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The Longest, Tuneful Day is 'Estivus for the Rest of Us'

6/20/2021

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Join Your Neighbors on the Solstice for Make Music New York 

By Caitlin Hawke

Today, Monday, June 21st, Make Music NY rings in its 15th year celebrating the Summer Solstice with music across the five boroughs.  For Upper West Siders, this means you have three outdoor 'venues' to choose from including West 103rd Street and Broadway where the music is on tap all afternoon and into the evening. Also, in the nearby West 104th Street Garden at 8 W. 104th Street, you can catch my personal favorite, the Ukuladies at 5 PM.

I always love the long days of June leading up to the solstice, officially ringing in summer. After the year we've had, we deserve a little dancing in the streets and a glorious 'estivus for the rest of us' celebration.

Enjoy!  Here's where:

Richard Tucker Park - 65th - 66th Streets, between Broadway And Columbus 
  • 6:30 PM - 7:30 PM: New York Mandolin Orchestra

West 103rd Street Open Streets Community Coalition - 230 W. 103rd Street at Broadway
  • 2:00 PM - 4:00 PM: Chamber Music Center of New York
  • 4:00 PM - 5:00 PM:  Esther Crow
  • 5:00 PM - 7:00 PM: Jean Ramirez

West 104th Street Garden - 8 West 104 Street  
  • 5:00 PM - 6:00 PM: SoHarmoniums featuring the Ukuladies
  • 6:00 PM - 7:00 PM: Socially Distant Mini-Orchestra
  • 7:00 PM - 8:00 PM: Ethan Mann Trio
 
Click on the image below for the full NYC listing of showtimes today.
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Open Discussion on Open Streets

5/31/2021

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Join the Block Association on June 15 for a Q&A about W. 103rd St. as an Open Street

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West 103rd Street between West End Avenue and Broadway on Earth Day 2021
By Caitlin Hawke
PictureNew sign seen at the corner of Broadway and West 103rd Street
Perhaps you've noticed the new sign at right which sits at the corner of W. 103rd Street and Broadway: "Room to Move! Open Streets." Or maybe you joined in the 2021 Earth Day events above.

To quote my favorite octogenerian: "Something is happening here but you don't know what it is, do you Mr. Jones?"  Well here's a chance to come find out more. For an open discussion on this NYC designation of W. 103rd Street, join our next meeting on June 15. Below are further details from the board of directors about this Q&A with neighbor Peter Frishauf.
"The Block Association invites you to attend the virtual monthly West 102nd & 103rd Streets Block Association meeting scheduled for Tuesday, June 15th, 2021, at 8 p.m.  An IMPORTANT agenda item is a discussion of the NYC designation of West 103rd Street between Broadway and Riverside Drive as an Open Street with the intention of creating an open corridor on West 103rd Street from Central Park to Riverside Park.
 
The Board of Directors of the Block Association is eager to get your feedback about this designation and how it affects you and hope that you can attend this meeting.
 
Peter Frishauf, a neighbor and longtime member of the association as well as an advocate for Open Streets, will be there to answer questions about how this designation occurred and what it means.
 
To receive a Zoom invitation to the June 15th meeting, please RSVP to AMZoom@w102-103blockassn.org."

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A Bloomingdale Neighborhood History Group Event

2/15/2021

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​Two Local Historians: A Free Virtual Event at 5:30 Tonight

By Caitlin Hawke

The Bloomingdale Neighborhood History Group presents an online event this evening, February 16, at 5:30 p.m. featuring Jim Mackin, author of Notable New Yorkers of Manhattan's Upper West Side, and another local historian Matthew Spady, who has written recently about Audubon Park up near W. 158th Street. Yes, the park is named for that Audubon. Matthew's book is titled The Neighborhood Manhattan Forgot. The director of Fordham University Press, Fred Nachbaur, will moderate. All are welcome to view the livestream via the link posted here: www.upperwestsidehistory.org. The group puts on consistently terrific programs. I am sure this one will not disappoint. Hope you can make it!

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Election Day 2020 Arrives

11/2/2020

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Rushed Limbo, Bob Dylan, and the Event Horizon

Mother of Muses unleash your wrath
Things I can’t see - they’re blocking my path
Show me your wisdom - tell me my fate
Put me upright - make me walk straight
Forge my identity from the inside out
You know what I’m talking about

~ Bob Dylan
​"Mother of Muses" from Rough and Rowdy Ways, 2020
By Caitlin Hawke

Down to the quadrennial wire, I find myself thinking about this day four years ago. Reading the blog post “Finding Strength in Pain” now makes it seem like I knew what would go down in the 2016 contest. But 20/20 hindsight is not exactly a superpower. I surely did not know then.  And I don’t know now: what indeed will happen Tuesday and in the weeks to come?

On that election morning, I was already seeking the balm of Bob Dylan and distracting myself with the glow of his Nobel Prize. Even without a single live performance this year — a first that I know of since 1977 — Bob Dylan pierced through the lockdown with explosively creative and beautifully haunting new songs on his album Rough and Rowdy Ways. Seeing the certainty of the Never Ending Tour — and that of all other cultural institutions — shaken and taken right to the brink of existence has been humbling.

The state of cultural institutions pales in comparison to the astounding toll of human lives. But the loss of the industry is a maiming to New York’s identity, and one that we will contend with for years to come if only for the economic impact, which to me is not the most of it. That said, if we’re tabulating perversities such as the silver linings of Covid, I’ll happily add to the list an unimaginable coming boom from our artists experiencing a world on pause. A balm to look forward to.

For Election Day 2020, the pandemic has enhanced the intensity, increasing the stakes and the risks people feel worth taking. The early voting lines in our neighborhood alone and the ambiance of neighbors talking to neighbors in those lines indicate an engagement we’ve never experienced before and put me in mind of the 1994 general election in South Africa, which we watched high on our horse. Little did we know: there but for the grace of voices unheard would go we. Our 2020 lines were more spread out due to social distancing, but the snaking and voter tenacity in the face of potential disenfranchisement rhyme.

