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.

Subway Prayer Rules... Usually there is a lull on the West side subways about 9:20 am. First you have to wait awhile for the number one train, and then there is another wait for the express at 96th. Thursday morning was typical- I had a Civil Court calendar call so I headed out about 9:15 with a medium briefcase. There was a three minute wait at the local stop, and when we pulled into the express station at 96th street a crowd was already waiting. I was at the back of the platform because I go up the stairs a Times Square to catch the Q train down to Canal and Lafayette. As we waited, people shifted around the platform trying to get where we thought the doors on the express would land when it pulled in. Every one moved away from the lady with the baby carriage, because baby carriages at rush hour jam up the area near the door. Finally, after about five minutes I sighted the express train- a warm light curving in the tunnel- a number three train. The three is the one to get, because it starts in Manhattan it isn’t crowded, and has lots of empty seats. The two comes from the far reaches of the Bronx, and is always jammed up. Anyway, the three pulls in and I lose the door lottery- I’m four feet away from the nearest door. As I crowd into the train, I spot an empty seat next to a young woman with her eyes closed, but a young guy moving quickly gets it right in front of me. I stand in the empty area in the middle of the car and reach up to hold onto the overhead rail as the train hits 72nd Street. As we head out again, the train speed picks up markedly, trying to make up time, and the train starts swaying, nothing bad but you have to think about keeping your balance. As I sway with the train, the young woman with the closed eyes opens them and curtly remarks “Ma’am please watch your brief case, it just went into my knee!” I turned and looked down at her, defensively saying “The train is swaying, I didn’t realize I touched you because I’m trying to keep my balance.” She answered sharply “Well you did” and snaps her eyes shut again. I moved the brief case to my wrist and grab one of the center bars to hold my self steady, disgruntled, mostly because she had a seat while I stood, and looked her more closley. She was fingering a set of beads in her lap and moving her mouth in prayer. At that moment I felt bad, feeling that maybe she had an injury and my briefcase brushing against her knee had activated the pain, and said “Look I’m sorry, if I hurt you.” but she impatiently shook her head and continued to pray. The train thundered on, and just before we reached 42nd street she opened her eyes and looking up at me unsmilingly, announced “ I wanted to finish my prayers before I accepted your apology. Now I accept it, because I realize you probably did not intend to have your brief case touch my knee.” Smiling, I told her to have a nice day. Then, obviously uninjured, she jumped up and got out the door ahead of me while I lumbered off the train. I can’t get this incident out of my mind. Did my briefcase hurt her? I’ve tried swinging it at my knee but barely feel it. But it must have been annoying to have a brief case brushing up against her, hitting her knee. But if she was religious, shouldn't she have used a gentler tone of voice? I’m a lot older than her, what about respecting her elders? Is it OK in her religion to be annoyed at an old person trying to keep their balance because her prayers were disturbed? Isn’t that against prayer rules? Why didn’t her God tell her to get up and give me her seat?

