Streetplay Discussions
Oh yeah I remember the Miss….
Spaldings were the ball…
Spaldings were the ball of choice at McCarren Park in Greenpoint, Bklyn. Some used the Pinkies, but everyone had their blue ball with their initials or tags either written with a magic marker or engraved using either a knife or a small piece of broken glass (which there was a lot of back in the day).
“Kick the can” was also…
“Kick the can” was also a Bronx game. The kids on my block use to hide our cans so that we wouldn’t have to go scurrying around looking for one the next day; Because the last one to tap their can was it. That was my favorite game, back then. We did all types of cheap tricks, like changing sneakers and hiding inside the garbage can closest to the “can”. And if we didn’t really like the kid that was it. We would run through the backyards and wind up on the other street, leaving the kid all alone for what seemed like hours, trying to find someone. oh, it was the best. I’m glad I not the only one that remembered this game. Thanks for the memories…..Vanessa (32)
My first real job was at…
My first real job was at the A&P Supermarket on E. 31 street & Lexington. After school (in my senior year) I’d take the 4 train down to Grand Central and the 6 across the platform to 33rd street. It was there I learned about produce, dairy, stocking shelves, packing PAPER bags, working the cash register. I had to give out change and count it back to the customer… no digital display on the register telling me what was owed to the customer. Yeah and I learned how to mop and dry seven aisles of a supermarket. And, oh, I hated truck night. It would arrive around 7:00pm and we’d be done by 10:00pm. I had to take the train back to Bronx on a school night.
I, who has been known to…
She had the brightest eyes…
She had the brightest eyes and smile that lit up like a Christmas tree when she was happy (which was most of the time). She’d come home from work, crack open a can of veggies to go with some hastily thrown together meat and grain (Thank God my grandparents lived downstairs and did the “real” cooking), while singing Dionne Warwick songs (You’ll never get to heaven, and Alfie, etc). She was tougher on me than a drill sergeant, but after a good interactive whipping, she’d kiss me, give me my favorite strawberry icecream, then let me (her oldest girl) hang out in her bed and watch a comedy past my usual bed time. She had an infectious laugh that made the doctors and orderlies in the hospital (where she was a nurse) fall in love with her. She loved to dance and sing. Over 300 hospital staff showed up at her funeral at age 29. We didn’t have many years together, but no one can replace my beautiful mom in my heart.
He made my life a living…
Born & raised in the…
Born & raised in the Bronx and current resident. I was born at St. Francis Hospital on St. Ann’s Avenue. I grew up near Tremont Ave & Southern Blvd area as a child. My teen years were spent on Grand Avenue off Fordham Road. My high school years and current residence is White Plains & E 233rd Street. We played alot of stickball when I grew up on Fordham Road. We’d play in the summer time on the street if we weren’t at a the Stadium sitting in the bleachers. In high school, my love for the game lessened as I found out I could croon a little bit. I met my first (late) wife singing ‘My Girl’ on the first day of school my soph year at Bronx Science (class of ’81). 15 years later after high school I wind up singing with Earl Lewis & The Channels Joe Rivera
This past Father’s Day I…
This past Father’s Day I called my dad in Arroyo, PR and thanked him for teaching me how to switch-hit, hit the cutoff man (although I wound up being a second baseman), how to run the bases and I always remember him telling me “never go down looking, take a cut if you’re going to make an out”. My friends all learned something from dad and applied it to their “game”. My dad played stickball as a teenager in “El Barrio” on East 103 Street and Lexington Ave, the HILL. He later played for “Los Astros” softball team in the Bronx in the early 1970’s as their 3rd baseman at Starlite Park .