Friday's Child Is Loving And Giving And On The Mend

There's a reason Friday's Child is now a part 

of Her New York, if only to say thank you.

Click Here to find out how Social Tees
LIKES SAVES LIVES!

Goldie sleeps with the dolly and the little teddy bear Joni gave me when my cousin, Martha died.  She is safe here in this corner from Jupiter insisting on being ... well... Jupiter.  She is also finally safe enough to rest from the exhaustion and weariness that happens when someone tosses an animal, no longer wanted, into backyards and onto street corners.   And she is safe enough to rest from being neutered right before those kittens were ready to be born.  Mending takes times and Goldie is now safe enough to take it.

Meanwhile kittens and puppies abound, all waiting for their own little corner to rest in and sure, every picture posted makes you want to turn your home into a haven for every single abandoned animal.

Snoopy - adorable, angelic, shy, needs exercise and a loving home!

But wait!  You don't have to become an animal hoarder.  There are so many other wonderful ways to help.

Do you want to participate in 

Friday's Child?  

Not everybody can bring an animal home.  Not everybody lives in New York.  That's why Social Tees just started an Amazon Wish List. It's easy, it's fast and you never have to risk any allergies or a plane trip when you click a button.

And if you live in New York and are in the neighborhood, stop by the 5th Street Store front 5-7pm weekedays and the Petco adoption events weekends!

Do you want to foster or adopt???!!!!

 It's easy.  All you have to do is fill out a form. 

WHAT'S FOSTERING, YOU WONDER?!

Fostering lasts a few weeks, and Social Tees can provide supplies if you need them.  Fostering is SUPER important because it's much healthier for our animals to be in homes than in cages, and it expands our shelter virtually.

AND for every cat and dog that is placed in a foster home, Social Tees can pull another out of the kill shelter. So if you are an animal-lover with commitment issues, FOSTER!!!

For more info on fostering, check out our FAQs here.
CONTACT SAMANTHA:samantha.socialtees@gmail.com

Social Tees
325 East 5th Street, NY, NY 10003;
5-7pm Monday to Friday
12-4pm Saturday and Sunday at Petco at Union Square
212-614-9653;
socialteesnyc.org

"May God Remember" this Sunday Memory Of A New York And A New Year

Soon it will be time to end and begin again...

...remembering that a sin is only an arrow that missed its mark and asking not to be forgiven, as a rabbi friend pointed out, but to be pardoned.  The debt of the misdeed released, the debtor, set free, stepping into the new year unburdened.  

And in these days of awe, it will be time to do Yiskor.  Asking for pardon, I will remember that night.

**

Originally posted September 12, 2010:

I came of age the day I lied to my mother. I was 50 and holding her hand. She was 84 and dying. It was Rosh Hoshanah

Her bones were trying to suck in dark bedroom air. I pleaded “Let me take you to the doctor…”

Her next to last words, “No.”

Pulling out wishes from years ago ‘save me unless I’m really dead,’ pleading again “you are in such distress…” and then my lie, “I promise you I’ll bring you home after. I promise you you’ll come home…”

Her last words, “OK.”

Other than the ER doctors telling me to wake my sister in Brooklyn NOW tell her to come to the hospital NOW, holding my mother’s hand was like any other 3:00 a.m. medical emergency, only this time she wasn’t fighting, singing, charming and admonishing me about how it was all my fault.

She did not come home. She died where she didn’t want to die. But she did not die in pain or fear or loneliness. She did not die in a bedroom made with decades of misery and disappointment.

Because I lied, she died holding my hand while my sister and I talked like machine guns about something else in our mother’s life we didn’t understand, which is just about everything. No longer the child who had failed her, I stepped into morning air with knowledge only gotten from absolute endings, and became a woman who survived a decision.

Light Seeking An End To The Tunnel

In the middle of red and blue and yellow delighting in one another, two pillars of white appeared. 