I feel as if I am experiencing all of this in a state of Rushed Limbo. I want to see more change, more enfranchisement, more civil society in action. Again, such are the perverse silver linings of this moment in our country — things we shouldn’t have to suffer through a constitutional or healthcare meltdown in order to harness. But perhaps this is just human nature, that action comes at the 59th minute of the 11th hour.

Limbo. Yes, I want the limbo of uncertainty to end. Rushed because I want to savor and let ferment all the powerful potential that’s coalesced in 2020. I want to herald the vindication of all the Colin Kaepernicks who knew. Who tried to tell a country not ready to hear. I want this massive populist potential to be what saves us after three branches of government have neither checked nor balanced one another or our sinking democracy.

The time signature of 2020 defies notational convention. It’s more like a warping than anything else.  To borrow from an astrophysical metaphor, I feel like I am sitting just beyond the event horizon of a black hole watching a clock slow down to imperceptible forward momentum. Y2K20 has done all it could to spaghettify us.
At this galactic Rubicon, will we snap? Or will we break free from the gravitational pull, claw back to the edge, move away from the event horizon, and see clocks resume their normal speed. And return to the Limbo, not as a state of anxiety but as a living room dance, done with family and friends in close proximity.
What are these dark days I see in this world so badly bent
How can I redeem the time - the time so idly spent
How much longer can it last - how long can this go on
I embraced my love put down my head
and I crossed the Rubicon

~ Bob Dylan
​"Crossing the Rubicon" from Rough and Rowdy Ways, 2020
Hang tough, fellow Bloomingdalers. See you on the other side of this event's horizon.

And Now for Something Completely Different, The Lagniappe

The video embedded below is my lagniappe to you -- a balm in the form of Bob Dylan's "Key West" from his recent album. As one commenter on youtube wrote "You could walk alone down a long and winding road, swim across the seven oceans, climb a steep snowy mountain with a smile on your face if you had Bob Dylan singing the song in your ears." I hope you will enjoy it. If you are reading this in your email subscription to this blog, you'll have to click on the blog title to go to the post online and stream the song.

And alas it is true, there will be no Bob Dylan residency on the Upper West Side this year, but you can relive Bob@Beacon (1) here, (2)here and (3)here.

(1)http://www.boblinks.com/112319r.html#2
(2)https://www.westsiderag.com/2019/12/10/an-appreciation-bob-dylan-keeps-coming-back-to-the-beacon-theatre-and-i-havent-had-nearly-enough
(3)https://www.w102-103blockassn.org/blog/bob-on-broadway

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You Put Your Feet in the Street - Want to Keep Them There?

10/21/2020

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Join Neighbors on Friday afternoon for the Big Reveal of "W103rd St. Re-Imagined"

By Caitlin Hawke

The year 2020 has thrown just about everything up into the air. We've paused, and in the pause our hyperlocal selves have had time and space to re-embrace our immediate environs. You've enjoyed your roof, your stoop, your sidewalk, your bike, and, when needed, your street as you spilled into the curb to give wide berth to each other. But you've also enjoyed each other, bumping into someone -- anyone -- after days of solitude was the highlight of many a 2020 day. 

While not without controversy, the opening up of streets to people undeniably gave pedestrians refuge -- a huge port in the storm of Covid. Perhaps you've noticed that W. 103rd Street has been one of the streets that opened for neighbors -- especially kids -- to enjoy. New York City calls these 'Open Streets' as they are open and safe for walkers, bicyclists, and those in wheelchairs. Cars, delivery, and service vehicles have access, subject to a 5 m.p.h. speed limit.  A harbinger of things to come?

There are many neighbors who hope that with all these open streets, we've crossed the Rubicon. Many have been buoyed by this unexpected momentum of prioritizing people over traffic. Of cleaner air and quieter airwaves.

It turns out that the groups Open Plans and Street Plans have been re-imagining a lot about W. 103rd Street, which near Broadway is home to an older adult community -- The Marseilles. Also, in the Marseilles's vacant storefrontage, the Purple Circle early childhood program will soon take up residence. Young and old cheek by jowl and in need of green space.  That might also be an engine for the re-imagination of W. 103rd Street.

So here's a chance for you to come learn more for yourself about what's being tossed around. At a socially-distanced, outdoor occasion this Friday, Open Plans and Street Plans will welcome your input and invite you to complete surveys about how you might use W. 103rd Street as a magic-carpet connector from Riverside Park to Central Park. 

If 2020 has taught us anything, it's that we have to be prepared for everything! We must be willing to roll up our sleeves to make the society, the city, and the neighborhoods that we want.  When coronavirus is no longer a threat, we need to be able to find each other and commune again. We need to seed the next generation of street-level commerce that has been chiseled away by years of our neglect, which I've written about at these links:

Part 1: We Got the Supply. Where's the Demand?
Part 2: In Joon, Our Fall
Part 3: Lincoln Plaza Cinemas: Fare Thee Well My Honey
Part 4: Three Restaurants Go Down in One Month
Part 5: A Glorious UWS 800-Person Wave Turns Back the Tide

Incredibly, we saw a remarkable reanimation of Broadway and Amsterdam with the recent outdoor café life, and perhaps there's a whole new business model there for our restaurants. But we do know that block after block of empty storefronts coupled with fewer pedestrians is a bad combo.

The pressure is still very much on for those very businesses who were hanging on pre-pandemic, and who now have been dealt a coup de grace by months of closure. Countless -- literally countless -- are lost and gone forever. Transformation can happen -- and often does happen -- quickly. Or at least tipping points come fast without warning after a long priming.

As we grind through these very hard times, there is so much potential right now to build back the way we want it, to push to the tipping point of our choosing. To demand reform at the commercial storefront level. To support greener streets and more vibrant avenues. To favor the strengthening of the fabric for all to benefit from.

