Category Archives: Street Lifestyle
Go go boots! I had a knee-high…
Sure, we had pedal pushers…
Sure, we had pedal pushers (I think having to do with pushing bicycle pedals?) and sun suits!!! (What we really wanted, but never got, was go-go boots!!) And my mom always bought my sister and me (3 years apart) matching clothes, but in different colors. Just imagine trying to do that to your kids now!
On the Lower East Side we…
On the Lower East Side we called them “sliding ponds” also. And yeah, I have to chuckle when I think about all the “death-defying” stunts we did on those things — and the swings! I never did it, but many of my friends loved to stand on those metal swings, pump as hard as they could and fly through the air just holding on to the chains. I was WAY too chicken to do that. I did love the monkey bars, though. – webdiva
Hmmmm … I remember something…
Hmmmm … I remember something a bit more sinister … SLING SHOTS. They were really easy to make .. All you needed was a tree branch shaped like a Y and a strong rubber band. My girlfriend’s brother (yes that SAME one that appears in some of my other stories) used to LOVE to hit us with his sling shot. Unfortunately, he was great at aiming too! We’d ride by on our bikes, and “POW!” we’d be hit. We’d rollerskate, and “BAM!” right on our derierre’s … Then he’d “POP” out of the bushes laughing. Wonder if Bart Simpson is his hero…. hmmmmm.
Does anyone remember the…
I went to college in Baltimore…
I went to college in Baltimore (pronounced Ball- mer) they had carts that would go around selling flavored shaved ice in a cup. The vendor had a big block of ice and a large sharp scraper. he would put the shavings in a paper cone then add the syrup flavorings you wanted. They aslo had lemons sliced in half and would use a hollow peppermint stick as a straw and you would suck the tart lemon juice through the pepermnt stick straw and it would taste real good on a hot sticky day-never saw that in Brooklyn
Kool-Aid stands were big…
Kool-Aid stands were big in my neighborhood (upstate New York in the 60’s). But one day my friend and I tried a new angle… We got a hold of a refrigerator box, which we placed upright and decorated (with crayons? markers?) as a “Kool-Aid Machine”, just like a Coke vending machine. We cut a hole for the customers to insert their coins, and an opening from which the Kool-Aid could be dispensed. Then we got inside the box and waited for our customers. When they inserted their coins, we would pour the Kool-Aid (from inside the box), and a little hand emerged from the opening with a glass of Kool-Aid. What a “blast” we had!
PENNY PINSKEY. This or something…
PENNY PINSKEY. This or something close to this was the brand name of the substitute ball of choice when the candy store was out of Spaldings. It wasn’t as firm or live as a Spalding, but it beat nothing–and heaven forbid we’d use a tennis ball, so heavy and dead compared to a pink ball.
I was so dumb on one major…
I was so dumb on one major snow storm that I didn’t listen to the radio and it was always better to be at school than to be home. I never didn’t go to school, maybe I didn’t go to my classes but school was where my friends were. So any way I was in eighth or ninth grade and it snowed a lot and I didn’t listen to the radio and my mom was asleep and her husband probably didn’t even notice if it was snowing raining or eighty degrees outside he was so involved in his paintings in those early morning quiet hours of the day that he may not have even noticed if I was in the house or out the door. So my school was a subway ride away and then a walk through a few blocks. Somehow that day I was wearing a long skirt and socks and sneakers and I was soaked and I got to the building only to realize that it was empty and I was the only one around.