Sunday Memories: Shopping At The Mall

Either in church or school or synagogue basements or auditoriums, or even sometimes on the street, closed to traffic, that's where we got almost everything we got, except for the stuff we got left carefully by stoops and lampposts, which was the universal sign of "Up For Grabs!" and the rare purchases from Macy's.

So today, St. Marks' Church once-a-year street fair unfolded all the neighborhood's treasures up for sale, a bunch of clothes for free from a table closing up five minutes before the fair ended, a much needed lamp shade for $5 and the joy of staring at the "Trigger Happy Polka" lady.

**
Related Posts

Sunday Memories: Moving Day

Even The Cat Was Found On The Street

Sunday Memories: Macy's Chewing Gum

Friday's Child Is Loving And Giving And Just Came Home

There's a reason Friday's Child is now a part 

of Her New York, if only to say thank you.

Click Here to find out how Social Tees
LIKES SAVES LIVES!

Goldie (formerly known as JoJo)

She was found on 4th Street.  A little cat, tiny really, young maybe eight-nine months old.  And pregnant.

Animal Control picked her up.  All the unborn kittens were taken out and she was neutered.  That was one way of dealing with the too many cats and kittens that lived short, hard lives on the streets and the many more cats and kittens that lived in shelters, being officially killed when adopting got too sparse and the shelters got too crowded.

Social Tees took her and put her on their adoption list, describing her as low-keyed and delicate, great with other cats.  And she was.  Stuck in a tiny box with another cat she slept, she ate, she slept again.  Scooping her up, she nestled in but there was a sense of loss and exhaustion but that also could have been me.

The idea of another cat had been on both our minds.  We had each other.  But Jupiter only had me until October when the big fall gig started up again.  Goldie seemed perfect.

The minute she stepped out of her carrier, this little girl came alive.   Adorable and curious, affectionate and sweet, she has been bouncing and cuddling ever since.

And on the other side of the door, temporarily exiled from his office, Jupiter waits.

On such a day of new beginnings and long-ago endings there is hope in a tiny golden cat.

Do you want to participate in Friday's Child?  

Not everybody can bring an animal home.  Not everybody lives in New York.  That's why Social Tees just started an Amazon Wish List. It's easy, it's fast and you never have to risk any allergies or a plane trip when you click a button.

And if you live in New York and are in the neighborhood, stop by the 5th Street Store front 5-7pm weekedays and the Petco adoption events weekends!

Do you want to foster or adopt???!!!!

 It's easy.  All you have to do is fill out a form. 

WHAT'S FOSTERING, YOU WONDER?!

Fostering lasts a few weeks, and Social Tees can provide supplies if you need them.  Fostering is SUPER important because it's much healthier for our animals to be in homes than in cages, and it expands our shelter virtually.

AND for every cat and dog that is placed in a foster home, Social Tees can pull another out of the kill shelter. So if you are an animal-lover with commitment issues, FOSTER!!!

For more info on fostering, check out our FAQs here.
CONTACT SAMANTHA:samantha.socialtees@gmail.com

Social Tees
325 East 5th Street, NY, NY 10003;
5-7pm Monday to Friday
12-4pm Saturday and Sunday at Petco at Union Square
212-614-9653;
socialteesnyc.org

In Memoriam As The New Year Begins: In Lieu Of Flowers...

In Lieu of Flowers... was originally posted on October 1, 2008 as an obituary for Florence who had died the previous morning on Rosh Hoshanah. Since Rosh Hoshanah appears in the English calendar differently each year, she in death has become as unpredictable as she was in life. Wouldn't have it any other way.

In Lieu of Flowers...



Tell the truth.

Tell yourself the truth.

Don't let your bullshit compromise either of the above.

Don't lie. Unless you're drunk. Then really don't lie.

Don't steal.

Accept hand-me-downs.

Look fabulous in your own clothes. They may have started out as hand-me-downs but they're yours now. Proudly recount their lineage. Never feel ashamed about that.

Never take a taxi.

Walk everywhere.

Don't wear a coat in winter.

Carry your own weight to the point of pathology. Better to err on independence than not.

