place in Altneudorf in the Odenwald with a friend who was a TV News producer for Southern Germany TV. Tony came in for a share and we went up every weekend. We took hikes, had big BBQs every Sunday, and planted a big garden with seeds I ordered from Stoke's through the APO. I had squash if every description and, of course, American corn. Tony worked on his compost heap. It was the most scientific compost heap ever built, and no one was permitted to touch it. Finally, Tony got a government job in Maryland at the Social Securities Administration, so we said good bye at the Frankfort Airport in 1975. A year later I came back and got my place in New York . Tony was the first person I visited, and he started coming up every other weekend to go to theater in New York. He moved up here permanently in 1978, taking up residence in our maid's room. After looking for a government job in the City, he followed his dream and got a job as Technical Director at Shelter West Theater on VanDam street. I was doing a lot of theater then, Barry and I were together, and Tristan got into Bronx Science. When he wasn't working, Tony took a welding course (which he talked about constantly) and got really interested in "how to do it" books. He also collected odd things from the street for the theater, and by 1988 we started looking for a new apartment for him. It was just around that time that he left Shelter West during a financial crisis, and got the job at Gryphon Books, where he stayed until this past November

Even in cronehood there is a special excitement about acquiring clothes. Yesterday, I finally bought the perfect denim jacket, and even on sale 65% off at Macy’s Brooklyn it was not really cheap- not Thrift shop cheap, just comparatively inexpensive. God knows where I’ll wear it- it’s no good for Court, and it’s too nice for turning compost at the garden. But, it goes perfectly with the long denim skirt from National Wholesale Liquidators, hides fat, and well, makes me look ...young. Other than professional clothing, which is necessary, because without a good suit and expensive briefcase no one takes you seriously, it’s a mystery why one continues hunt for that perfect summer top, another shirt dress, or a new evening skirt. A couple of years ago, I walked into the Housing Works thrift shop on East 23rd street and found a green-colored boiled wool cape with large silver double headed eagle buttons and a black crocheted border for 10 dollars. Made in Austria, it is the classic fingertip length style with the extra buttons along the border to secure hand access so the cape doesn’t flap in the wind on a bicycle. This very cape was all the rage 30 years ago when I was a starving singer-student and mother in Heidelberg. All the young women had just such a cape. I would enviously look at the other women at Market in their capes, their hands extended out of the buttoned hand holes and holding little lined market baskets for their groceries, or walking along the Neckar river, pushing prams in their boiled wool capes. I longed for one so badly in those days that I bought some cheap corduroy in Nuremburg on a train stopover to a rehearsal in Bayreuth and made a cape with a matching skirt to wear bike riding in Heidelberg. Now, here was the perfect Cape, thirty years too late, in a New York City thrift shop. If course I instantly bought it, and even occasionally wear it bike riding along the Hudson to the uptown Fairway for groceries. I often wish it could be sent back in time and space, addressed to Jackie Hansen-Bukowski, 6-8 Marz Strasse, Heidelberg 69.

Community Gardens in Chicago and Philadelphia have group insurance policies- why can't New York? Maybe there really is something in this country that discriminates against New York City. Plutonium mines have insurance, rock climbing experiences have insurance- how come New York City Gardens can't get a quote? We don't know if its because New York is still viewed as a terrorist target, or that New York is viewed as more litigioius than the rest of the country. All the Community Gardens in New York City (about 650 gardens) lost their Community Garden group insurance policy last August 31, 2005, ( except for Restoration Foundation's 50 gardens which have their own seperate policy) We were not notified of the pending termination and many of us did not find out until sometime in October. Since then, despite our low "loss runs" none of us - the City, the Landtrusts, and Individual gardens - can get an insurance quote. This loss of insurance affects almost every Community Garden in New York City, and has resulted in a total closing down of public access. The City of New York Parks Dept -Green Thumb, is trying to find a "work around" [The City doesn't want to wholly self insure Gardens on City land because they don't have on site employees.] The Gardens located on the Department of Transportation property are also looking for a quote. One of the biggest gardens in the City is the Bissel Garden, on the Bronx/Westchester boarder on an unused Railroad right of way. A big land trust like Trust for Public Land with some 60 odd gardens and little independent Gardens like mine are together in the same boat scrambling for an insurance quote.As a Board member for our little 16,000 square foot Garden, (westsidecommunitygarden.org) I have been working with two insurance agents and they can't get anyone willing to insure us. The one serious consideration finally turned us down because their actuaries thought someone may get injured by herbicide/pesticides. This excuse came from Chubb- who specializes in large landtrusts that have rock climbing trails, canoes, lakes, and fast flowing rivers. I responded that we are an "all organic garden," and besides, gardens located in the middle of Manhattan don't really have big problems with hordes of locusts, (except twolegged ones). We certainly don't need to use herbicides cause it takes about two minutes to weed the tiny lawn in our amphitheater. If nothing happens by spring, we will have to cancel neighborhood school field trips and our regular school program, a summerful of Children's Shakespeare theater in the floral amphitheater, and a proposal for classical Viol concerts this spring/summer. For the first time in 30 years, our gates will remain closed during the annual Tulip Festival of 15,000 bulbs in bloom.