I love this neighborhood and can imagine only the sky as the limit for Bloomingdale.

So mask up, come out on Friday to the SW corner of W. 103rd and Broadway, and tell the folks who are driving this innovative project what you think about their rethinking.

In the morning, you may find a parking space or two transformed into a parklet. And starting at noon, the Open Plans and Street Plans folks will be standing by to hear your take.
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Rain date is October 30th. More below.
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Getting Our Civic Houses in Order: Part 3

9/29/2020

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Plan How You Will Vote in the November 3rd Election

By Caitlin Hawke

​Okay, 2020 has done its more-than-fair share to coop us up. Some of us are returning to the life we love of walking the neighborhood and soaking in the city, masked and somewhat anonymous. We have a governor who is on the qui vive, watching Covid-19 positivity test rates and hospital admissions like the proverbial hawk. He's got one hand on the valve that seals our fate as to whether we walk freely or return to our confinement.

We know not what the following weeks will bring.

But we do know that November 3 is galloping in.

Come Election Day, how will you cast your actual vote? Not who will you vote for. How will you get that vote registered. Do you have a plan? Like a great chef, with a mise-en-place first in mind, then in deed, have you envisioned how you will act on what you visualize: physically casting your ballot for POTUS and all the other races in play?  Are you going -- first thing -- to your poll the morning of November 3rd? (Do you know where you poll is?! Find it here.) Are you worried about being in a long line, a crowd, exhalate circling? Perhaps you envision mailing in your vote? Did you request your absentee ballot? Do you know if your application for the absentee ballot was accepted? Are you certain you are registered to vote?

There's word from the board of elections that absentee ballots should be mailing out this week. When you get yours, will you mail it in or drop it at a polling place?

A lot of questions!  Solace may come in the good feeling that having a concrete plan brings.

You must request your absentee ballot by October 27th, but that is very late in the game given our snail mail system. Why not request it today right here:  

https://nycabsentee.com/absentee

We are all eligible to vote with an absentee ballot as we've been affected by Covid-19 or are concerned with the potential of contracting the virus. In your application for an absentee ballot, make sure to check the box for "Temporary Illness". The definition has been expanded to include "a risk of contracting or spreading a disease" such as Covid-19.

Your ballot must be postmarked by November 3rd to count, but get it in early. You never know which gremlin will gum up the works of the ghosted sorting machines.
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Perhaps you've already requested your mail-in/absentee ballot. Did you know can track your request to learn if your application (or request) for your absentee ballot was approved and learn whether it's making its way to you? Yup! You sure can, right here:

https://nycabsentee.com/tracking

Make certain to enter your information exactly as it appears in your voter record. Failure to do so may result in a “Record Not Found”.

This does not mean you are not eligible! For further assistance, you can call 1-866-VOTE-NYC or email AbsenteeHelp@boe.nyc.

We spent all spring getting our houses in order. Now is the time to attend to our civic houses. Only 58.1% of our voting-eligible population voted in the 2016 election or some 138 million people, down from 58.6% in 2012 and a recent high of 61.6% in 2008.

Lamentable.

Of course, behind those percentages are literally millions of poll stories of effort and perseverance, of dismay and disappointment, of iron wills and of towels thrown in.  

Get ready to vote your hearts out. Stay safe. Stay vigilant. And most of all: make your plan for how to cast your vote.
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Getting Our Civic Houses in Order: Part 2

9/28/2020

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Register to Vote by the October 9th Deadline

An edit to yesterday's post: After publishing "Getting Our Civic Houses in Order: Part 1, The 2020 Census," I added the information that while federal U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh ruled last week that the 2020 Census count be extended until October 31, 2020, the Trump administration is appealing that ruling. Conclusion: get your count in and fill out the census without delay: www.my2020census.gov.

By Caitlin Hawke

This is Part 2 of a three-part series of posts on civil society since it seems worth wondering when the check and balance of the citizenry has ever been poised to have as big an impact as it will on November 3, 2020. We have gone through the gantlet of a cruel year, and we went through it very much together in New York. I saw you out there in your windows in the darkest days banging on pots. I saw you ferrying groceries and staffing stores as essential workers. I saw you poking your head up and returning to a (masked) semblance of normalcy. And I see you now, ready to hunker down and keep NYC safe for the indoor season. But the cruelty of a once-in-a-century pandemic has put emphatic punctuation on how crucial leadership is in our time of need. Leaders are of our choosing. And we have many times-of-need bearing down on us still. I am looking at you: ravaged New York economy, west coast fires and rapidly changing climate, and vaccine of our deliverance.

Who do you want governing through it all?

Dear neighbors, as if you needed reminding, Election Day Approaches. And it is finally our turn again.  Your house may be pristine from months of winnowing, but is your Civic House in order?

For one, are you registered to vote?

Friday, October 9th, is your deadline to register to vote. But don't delay; go to vote.nyc or call 866-868-3692 to verify if you are registered or to obtain registration instructions. Once registered, vote early or request your absentee ballot, also known as your mail-in ballot. Act now or forever hold your peace.

Register to vote here:
www.vote.nyc/page/register-vote

Verify whether you are already registered to vote here:
www.vote.nyc/page/am-i-registered

What else can you? Talk to your family and friends and see if they have their civic houses in order. Share this blog post. Ask them what their plan is to cast their vote.

Tomorrow, you'll see information here about absentee voting. Stay tuned. Stay vigilant. Remain present. But if needed, vote absentee.

For Part 1, see yesterday's post about the 2020 Census. You still have time to tidy up that room of your civic house. Be counted not just for the sake of the NYC and NYS budgets and representation, do it for the historians to come and the future that is unfurling at breakneck speed. The US Census report is a goldmine for researchers and genealogists. And it is a critical tool for equity in our society. 2020 has asked you to look her in the face and accept her painful lessons about what just society looks like. She got us out the door onto the long road. Now comes the time to count every person, seize our enfranchisement by registering to vote (today's post), and make sure your vote is cast (tomorrow's post).