Refuse to lose at the hands of cowardliness, mediocrity, stupidity, and the need to blend in.

Suffer aloneness at the risk of fitting in with any of the above.

Refuse to feel fear. If you do, ignore it and keep going. Just like Florence did that night during a World War II blackout under the Manhattan Bridge by the movie theater (now a Chinese market).

Always put your work first.
Always do your work.
Always put your work first.
Always do your work.

Rage against the Machine. Even when it looks like it's related to you.

Risk being laughed at by morons when you do something no one else is doing. Just like when Florence put on those roller skates in 1972 and skated up and down Grand Street and all those people laughed at her and then a couple of years every one had disco skates.

Start your entire life over at 60 like you were a 14 year old. Because on some level, you still are.

Fight back just like Florence did all the times someone mugged her or tried to mug her during the 1970's.

Don't EVER quit.

Know that that beer, that sandwich, those shoes, that jacket, those pants, that avenue, that movie house, that proper grammar, that street, that bar, that woman, that dance, that etude, that sonata, that scale, that subway, that bus, that hotdog, that boardwalk, that beach, that ocean is Your New York.

It Was Hers.

**

L'Shana Tova to all those of you so kind to take out time from your lives to visit Her New York.  May peace fill all our hearts, our homes, our neighborhoods, our cities, our countries and thus the world as the new year unfolds.

The Precipice

Florence's fire escape

In early days, before Florence leaned out this window to guide me across Columbia, there was a man who came to polish the floors in my parents' attempt to keep the house splinter free.

Sam.  He was a vet, of what I don't know except that he came from the Bowery and when he came, he ruled until he left behind a house spic and span and floors that were walkable.

One day, I was little, like four or five, I came home to pee.  That's what I did when I had to pee. Go home.  The bathrooms in the park across the street weren't always open and when they were the bathroom lady yelled a lot.  

But Sam had just finished polishing the floors, including the floor that started at the front door and traveled all the way to the bathroom.  And he wasn't having anyone, including a desperate little girl, disturb the results of his efforts. 

Despite being terrified of heights, Florence walked across the fire escape and knocked on Mrs. Harlick's window.

I don't remember the order of things, but even after successfully coaxing me into her apartment, I refused to use their bathroom.  And even with my mother teetering on the fire escape, I refused to step out over Columbia Street and inch my way back into familiar walls.   Instead, I returned to the stairwell and sat and waited until Sam decreed it was ok to open the door.

Looking at that fire escape recently, exactly the same as it had been 50 years ago, all I could wonder was what hell was she thinking?  Except that her kid needed to pee and though she didn't have it in her to tell Sam to fuck off, she did have it in her to step onto the precipice.

**

ADDENDUM:  FROM MY SISTER LOUISE:   I believe Sam had been a sailor, that is, worked on a ship.  He was tall and thin.  He had white hair and a red face.  I guess he was an alcoholic.  I think F used to give him beer.  (It was customary to give moving men alcohol as well.  Weird.)  I don't remember if he came once a week or every other week.  "Cleaning man" was the standard phrase I knew and it was only much later that I found out that everyone else had a "cleaning lady." 

Sunday Memories Of Love's Labours Lost: Walking the Walk, Walking The Talk

Labor Day for us was just another day where instruments were picked up and scales were practiced.  Being an artist, who could work every day, regardless of its significance, required unique union rules and special job descriptions.

Originally posted October 23, 2008



the only shoes she wore, the contract I found in her papers.

"Self Contract Feb 22 - Feb 29 Mid 1988


From this day forth I choose to do the following.

1. Every AM I will push the blue bedroom chair into the middle of the room and push it back at the the time I go to work

2. Every PM at bedtime - I will turn on ALL the lights of the house; then turn them all off.

3. I will look through one pile of music or drawer of music every day.

4. Every day I will read several pages of my high school diary.

5. Do A.C.T. in AM

This is an irrevocable agreement which I make with myself.

Florence D. Moed
4.47 PM Feb 21-88"

Friday's Child Is Loving And Giving And You Made It Happen!