I lived in Heidelberg for ten years 1965- 1975 in a 7 story apartment building without Central heating or hot water. We had a coal/woodstove in the kitchen, a "running" gas heater for water in the bathroom, and an oil heater in the living room. When we were low on funds I ran up onto the mountain to get wood for heating. My friend in Stuttgart lived in a 17 story building built after the war, and it also had no central heating. They had an oil stove in the living room, and when I wanted a bath there was a water heater in the bathroom with a scuttle of coal bricks beside it. We all dressed in heavy clothes around the house and slept in featherbeds. Normal everyday travel was by bicycle, and we rented a piece of roadside land from the City at 30 marks a year with the proviso that we would cultivate it. We reached it by bicycle and raised a lot of American vegetables- things like summer squash, acorn squash and eating corn, which they didn't have in Europe then, and American origin vegetables tomatoes, potatoes, and beans. Except for dairy and some meat, we basically ate off the garden between June and November. There was a big strawberry patch and a cherry tree already on site, so I made preserves, and sold fresh cherry pies to American army expats. Vacations were made on bicycles, and we took our bikes to the train station, got on the train with them, and rode around Paris or Normandy. My son had a kinderseat on the front of the bike. The summer I had a singing job Bayreuth I got a reduced fare train pass. Life in the City of Buffalo where I was born and grew up in the fifties wasn't that different then. We had a coal furnace in the basement, a big backyard garden, and I walked or rode my bike to grade school, high school, and college. When I was very small Buffalo still had a belt line with commutor trains and street cars, and my older brother would take the train downtown to work. Buffalo was killed even before the steel plant closings by the dismantling of the mass transit and huge eminent domain takings of entire middle class neighborhoods to build highways. I recall riding my bike through miles of a empty formerly German- American middle class neighborhoods destroyed for highways. I was an usher for the Philharmonic Junior Committee and my social life stopped when they stopped running buses after 10 pm. The developers also convinced Mayor Sedita to seize and dismantle downtown Buffalo - mostly east of Main street, and downtown became a huge vacant area. When I went to Mannheim Germany for voice lessons I stupidly asked my voice teacher if they had ripped down downtown Mannheim for a redevelo[pment project. He gave me a tart answer- roughly translated "No , your people redeveloped us- with bombs." Right now I live in Mannhattan, and still have a Garden- two gardens really, but use them mostly for herbs and flowers- I buy our vegetables in Chinatown after Court, or the GreenMarkets or the Koreans.. I got my first car as a gift when I was fifty, for trips outside the City. I am always amazed at the waste of good land I see in the suburbs. Our brother in law has a huge 12 room house in the suburbs of in Fairfax Va.,- they never use the deck, preferring the central AC, and the huge plot of land is manicured by Mexican day laborers There is, no vegetable Garden and you need a car to buy a quart of milk. But strangest of all- whether its in Va. or upstate, I never see anyone outside - people have huge houses on big plots of property and never sit outside or walk around. If my relatives are any indication, everyone is sitting around in the basement watching TV , or at the mall looking for more uninteresting stuff to buy. Why do they have to take up all that land if they are just going to stay inside all the time? In the Cities, people still walk around on the street, take buses and trains and ride bikes, and different types of people get to mingle and talk to each other.

Plummania... It's the time for beach plums out at Canarsie in the Jamaica Bay wildlife refuge. I've been going there for about fifteen years to harvest the small reddish-blue astringent fruits. They taste like a cross between a cranberry and a plum. When the harvest is good, I have enough beach plum jelly to serve at Thanksgiving Dinner with the bird, alongside fresh cranberry-raspberry relish. The jelly is gone by Christmas, but if the harvest is good, we have beach plum shrub spiked with vodka and ginger ale. Beach Plum shrub is also good in seltzer or in sweet and sour sauces. Last year, 2004, was not a good year for beach plums. I didn't get out to Canarsie until Labor Day, and only found one lone beach plum. A friend of mine called to report that she had gone earlier and had found only a few plums. The natural cycle of beach plums alternates between good and sparse years. Every five years or so they have a prodigious year, yielding a huge crop of succulent plums - enough for jelly, shrub, preserves, and some to freeze. This year was average, but the fruits were very small, only about an inch wide, which is a pain because they have big plum pits. To get out to Canarsie Pier, take the L train from 14th street. Emerging from the tunnel in mid Brooklyn, the train travels over the highest point in the 'subway" system, soaring 200 feet at Broadway Junction over the "A" and "J" line stops. Looking out from the train, it is at eye level with a nearby seven story building. The next stop, Atlantic avenue, is equally high, and as you move on to the next stop at Sutter you can look down into junk yards where giant cranes lift up cars and trucks, placing them into crushing machines. The crushed up metal is taken on a conveyor belt over to the next yard and fed into a noisy shredding machine which spits out metal nibs onto a blackish pile. Descending, the train is at street level by the last stop. Busses meet the train inside the train stop, no fare necessary, to continue the trip. Although the buses travel under the Brooklyn Queens Expressway (BQE) directly to Canarsie pier, there is no bus stop directly at the pier. Instead, travelers must get off a block away at the bus stop and walk to the pier. Cross the BQE exit ramp( there is a signal), walk under the BQE and then cross the BQE enter ramp ( there is no signal- watch carefully) in order to get to the pier and wildlife area. Once you have navigated these dangers, you'll find a large pier and a picnic area. Forget them - unless you like large expanses of concrete and parked cars. The little restaurant is usually closed, but people like to gather there to promenade. Old guys hang out along the fringes of the pier fishing. I saw a kid last year catching crabs in a trap by the defunct restaurant, and a 40'ish guy with sideburns was putting on his own DJ radio type show by the restrooms, with strong interference from the younger set. To find beach plums, Face the pier, turn left, and walk on the bike/jogging path along the expressway. You'll see a line of wildly inappropriate Arbor Vitae ( a columnar evergreen which prefers slightly acid soil) ) which is turning brown. Walk to the end of the line of dying evergreens and then lurch into the brush. The beach plums are on small shrub like trees or bushes with oval leaves. Look carefully for the small purple plums, they are overgrown this year with vines (maybe I'll take a trip out there next spring for some vine removal) After you spot a few, your eyes learn what to look for, and it gets easier to spot them. I quickly picked a pail full and then, since it was low tide, wandered out on the beach to enjoy the sky and watch the birds. A family was quietly fishing nearby, hip deep in the water, dressed in their bathing suits Working my way back up through the brush onto the pathway, I navigated the peril of the double BQE ramps to the bus stop. Getting on the bus, the fare box registered "transfer" on my Metro card. A cool one fare round trip between Manhattan and Canarsie Pier if you clock back onto the bus within 2 hours of your start time.