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Getting Our Civic Houses in Order: Part 1

9/27/2020

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2020 Census

By Caitlin Hawke

Edit: Post-publication of this blog post, I am adding the information that while federal U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh ruled last week that the 2020 Census count be extended until October 31, 2020, the Trump administration is appealing that ruling. Conclusion: get your count in and fill out the census without delay: www.my2020census.gov.


This is one of three posts this week about civil society. As a community of citizens, we are -- for better or worse -- linked by our collective activity. I can't recall a time in my life when the check and balance civil society represents had more potential for impact.

So here is part one. We all have two days to complete the 2020 Census. It closes on September 30th. In my innocence, I have always loved the historic censuses -- some on microfilm, some digital -- to search for ancestors and make other inferences for research purposes. The idea of a census that so vastly undercounts our population -- in this so-called advanced and digial era -- smacks at the gob.

Have you been counted? Have yours been counted?

Here's one last push. To make sure you're in there so NYC, NYS, the USA and future historians may all benefit from a full and accurate count, go to www.my2020census.gov. The clock is ticking loudly at this 59th minute of the 11th hour.
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Where Were You?

9/11/2020

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One Crisp First Day of Fall Nineteen Years Ago

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By Caitlin Hawke

Today, I left my home just as FDNY members were streaming past, down 100th Street toward the Riverside Park firefighters monument where they remembered their fallen for the 19th time in their annual rite. 

I realized it was, again, September 11th. 

In the first years, it was so raw. As time passed, the anniversary provided a chance to summon back the day's events, to remember and pay tribute. To mourn. Now nearly twenty years since 9/11, a generation gone by, I remain incredulous.

Waking New Yorkers soaked in the morning's perfection, readying for work. Not a hint of the waning summer's humidity. A clear, deep blue sky. A cool edge on a late summer day or a warm edge on an early fall day -- take your pick.

I get hung up when I think back, looping memories of the weather in the hours before disaster struck, the perversion of such a fine day juxtaposed with the date's murderousness.

And nineteen years later, I find solace in the poignant telltales, pictured here, left by firefighters remembering their own. It rekindles the solidarity I experienced with my fellow New Yorkers that whole autumn long. And I feel the throughline of that solidarity now in our current ordeal from which we momentarily emerge for a fine fall day. 

​
~~Dedicated to the West Coast Firefighters with respect for their valor and hope for their safety.~~
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The monument -- which needs to be updated with mention of women -- is inscribed:
To the men of the Fire Department
of the City of New York
who died at the call of duty
soldiers in a war that never ends
this memorial is dedicated by the people of a grateful city.
Erected 1912.
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A memorial offering, above right, to Joseph P. Spor, Jr. from Rescue 3 in the Bronx, who perished in the South Tower with seven others from his team. He was a father of four, the youngest of whom -- Caitlin Marie, like me -- was just nine months old.
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FDNY lost 343 members on 9/11.
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A recognition to horses, the fire engines of yore.

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A Free Neighborhood History Talk: Tuesday, July 14, at 7 p.m.

7/13/2020

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From Ford's Theatre to 855 West End Avenue:: Maggie Mitchell & The St. Andoche

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By Caitlin Hawke

There's still time to make plans to join us for Tuesday's history talk via Zoom (July 14 at 7 p.m.)! I'll be presenting at the annual meeting of the Block Association. To tune in, send an email to AMZoom@w102-103blockassn.org. You will receive the log or dial in information for Zoom.

If you haven't heard the talk, it revives a 125 year-old piece of our neighborhood's history. Once known as the St. Andoche, 855 West End Avenue (at center above) was constructed by beloved Civil War-era actor Maggie Mitchell, whose fame was second only to Edwin Booth’s, brother of John Wilkes Booth. Her story is largely forgotten, but the eight-story colonial revival St. Andoche still stands proud on the southwest corner of West 102nd Street where Maggie retired and lived for the last two decades of her life. The talk is equal parts early U.S. theater history, Bloomingdale history, and neighborhood architectural history.

Hope you can make it but make sure to register at the email above. Please share this with your Block Association neighbors.

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The Second Wave Rolls In

6/3/2020

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And It's High Tide in America

​In the bitter dance of loneliness fading into space
In the broken mirror of innocence on each forgotten face
I hear the ancient footsteps like the motion of the sea
Sometimes I turn, there's someone there, other times it's only me
I am hanging in the balance of the reality of man
Like every sparrow falling, like every grain of sand

​-- Bob Dylan, "Every Grain of Sand"
By Caitlin Hawke

West End Avenue is deafeningly silent early this morning as the curfew has curtailed most car traffic south of 96th Street. It's a street I recognize less and less yet one that I've come to know deeply. I find myself studying it. Each bird chirping. Each passerby. Each delivery truck. Each siren. Each neighbor at his or her window in my sightlines. All targets of my gaze in a way I have never gazed before.

Looking out my window in sleepy Bloomingdale all day today I perceived a strange vibrato. Tension thick in the air. Anticipation. Trepidation. And the gaze from apartment to street of all these neighbors still cooped up is one of watchful, worried eyes. The First Wave scarcely receded, the Second Wave is roiling and swiftly rolling in.

But I am not talking about the virus. Like a Rube Goldbergian contraption, infection has become the vector of infection. Instead of picking up with some semblance of normalcy coming off the first wave of coronavirus, we are now again waist deep in. Begat by the first wave but not precisely in its own image, the Second Wave of which I speak looks and feels very much like a growing revolution, where people the city over -- the country and the world over -- have been swept up as it crests. 