 There's a reason Friday's Child is now a part 

of Her New York, if only to say thank you.

 

Little Troy getting a well deserved rest

HAPPY LITTLE TROY SAYS, "THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!!!"
 
Social Tees and Troy would like to sincerely thank all of you wonderful animal-lovers who donated to its fundraiser for this rescue puppy's medical care!! 

Thank you also to those who spread the word!! The fundraiser ended this past Saturday, and while ST didn't quite reach its goal, it got over two thirds of the way there... which will make a HUGE difference in putting this deserving pup on the path to a healthy life. 

Troy will soon be starting his next round of veterinary care, and it's all thanks to you!!!!!!!! Sweet dreams, little Troy! You're on the road to recovery.

WASN'T IT GREAT TO HELP TROY OUT??? 

YOU WANNA DO IT AGAIN? 

Incoming Puppies!!!!

The kill shelters in Los Angeles are full. Social Tees is working to save 12 small dogs/puppies and have them flown out to New York and new homes.   It will ONLY cost $125 per dog to save them from euthanasia and get them here!  


So give what you can and spread the word! 

https://fundrazr.com/campaigns/baa7c

**

Got Cat?

JOJO IS OUR GOLDEN GIRL!!
 

This one-year-old is delicate, low key, loving, and grateful. With her slight frame and sweetly intriguing personality, she's like a feline version of a fairy. It almost wouldn't surprise us if this gorgeous little lady sprouted a pair of glittery wings one day and floated out of her cage! 

Jojo is great with other cats and dogs.

Come meet her (and our other awesome animals!) at 325 East 5th Street, NY, NY 10003; 5-7pm tonight; socialteesnyc.org or come to one of the adoption events!!!

HOW DO I ADOPT FABULOUS DOGS AND CATS LIKE TROY AND JOJO AND THOSE PUPPIES???!

Do you want to meet all the other great pups and kitties at Social Tees, but you're stuck at your desk during the week? Then come to the weekend events at Petco / Union Square!!

OR

If you have questions, answers, money? time? dry cat food?

Everything helps!

CONTACT SAMANTHA:
samantha.socialtees@gmail.com

Social Tees
325 East 5th Street, NY, NY 10003;
5-7pm Monday to Friday
12-4pm Saturday and Sunday at Petco at Union Square
212-614-9653;
socialteesnyc.org

Calling Her New York

It's been a never-ending fog of mugginess and loss, each day another announcement of 100-year old businesses vanquished by high rents and neighborhoods disappearing into someone's idea of an exclusive playground. 

Too, it's been a time of slowly saying goodbye to Her New York as things get packed up in one old home and a new home rises from the ashes of failed attempts.  In the rushed wanderings, I kept looking for something that called out a city everyone wanted to live in so that they could become themselves.

Look up.  Look up.  So I did.

Outside the front door, on the third floor which was really the fourth floor because the first floor was really the second floor and the lobby was the floor before the numbers started, up on that third floor lived Cindy.

And yeah, I could have walked down from the fifth floor which was really the sixth floor and knocked on her door, but usually I just ran down all the stairs to see if she and B were already there in the courtyard. If they weren't, then our version of cell phones took place.

We'd look up and shout "Cindy" or "B" and someone would stick their head out the window and shout down, "I'm coming down" or "I can't I gotta do homework" or "she's not here".

And when it was time to come home, some mother or older sibling would stick their head out the window and shout, "Mom says come home, supper's ready".  And sometimes one mother whose windows didn't face inside the courtyard would have another mother whose window did face the courtyard shout down "Your mother wants you to go home now".

We all shouted up and we all shouted down, our noise filling the courtyard day in, day out, even when we were teenagers and our idea of 'playing' was sitting around in blue eye shadow and sulking or walking the rim of the courtyard talking of God and marriage.

These brick are mamalochen, for the minute I looked up a call came to my lips, the name of a friend now dead a few years or the other, a grandmother in New Jersey.  But the courtyard is now politely quiet, silence being an important selling point for apartments no longer considered homes but luxury housing.  And I think, well then when you look up all you're gonna see is brick, not your New York.