Swimming in New York...It was 95 in the shade when I got out of court today, so I rushed out to Far Rockaway for a swim. Ernie, who works mostly weekends as a church organist, joined me on the long air conditioned ride to the beach. When we got there it was blisteringly hot, with only the slightest breeze coming from offshore to promise relief. We spread our blanket ( actually my orange Halloween tablecloth) on a promising stretch between two jetties near the water where the breeze was strong. The water was green and glaucous with bits of seaweed churning in the waves like torn up bits of salad. The surf was pretty high with some waves over my head and it was cool and exciting tumbling in the waves. You couldn't go past waist deep to swim because the lifeguards were double teamed on the whistles, herding the people into a little patch of water directly in front of their chair. There have been a couple of unnecessary drownings in the papers this summer so they are super vigilant, guarding their reputations. Rockaway is like New York's secret beach. It's so big that it is never very crowded, and you can get there by train. Change for the shuttle at Beachchannel, and the subway lurches right on a concrete subway viaduct when it reaches Rockaway. After a few stops, it comes to the end of the line at ground level. The exit is in an old shopping district, and a couple of short blocks away is the beach, which spreads out for miles on either side. It's a world class beach at the end of the "A" line. The place I really want to swim is in the Hudson. Most evenings I take a bike ride down into Riverside park and ride along Cherry Walk, the path between 98th street and 125th streets, by the water. The Parks Department has put giant rip-rap along the water, and some of the large pieces of rock jut right out into the water. On hot evenings it would be nice to climb down and sit on one of those rocks - to take off my sandals and dangle my feet in the river, and then, as the sun sets, slide down into the water for a swim.

Speer's Toothpick.. Today the paper of record carried a couple of stories about the new design for the "Freedom Tower" in downtown Manhattan. The minute people start talking about building monuments to freedom I get nervous. Generally, governments that build monuments to abstract concepts, like freedom, are actively engaged in taking it away from us and giving us the freedom tower as a tombstone.Appropriately, the proposed monument looks like something from the drawing board of Albert Speer, Hitler's architect. The best monument to freedom in this country is the law and impartial administration of justice and the rights it preserves and protects. Rights that this administration feels less and less compelled to uphold, and laws that it feels are outdated impediments to its imperial power. How can there be justice without a government that is bound by law? How ca n there be freedom without justice? Meanwhile, let's name that building downtown something else. How about WTC2?

U.S.C. TITLE 18 > PART I > CHAPTER 47 § 1001. (a) Except as otherwise provided in this section, WHOEVER, in any matter within the jurisdiction of the executive, legislative, or judicial branch of the Government of the United States, knowingly and willfully— (1) falsifies, conceals, or covers up by ANY trick, scheme, or device a material fact; (2) makes any materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent statement or representation; or (3) makes or USES any false writing or document knowing the same to contain any materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent statement or entry; shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 5 years, or both. (b) Subsection (a) does not apply to a party to a judicial proceeding, or that party's counsel, for statements, representations, writings or documents submitted by such party or counsel to a judge or magistrate in that proceeding. (c) With respect to any matter within the jurisdiction of the legislative branch, subsection (a) shall apply only to— (1) administrative matters, including a claim for payment, a matter related to the procurement of property or services, personnel or employment practices, or support services, or a document required by law, rule, or regulation to be submitted to the Congress or any office or officer within the legislative branch; or (2) any investigation or review, conducted pursuant to the authority of any committee, subcommittee, commission or office of the Congress, consistent with applicable rules of the House or Senate.

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