Chalked on sidewalks, hung from windows, held up in protest posters each day at 1pm in Straus Park, called out by peaceful congregants making their noontime way down Broadway, the revolution beckons: manifest in support of justice for all, manifest in opposition to police brutality, manifest in acknowledgment of the grotesque and disproportionate toll Covid-19 has had on people of color.

The solidarity of the Second Wave equals that of the first, but its fury surpasses it. Both share uncharted waters, unpredictable consequences, unimaginable cost, unfathomable pain.

Experts tell us that there will be another wave of viral infections. But they didn't tell us that our social isolation would finally make us immune to complacency and catapult us into the work we must now do. 

I'm still too jaded to believe that in corona there could be salvation. But at a minimum there is transformation. And we are most definitely not coming out of this the same.  Prepare ye.

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Above photos courtesy of Sharon Waskow
Daily protest near Straus Park near W. 106th Street, where neighbors gather at 1 p.m.
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Thunder and Angels Today

4/27/2020

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Air Force and Navy to Tip Their Wings to Our Essential Workforce at Noon

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By Caitlin Hawke

I won't go much into my complicated relationship to my patriotism. Except to say, while I could have done without all the lapel pins that later ensued, when I saw the first flags appear in solidarity in the immediate wake of 9/11, it took a deep emotional toll. I don't think I'd ever before realized how powerful a symbol a cloth flag could be.

When I was in grade school, I remember learning "Lift Every Voice and Sing" and being awestruck by its beauty. It shook awake in me an explosively optimistic feeling, perhaps the birth of my complicated patriotism.

Today, cheering at my window, watching my partner cheer beside me, hearing his voice projecting over West End Avenue, listening to but not seeing my downstairs neighbor ringing her school bell, and seeing my counterparts across the avenue materialize from behind closed windows night in and night out: these are small moments of solidarity I never could have imagined would be mine. 

Like the flags after 9/11 and the voices lifted in song of my DC childhood, the evening cheers touch a deep nerve within. Collective and rallied around a single cause. A patriotism.

Here now come the airborne elite. In a military tribute to the legions who've kept our fates from a downward spiral -- the U.S. Air Force Thunderbirds and the Navy's Blue Angels will flyover our punch drunk city today at noon in a salute to the people whose debt we are in: our essential workers and the frontline Covid workers.

These glorious flocks of flying machines are guaranteed to take your breath away.

I can't imagine any aerobatics, but the metaphor of the jets passing in impossible proximity at impossible speed is akin to what our medical, city, and essential business workers have done these past two months. Lockstep. No margin of maneuver. In sync. All ramped up at full speed.

As I said at the top of this post, my patriotism has its complexities. But when it comes to the Blue Angels and the Thunderbirds, when they fly over, all is forgiven and forgotten between me and Uncle Sam: I am American to my core. The sight and stunning sound of them, too, make a deep emotional mark -- like a roaring promise that anything is possible, anything achievable. If we come together.

Deep inside we know it's time to face the rising sun of our next new day. With the Blue Angels above, let it resound loud as the rolling sea.
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By George, He's Done It!

4/12/2020

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The Bloomingdale School of Music Gets the Full Treatment by 'George to the Rescue'

By Caitlin Hawke


A big hat tip to neighbor Win Armstrong for sharing news of this episode of "George to the Rescue" wherein the Bloomingdale School of Music gets the full "surprise reno" treatment that the show is known for.

While we are socially isolating and dreaming of the days of yore when stepping out to a concert didn't require biosafety level 3 gear, here's a feel-good story about how the little tuneful powerhouse known as the Bloomingdale School of Music gots its groove back. You may have seen the prodigious schedule of BSM concerts featured in our newsletters and website calendar. And you may have passed by this modest landmark just west of Broadway at 323 W. 108th Street, but never thought about what goes on inside.

Founded in 1964, this school is all about making music education accessible. It's one of those neighborhood gems like the temple of Shinran Shonin known as the New York Buddhist Church, or the Nicholas Roerich Museum -- institutions that quietly populate our residential streets and are getting on in years. Pushing 60, BSM has been so focused on educating, that sprucing up its backyard or performance hall has had to wait.  Until the angel-makeover show "George to the Rescue" got wind of its aspirations. Now that time has come, and the full transformation is unveiled in the video below.

On pause like the rest of the city, BSM will come roaring back one day soon because one of the things that makes us human is our need to make and experience music in live performance. Maybe this lovely little tale of its recent sprucing will make us all jump at the chance to attend one of their student or teacher concerts. That is, once we are delivered from our surreal sequestration. But it's something to look forward to in our Bloomingdale backyard.

Click on the image below to view the video directly on youtube (you know you have time!), or click on the blog post title to view this on our website where the video is embedded.  While you are thinking about it, now is a great time to share this blog with your neighbors while we are all in hyperlocal lockdown. It's easy to subscribe via the links below and receive posts directly to your email in box. So tell a couple of friends or neighbor about this site.

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Reminder: Tomorrow's Neighborhood History Group Presentation

1/12/2020

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Maggie Mitchell - From Ford's Theatre to 855 West End Avenue

By Caitlin Hawke

Neighbors, just a reminder that this talk -- the story of the building once known as the St. Andoche on West End Avenue -- will be held on Tuesday, January 14, at 6:30 p.m. at Hostelling International, 891 Amsterdam Avenue at W. 103rd Street. Hope you can make it for this lost slice of Bloomingdale's history! It's a free presentation in the Bloomingdale Neighborhood History Group series. All are welcome!
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Throwback Thursday, Bloomingdale Edition

1/8/2020

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1918: West End Avenue at W. 102nd Street

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Funeral notice published in the New York Times on March 25, 1918, about Michell's service at 855 West End Ave.
PictureMaggie Mitchell in the 1870s
By Caitlin Hawke

As a teaser for the talk I'll be giving on Tuesday, here's a little Throwback Thursday entry which I hope will entice you to come hear more!