**

Related Posts:

Sunday Memories: Mamalochen

Sunday Memories: Part One: Cindy: That Day We Met

In Memory Of Cindy: The Land Of The Quartchyard

Sunday Memories: From That Moment On Life Was Different

Sunday Memories: My First Date With Bond

Hyman

Art Is Where The Home Is

Sunday Memories Encore: God Of My Understanding

Sunday Memories:  Moving Day

Summer Ending

 

The cat made a last ditch run for the top floor to hunt the pigeons before they left for their winter homes while the rest of us hoped that nice cool air would quickly do away with constantly running the fan.

Summer Reruns Become New Memories: In The Still Of The Night The Sound Of Silence Revisited

Originally posted August 17, 2010



It started as an unconscious homage to Florence.

During the hot days, she, like many of our neighbors, would prop open her front door and let whatever breeze existed waft in from the stairwell's window.

With so many opened doors our different lives would also drift up and down the stairs, the sounds and smells and conversations, the T.V. going, all weaving in and out making a village out of thirty-five apartments.

One night, decades later in a much smaller apartment building, I opened the door during a non-stop heat wave, and a breeze blew in and as it came in, the cat ran out, the cool of 100 year old marble floors and walls too much to resist.

And soon that door, like Florence's, stayed open as the cat and I, wandering the stairs in the middle of the night, listened to our neighbors sleep, hummed along with all the air conditioners in the air shaft and sat in the still and the silence.

I miss the normalcy of open doors during hot days and sleepless nights, and when my door is closed because the neighbors are awake, I miss my mother.

Friday's Child Is Loving And Giving And That's What Troy Is!!!!

There's a reason Friday's Child is now a part 

of Her New York, if only to say thank you.

 

TODAY is the LAST DAY to give to the Campaign for Troy!!!!!

This is Troy and if you have ever met a cuter, sweeter, more delicious, adorable, loving dog, well then damnit you have met Troy.

Little Troy was rescued from a high-kill shelter in NYC. Before he ended up there, he was severely neglected, kept exclusively in a tiny cage, and only fed scraps every other day. Due to lack of nutrition, space, exercise, (and love!), he did not grow properly -- his legs are deformed, his teeth are rotting, and his body is weak from muscle atrophy. 

But despite his rocky start, this little angel is happy! He LOVES EVERY HUMAN HE MEETS, showering them with wiggles and kisses.   

See for yourself in this video about Bark Box which he stars in!  I mean, can you just plotz!!!!!

Social Tees wanted to help this boy get a shot at life and give him the medical attention he needs.  So they put out a call for donations for his medical treatment.  And everybody shared the words. 

So far a whopping $3,692 has been raised, a huge chunk of that within the past few days alone. PLEASE help them reach the goal of $6,000 so Troy's medical plan can be completed!

Read Troy's story and DONATE HERE: http://fundrazr.com/campaigns/4Z5e5 and PLEASE DONATE, PLEASE SHARE!!!! Which, the second you watch him in that video you won't be able to stop yourself!!!

Infinite gratitude goes out to all of the wonderfully generous souls who have already contributed to this angel's recovery.

***

A STAR IS BORN!!!
 
Troy in Bark Box's video!


**

HOW DO I ADOPT FABULOUS DOGS AND CATS LIKE TROY???!

Do you want to meet all the other great pups and kitties at Social Tees, but you're stuck at your desk during the week? Then come to the weekend events at Petco / Union Square!!

OR

If you have questions, answers, money? time? dry cat food?

Everything helps!

CONTACT SAMANTHA:
samantha.socialtees@gmail.com

Social Tees
325 East 5th Street, NY, NY 10003;
5-7pm Monday to Friday
12-4pm Saturday and Sunday at Petco at Union Square
212-614-9653;
socialteesnyc.org

Once In A Blue Moon

It wasn't just because it was the second moon in the month that made it a blue moon.  And it wasn't just because it was the fourth moon in a season that was only supposed to get three. 

This moon was blue because it was the last moon of the first summer I could remember being this happy.

So me and the Mariner sat on the benches by Stuy Town's fountain and watched the moon glow from behind the clouds, waiting for it to peek through.  

The clouds were winning.

Finally, we gave up and headed home.  Maybe there was something good or stupid or both on TV to end the day and make our brains slow down.  But by the time we got to First Avenue, the sky unfolded before our eyes and while waves of bodies poured around us staring at their cell phones, we watched the best show in town.

It Was Our Private Coney

Another great game over, we almost didn't turn left until he told me he had never been on the Boardwalk.   I had never been on the Wonder Wheel at night.

So adventure called to us louder than the Q train heading back to Manhattan. 

Summer Reruns Of Coney Island Memories by Guest Artist Joni

A woman truly from Her New York, Joni has, throughout the years, been a Guest Artist.

Her visit to Coney Island, originally posted September 28 and 30, 2010.

A goodbye to summer at Coney.

...and a wondering if it will be there next year.

***

These photos may not be used without permission from myprivateconey.com

Friday's Child Is Loving And Giving And Rocks The Casbah!

ANOTHER SOCIAL TEES SUCCESS STORY!!

LOVE IS IN THE AIR!!!!!

AND ALSO ON A PILLOW!!!

Dottie (formerly Rihanna) was rescued from the kill shelter a few months ago when she was very pregnant. She had her puppies shortly after, all of which were snatched up as soon as they were able to leave her side -- but this gorgeous girl was left behind! Lo and behold, along came the family of her dreams. They fell in love with her right away and swept her off to Williamsburg. Now this spotted little pittie lives like the princess that she is. Sweet dreams, Dottie!


YOU COULD BE A FUTURE SUCCESS STORY TOO! SOCIAL TEES HAS ADORABLE KITTENS, SEXY CATS AND WONDERFUL SMALL AND LARGE PUPPIES AND DOGS UP FOR ADOPTION AND FOSTERING!   CHECK OUT THEIR FACEBOOK PAGE!

A FACE ONLY A MOTHER COULD LOVE

GEMMA THE BULLDOG NEEDS A FOSTER HOME!!

Two-year-old Gemma is great with other dogs, crate trained, and cute as hell. We need a foster home for her starting ASAP! (She is also up for adoption.) Pickup is at Social Tees in the East Village, fostering would last 1-2 weeks, experienced dog owners/fosters only please. 

WHAT'S FOSTERING, YOU WONDER?!

Fostering lasts a few weeks, and Social Tees can provide supplies if you need them.  Fostering is SUPER important because it's much healthier for our animals to be in homes than in cages, and it expands our shelter virtually.

AND for every cat and dog that is placed in a foster home, Social Tees can pull another out of the kill shelter. So if you are an animal-lover with commitment issues, FOSTER!!!

For more info on fostering, check out our FAQs here.

TO HELL WITH THESE ONE-NIGHT STANDS!  

GO FOR THE COMMITMENT!!! ADOPT!!!

Meet Hay and Oats,  two recently rescued Siamese guinea pigs! Boy do they love to nibble on corn fresh from the farmers market. Spoiled little guinea piggies. Interested in adopting them? Come hang with Hay and Oats at Social Tees or email Marisa.socialtees@gmail.com for more info!

HOW DO I ADOPT!

Do you want to meet these guys and all the other great pups and kitties at Social Tees, but you're stuck at your desk during the week? Then come to the weekend events at Petco / Union Square!!

OR

If you have questions, answers, money? time? dry cat food?

Everything helps!

CONTACT SAMANTHA:

samantha.socialtees@gmail.com

Social Tees

325 East 5th Street, NY, NY 10003;

5-7pm Monday to Friday

12-4pm  Saturday and Sunday at Petco at Union Square

212-614-9653;
socialteesnyc.org

https://www.facebook.com/SocialTeesAnimalRescue

Stepping Through The Bakery Window

Passing Moishe's unadorned window day in and day out and staring at the filled trays of everything we were never allowed to eat was just another occasion for me to yearn and dream.  Once in a while, I'd get hold of a black and white cookie or a chocolate bell, either through begging a luckier friend to share or bought with money that perhaps might have been illicitly procured.  I don't recall.