For the past many years, I've been digging up tidbits about the apartment house that stands at the southwest corner of West End Avenue and W. 102nd Street. Built in 1895, it's a little building, filled with charm. Its solid construction is thanks to the fortune that bankrolled it -- one amassed by Miss Maggie Mitchell powerhouse of the American stage in the Civil War era.

For about 22 years, Miss Mitchell called this building her home. Sadly, she died there in the wee hours of March 22, 1918, but at the ripe age of 81. Hailed at her passing as "one of the most popular actresses of an earlier generation," and "one of the most famous of American actresses," Mitchell left the stage in 1892, and retired to Bloomingdale where her well-constructed, eight-story, colonial revival building still stands, but where her name has been all but forgotten.

I'm hoping to rectify that on Tuesday, January 14, at 6:30 p.m. To hear how George Sand, John Wilkes Booth, Laura Keene, Abraham Lincoln, and a shadow-dancing waif with enchanting powers all cross paths with Maggie, come over to Hostelling International for this free presentation in the Bloomingdale Neighborhood History Group's wonderful lecture series. More details in the poster below.

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Shaking the Sugar Down in Sugar Town

12/10/2019

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Bob Dylan's Return to the Upper West Side

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Post-concert scene at the Beacon Theater on December 6, 2019
By Caitlin Hawke

Bob Dylan has been in a long-term relationship with Greenwich Village, but he's been spotted in the throes of a torrid affair with the Upper West Side.

Even non-fans know the story of how he hunted down Woody Guthrie and then settled into the basket-house scene of Greenwich Village in early 1961. From his first apartment at 161 West 4th Street to his Stanford White townhouse uptown near City College on “Striver’s Row” Dylan is, at heart, a New Yorker.

I, like 20,000 others, will never forget the November 19, 2001, concert at Madison Square Garden when he played “Just Like Tom Thumb’s Blues” to a packed house of aching souls, still in shock after 9/11. As he got to the last couplet — “I’m going back to New York City/I do believe I’ve had enough” — the hometown crowd erupted in a cry of solidarity and civic pride. I recall that he spoke between songs that evening — a rare occurrence in the second half of his career. He didn’t say much, but in acknowledgement of the tragedy he said simply that no one had to tell him how he felt about New York. Again a cheer brought down the house.

I could go on about all the Dylan landmarks and connections of this town — how he picked up violinist Scarlet Rivera on an East Village corner and convinced her to record with him on the seminal album “Desire.” Or that half-mile taxi ride with Lenny Bruce. How the fabulous folkloric “Rolling Thunder Revue” tour of 1975-76 was cooked up at a back table at the Other End with Bobby Neuwirth. As landmarks go, the one with the tightest connection to my heart is the legendary Supper Club, where on November 16, 1993, Dylan played an acoustic show that fans have traded bootlegs of with abandon for the last quarter century.

​But thanks to his two-week stay at the Beacon Theatre from November 23 to December 6, Bob Dylan was shaking the sugar down in our very own Sugar Town for ten sweetest of shows on positively 74th Street.

Read on here at the West Side Rag where I wrote an appreciation and here for a review of the first concert of the run. 

It's all over now, baby blue, but buck up, because in 50 short weeks, he'll be back.

Til then, I am pressing on.

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What's Your Senior Experience?

12/8/2019

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Find Resources at CB7's Resource Fair for Older Adults on December 11

By Caitlin Hawke

On Wednesday, come out for this resource fair for older adults in our neighborhood.  

Don't need these resources now?  Well, you or someone you know will soon enough!  By the middle of this century, the age pyramid of the U.S. is going to start looking rather top heavy with those over 65 making up about a quarter of the population. This is unprecedented and thanks to the Baby Boomer generation and strides in public health.

The Upper West Side, we know, is a great neighborhood for folks of all ages.  But for people nearing retirement or who have retired, it's a launch pad to all NYC has to offer: access to transportation and healthcare, free courses at Columbia, local shopping (or what is left of it), cultural institutions, volunteering gigs, it's all right here.

I didn't even mention Bloomingdale Aging in Place -- BAiP -- which, as the spiritual child of our Block Association and the one just to the north, has thrived over the last 10 years. BAiP have a spot at the fair, so drop by and ask about how to join, what groups are open and how to get involved. It's also a chance to meet our electeds who will be there in force. No matter you age, come let them know what you need to bloom in place.

It all happens on Wednesday, December 11, from 1:30-3:30 p.m. at Children's Aid (885 Columbus Avenue and W. 104th Street).
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SOS on the UWS

12/5/2019

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Thursday, December 5, 6:30 p.m. 

By Caitlin Hawke

You know it. You live it. We navigate the tumbleweeds of Broadway storefrontage every day.  And it is far from just our neck of the woods.

I've written about the blight many times in a blog series called Empty Storefronts and the Changing Streetscape:

Part 1: We Got the Supply. Where's the Demand?
Part 2: In Joon, Our Fall
Part 3: Lincoln Plaza Cinemas: Fare Thee Well My Honey
Part 4: Three Restaurants Go Down in One Month
Part 5: A Glorious UWS 800-Person Wave Turns Back the Tide
Part 6, which I hope to post soon, will feature Jen Rubin's story of her family's store Radio Clinic or RCI.

So who is going to Save Our Stores?  Literally, SOS! I mean: who among us is going to the first town hall meeting planned by the new group UWS Save Our Stores?  

Their event "Vacant Storefronts and Visions for Neighborhood Revitalization," will be held Thursday, December 5, 6:30-8:30pm, at the NY Society for Ethical Culture, 2 West 64th Street. The event is free to the public. Doors open at 6pm, and the meeting will begin promptly at 6:30 p.m.  Venue is wheelchair accessible.

We keep experiencing it. Many keep talking about it. Others keep writing about it. But what are we DOING about it?  Surely no one agrees that vast swaths of our avenues should remain void of storefront life?  What's the next big idea? Where will it all go from here? What are the forces at play? 