The other day, finishing another round of prep to sell Florence's last home, I stepped up to the window.  Forty-five years later I still didn't feel allowed to do more than yearn and dream.  Of course, now I had more reasons other than 'my parents won't let me'.   Like none of my jeans fit, I hadn't been to the gym in months, gluten made me sick, sugar was bad for me, I hadn't had dinner, I should eat more veggies....

Fuck it, I said and walked in and pointed to a bunch of stuff I had always wanted, and before I got home half of those things were already gone.

**
Related Posts:

The Exhaustion Of Diaspora: Part Six - Where My Love Lies Waiting

Faster Than A Cable Car Going Down A Hill And Way More Fun

Photo by J. Wong

The toilet just started leaking and the interview can only happen in the middle of the afternoon.  In between there's a daily commute that tickles three hours for a ten hour day job and a home front filled with forty years of files and letters and photos and condemning history and lost time and good memories and horrifying fashion decisions to cull through.  Not to mention the laundry, the garbage, the recycling, the cat and the cat's food which can only be gotten at one place in one flavor or he won't eat it and which we've just run out of.  

And still, and still, and still...two years just slipped by because we were too busy laughing really hard as we flew down fast into more fun.  

The Mariner says he now knows why people are glad to come home. 

**

Related Posts:

Days Like This

Another Rerun of a Sunday Memories: "How Lovely To Be A Woman..."

Originally posted August 30, 2009


The competition to have breasts and a new bra to fit those breasts was fierce on Grand Street.

Of course, all my friends got their bras first, regardless of how far along their secondary sex characteristic were.   Finally, in desperation, I ripped every single one of my undershirts down the middle and insisted that my 12 year-old bosom had caused that destruction.

Florence reluctantly loosened her purse strings and sent me off to Grand and Orchard where the many dusty underwear stores, run almost exclusively by Hasid and Orthodox Jewish families, lined both sides of the street.  Everybody - the mothers, the fathers, the sisters, the brothers, the grandparents, the nephews, the cousins, the in-laws - everybody worked in those family stores.

Then, as now, the assessment of size was done in two ways. If it was a man who waited on you, a deceptively vague glance across your chest would pinpoint the right cup size within millionths of an inch. If it was a woman, sizing was much more hands on.

Entering Weiss Loungewear, I quickly walked past the men offering to help and went straight to one of the more grandmotherly women there.

Within seconds of describing what I wanted - and without any warning - the woman’s elderly, firm and intelligent hands grabbed what, up until that point, I had been able to grow in 12 years.

Then, just as quickly, the hands left my chest and pulled out a thin, white box from the hundreds of identical thin, white boxes that lined the entire wall.

A “training” bra appeared. I don't even think I tried it on.  I just watched it get packed up and Florence’s money disappear into a cash register.  Heading home, I was a bit bewildered by touch I had only experienced before by camp counselors and friends' uncles.  But, at least this time, I was carrying proof that I was now a woman.

A couple of years ago, in need of a bra that not only really fit, but also fulfilled certain vanity criteria, I returned to Orchard Street and to one of the last remaining dusty underwear stores.

Stepping into the familiar walls, stacked with hundreds of identical boxes, I was immediately met with that familiar vague glance across my chest by the young Hasid man at the counter.  And after barely telling the grandmotherly woman what I needed - and without any warning -  a pair of elderly, firm and intelligent hands grabbed what, up to this point, I had been able to grow over 50 years.
*BYE BYE BIRDIE

How Lovely To Be A Woman

...How lovely to be a woman,
The wait was well worth while;
How lovely to wear mascara
And smile a woman's smile.
How lovely to have a figure,
That's round instead of flat...