There are so many questions....  Perhaps we need to craft the answers all as one.

SOS and See You There!  RSVP at UWSSOS.org.
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Another One from the Bloomingdale Neighborhood History Group

11/30/2019

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​December 4, 6:30 p.m. at Hostelling International NYC

​By Caitlin Hawke

The rest of the year is going to pass by like a flash now that Thanksgiving is behind us. I hope you had a good one and are resting comfortably amidst meals of leftover carb-on-carbs.  And yes, the cranberry relish counts as a veggie.

In preparation for December's competing demands for our attention, there are several dates to pencil in on your December calendar.

• The first is coming this Wednesday, December 4, from our friends over at the Bloomingdale Neighborhood History Group about how NYC's waterways contributed to the city's development. I hope there will be something juicy about the arrival of the obelisk of Thutmose III that stands outside the Met Museum which came via the shore. Look for my next Throwback Thursday post on this. The flyer for this talk is below.

• On Thursday, December 5, save your evening for a town hall on our vacant store fronts to be held at the Ethical Culture Society.  More to come on that tomorrow but also see this link to the WSR piece..

• On Wednesday, December 11, at 1:30pm, Community Board 7 will be offering up "The Senior Experience" a resource fair for older adults (flyer with location and more information to post shortly)

• And, of course, December 21 for the Block Association Solstice Caroling! The song sheet and meet up details are available on our home page.

More information to come on the above. See below for the BNHG talk on December 4.

See you in the neighborhood! 
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Bring Your Whole Kit and CaBOOdle

10/26/2019

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It is Time for Our Halloween Parade and Party

By Caitlin Hawke

My favorite part of this event isn't the kids hopped up on sugar. Bat that's pretty good. It's not that gamut of guises the munchkins choose for costumes, witch is a close second. It's how INTO it the grown-ups are.  Holy Moly, did you get a look at Wavy Gravy??

Simple proof that the little kid in all of us yearns tomb break into play.

So come for the wee'uns, but stay for the adults who somehow phantom in their busy schedules to pull a costume together.

It's our community, and it is turning out all along the block between Riverside Drive and West End Avenue on W. 102nd Street for the traditional treat-filled party. If you get there at 6 p.m. you can specterate (or join) the parade that sets off from 865 West End Avenue at 102nd Street. The candy-crazed group marches north to W. 103rd, heads west, then turns south along Riverside Drive to pour into the block-long, traffic-free corridor of decorated brownstones, whose stoops will be filled with dudded-up neighbors, storyreaders, and volunteers. The treats table will be staffed by the Block Association's team with help of friends from St. Luke's. There will be cake and candy; if you have broom, wash it down with delicious apple spider.

So grab your kit and ca-boo-dle, your next of pumpkin, and get ye to this hallowed affair.  Soul help me, it's a bury good time.

Photo gallery to come -- send me all your shots: blog@w102-103blockassn.org.

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Cultural Festival at the New York Buddhist Church

10/25/2019

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By Caitlin Hawke

Saturday is Autumn Festival Day at the New York Buddhist Church on Riverside Drive between W. 105th and 106th Street. 
​
Neighbor Cathy Wald shared the flyer below. The New York Buddhist Church sits among the Beaux Arts buildings of Riverside Drive that Dan Wakin featured in his recent book, also known as the Seven Beauties (see prior blog post here). An eighth stood where the Buddhist temple is now.

The church has a lovely line-up with Japanese and Hawaiian food, dance, drum and martial arts demonstrations, a silent auction and more.

Check it out!  It's all part of the fabric of Bloomingdale.
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Community Tucked inside Community

10/13/2019

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The BAiP Founders Oral History Project Debuts on Wednesday, October 16

By Caitlin Hawke

At some point, I am going to write long about BAiP. There are a lot of angles about this organization that would make good blog fodder. One of the most compelling is how deep its grassroots have dug in as if it's always been here. Another is how its existence was catalyzed by two block associations pooling resources to make the initiative known ten years ago as it started up. Originally a community tucked inside the community of the Block Association, BAiP has grown to cover well over a half mile squared.

I know college-age students who are envious of the depth and breadth of connections fostered by BAiP's members. That reaction is always sobering to me because no matter how "connected" we all are with technology, nothing replaces the person-to-person experience of sharing meals, books, walks and many other pursuits together right in the neighborhood. It is not an age-group specific yearning. We all need it and we all stand to benefit from knowing our neighbors better for lots of reasons.

I've written about David Reich here before, and it's hard to speak of BAiP's 10th anniversary without acknowledging the incredible work that David did, first from his perch as head of this Block Association, and then heading the steering committee that would eventually become the non-profit known as Bloomingdale Aging in Place. As a founder, among many other efforts, he laid down the communications systems that have proven to be BAiP's enduring but virtual infrastructure. Of course David was far from alone in building the initiative, but he was the undeniable organizational engine.

To recognize the decade gone by and recommit to BAiP's mission of creating connections, throughout the fall, its members are finding dozens of ways to mark the birthday as well as to look forward to what is to come.  One of those "BAiP@10" activities happens this week: "How a Community Blooms: An Oral History of BAiP." 

This event is a debut of sorts. You see, a few years ago, one of BAiP's activities groups took up a training in the art of oral history, in a workshop led by neighbor Pat Laurence. Once trained, the group members turned to exploring progressive movements on the Upper West Side and set its sights on compiling an oral history project on BAiP's founders, how and why this organization materialized, and then how the founders oversaw its organization and sought to carry out its mission. There were many people who poured love and sweat into laying down just the right tracks, several of whom have long history with this Block Association. Some of these neighbors were interviewed in two lengthy oral histories over the past two years, with interviewers trying to understand the "special sauce" -- the secret to BAiP's success.

This project is now nearing completion, having documented some of these early voices and perspectives in an archive consisting of audio recordings and transcripts, photographs, a timeline, press clippings, and much more. The collection is open to researchers and producers for future study and/or documentation of progressive, grassroots movements on the UWS that have taken hold. The collection illustrates how community members have come together and assisted one another as older adults. In sum, BAiP represents an early, ahead-of-its-time community response to issues around aging that are now part of the state and national dialogue.
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This BAiP Founders Oral History project comes alive on Wednesday, October 16, 6:30 p.m. at Hostelling International New York, 891 Amsterdam Avenue at W. 103rd Street, in a program presented by the Bloomingdale Neighborhood History Group and conceived by BAiPers Pat Laurence and Nancy Macagno (who also wears the hat of a BNHG Planning Committee member).

It is free and open to the community.  Come check it out!

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Got Something to Give Away? Try "What a Bargain"!

9/15/2019

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It's time for the W. 104th Street Yard Sale and Your Donations Count!

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By Caitlin Hawke

Our friends over at the West 104th Street Block Association are on a roll. You've seen them raising funds with the split-pot raffle and readying themselves for the extravaganza this Saturday, September 21. Here's a call to neighbors for donations to their "What A Bargain" table, run by Joyce Mann. Those things that seem to precious to throw away but you are tired of looking at? Those things (I am looking at me, now) clogging up your closet for another time, another home, another go round?  You know you're never gonna use 'em!  Donate them to West 104th Street Block Association to help the organization carry out its community building efforts throughout the year.

And don't forget to stop by and enjoy the yard sale all day Saturday (10 a.m. to 5 p.m.) along West 104th Street between Riverside Drive and West End Avenue.

To help the "What-A-Bargain" table, here's all you need to know:

​Donate to What-A-Bargain, a hot spot at the West 104th Street Yard Sale where shoppers find great deals and make purchases that support our Block Association. 

Dig into your cabinets and pull out: 

•    Jewelry
•    Handbags or wallets
•    Toys
•    Charming bric-a-brac
•    Unopened personal care products
•    Ceramics/pottery
•    Musical instruments
•    Bicycles
•    Complete games and puzzles  

(Please do not contribute the following: clothing of any kind, heavily used pots, pans, and glassware; outdated electronics; items missing pieces; or things like used coffee mugs because in the past Joyce says these haven't sold and will end up in the landfill.)

To donate, please contact Joyce directly to let her know what you have and to arrange a drop off time before September 19. She'll give you all the information you need: 
​
Email: joycemann2@gmail.com
Phone: 212-721-6341
​Cell: 516-238-4609

Don't have anything to donate?  Come check out the yard sale and find a bargain just for yourself -- another way to help our neighboring Block Association. And there are rumors that their bake sale table will be an abbondanza of scrumptiousness.

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An Event from TriBloomingdale: November 7

9/14/2019

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Climate: The Positive Role of NYC Parks with Dan Garodnick

By Caitlin Hawke

On November 7, at 7 p.m., TriBloomingdale's "It's Easy Being Green" group presents the president and CEO of the Riverside Park Conservancy, Dan Garodnick.  Dan will speak about the importance of parks in the bigger outlook on climate. But the parks, like our beloved Riverside Park, are also vulnerable to the effects of climate change, and Dan will dive into that as well. You will find details below. Space will be limited, so RSVP quickly to ItsEasyBeingGreen.UWS@gmail.com.

TriBloomingdale's "It's Easy Being Green" group began a few months ago as the brainchild of neighbors Christine Campbell and Sharon Waskow to bring neighbors together each month to take action on climate change. It is one of several opportunities to engage with neighbors in the TriBloomingdale initiative which was begun in 2014 as a simple concept: take one great neighborhood -- Bloomingdale -- with lots of community-minded neighbors. Add three anchor community organizations -- BAiP, West 104th Street Block Assocation and West 102nd & 103rd Streets Block Association. And you get TriBloomingdale. The idea behind the three organizations joining forces from time to time was to bring a broader group of neighbors together to pursue common interests. We've always collaborated loosely on neighborhood events like the Halloween parade or the two annual yard sales.  And BAiP owes its creation to leaders from both block associations and their members back around 2008.  So it is natural to pool efforts so that members can find ways of getting to know each other.

In addition to this climate group, TriBloomingdale offers the following:

• TriBloomingdale Sunday morning brisk walking group where members walk at a very brisk pace.  

• TriBloomingdale SciFi reading group on third Thursdays where members enjoy favorite classics by writers like Robert A. Heinlein, Terry Pratchett and John Scalzi.

• TriBloomingdale Networking in the Neighborhood on first Friday mornings for Bloomingdale's sole proprietors who work from home and want to enlarge their nearby resources and build their businesses.

If you wish to lead an activity within this tri-organizational initiative or would like to receive more information about any of these activities, please email Caitlin Hawke: chawke@bloominplace.org.  

Come out and try TriBloomingdale!
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Attention Bloomingdale Shoppers

9/3/2019

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Save the Date for the 30th 104th Street Yard Sale - September 21

By Caitlin Hawke
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It's nearly time for the 30th Annual West 104th Street Yard Sale put on by our neighbors at the West 104th Street Block Association. On September 21 on West 104th Street between West End Avenue and Riverside Drive, you can enjoy the energy of a bustling street market in an exotic land. Shop in more than 60 stalls bursting with second-hand treasures. Bid on gift certificates, antiques, vintage collectibles, posters, photographs, paintings, theater tickets, household items in their original boxes, and services at the Silent Auction. Browse a large selection of novels, plays, poetry, history, biography, children’s books, cookbooks, atlases, dictionaries, and CDs at the Book Sale. Select your family dessert at the Bake Sale. Hunt down a two-dollar labor saver or conversation piece at ‘What-A-Bargain.’ Take a chance in a raffle. (Last year’s winner took home $2,025.50.) Tap your foot to live music performed by seasoned New York musicians. Free admission. 10 AM to 5:00 PM. For more information, visit www.bloomingdale.org.

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