When "Cousin Brucie" lived in Kensington

Cousin Brucie lived at 370 Ocean Parkway during
the early 70’s. When we used to walk to Ditmas JHS
back then, we’d always look for him by his building;
either being picked up by a limo or driving a hot car
that the radio station lent him.

Buy the way, 370 Ocean Parkway is that big
white apartment house with the triangular
“64 Worlds Fair” design in front.

Yeah, you've seen it a million times.

“Hey, Cousin Brucie!”
“Hey, Cousin Brucie!”

And of course he'd always wave to us.

Could you imagine the most popular radio DJ
in the world living in Kensington Brooklyn?

I mean this guy was at the height of his
career then.

And he lived in Kensington.
Not Manhattan.
No, Kensington Brooklyn.

And boy, were we proud!

Ron Lopez


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Pushing tin over Kensington, Brooklyn

The tin’s been moving over Kensington since I was a kid looking out my bedroom window. The flight path is exactly the same and has never moved.
On any Sunday night you can count upwards to a dozen Jet lights stretching from Brooklyn through Staten Island and into New Jersey.

In the early 60’s there were probably more prop planes than jets.
I would sometimes sit with my Dad on the couch and try to make out the tail markings with my telescope. Pan Am, Eastern, United, TWA. Just about when they reached Ocean Parkway you could see the landing gear start to come down and the planes would usually disappear over the apartment buildings before the wheels were
fully in position.

We also had these strange “whirly birds” too; they were double bladed helicopters that used to land at LaGuardia along with the planes and jets. I believe they came out of Newark, but I was never quite sure. I know at one time they used to land at the top of the Pan Am building, now the Met Life building in the city. The gigantic “whirly birds” seemed to end their flights over my house around the same time they ended them in the city. One of them had a horrible accident on the top of the Pan Am building in Manhattan, killing some people on the roof and down below on Vanderbilt back in
the early 70’s.

I think I was too young to remember seeing the wounded
United DC-8 fly overhead on fire before it crashed in Park Slope in 1960. But according to my Mom, I was home at the time and may have seen it if I was staring out the back window as usual. And I can’t tell you the hundreds of dreams I have had in my lifetime, about seeing a jet on fire flying over my house.

I would have been almost three at the time, but I can’t really say I remember seeing that Jet before it crashed.

I had to spend New Years Day this year at the emergency room with my wife at Methodist Hospital in Park Slope. After about twelve hours they finally discharged her. On the way out we passed by the Chapel in the hospital. There’s a plaque on the wall outside the Chapel that’s dedicated to the memory of a little boy that initially survived that Jet crash. Only to die a day later of severe burns. They bronzed all the change the kid had in his pocket, and attached it to the plaque. His name was Stephen Baltz.

And as far as seeing that Jet fly over my
house in 1960 before it crashed in Park Slope.
I hope it was just a dream and nothing more.

Ron Lopez


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The F-Express

The F-Express was the fastest train around. There was no
way I would ever take the local because it was just that slow.

Like a shell shot out of a cannon, it would barrel from the
4th Avenue station at speeds well over 50 miles per hour.
Church Avenue, Seventh Avenue then Bergen Street.

We left everyone else behind and couldn't care less.

Yes, the F was my ride to the High School of Art and Design
every day. And it only took about 37 minutes to get to 53rd
and Lexington from Church Avenue. So who had time to
study on the train?

It's been well over 25 years since the express was
discontinued, and there's hope it may return.

But until then I still suffer on the "slow" local,
knowing that there was something so much faster
and so much better. Somewhere, a long time ago
in the Kensington Brooklyn of my youth.

Ron Lopez


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Top Ten Reasons why Kensington is better than Park Slope

10 Instead of the Pavilion, we have the Kensington Post office,
and the shows are free every day.

9 If you loose your job as a television comedy writer, you can
start your own construction business by simply walking to
McDonald Avenue at eight in the morning.

8 You’ll always be able to walk off your meal from the nearest
nice restaurant, because it’s not near at all.

7 When you shop lift at Golden Farms, you can immediately gain
celebrity status by having your Polaroid taped to the cash register.

6 Our calves are smaller because we don’t have to walk
up and down hills all day.

5 Dressing up as an Amish Farmer and re-selling vegetables
bought at Golden Farms is always a “hoot” at the green
market every Saturday morning in Park Slope.

4 We know that “ugly” train yard on Atlantic Avenue is actually ugly,
and are not fooled by the “Develop don’t destroy Brooklyn” people.

3 Cousin Brucie and Albert Shanker can kick any of your
celebrities asses.

2 We also use our Yoga mats to lie on when we steal the lithium
batteries out of your hybrid cars.

1 Electro shock therapy is alive and well in Kensington and involves
licking a live slot car track at the Buzz-a-rama for only
twelve dollars an hour.

Ron Lopez


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Summer Pictures from the Catskills

These are strawberries that we hand picked from a
local farm near our house in the Catskills.
The flowers are all wild and grow on our property.


A rainbow developed after a severe rain storm
over the mountains in front of our house. I think
I saw Black Bear walking away with the "pot of gold".
Buy hey, maybe now he can buy some food instead
of eating our bird feeders.

Just some Summer pictures
from our weekends in The Catskills.

P.S. we may be renting the house next year
on a weekend/weekly basis. Sorry we backed
out of doing it this year.

Ron Lopez


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Black Raspberries Grow in Kensington

When I was a kid we would always pick berries up
in the Catskills during the summer. No, Kensington
was only for grapes and the fig tree that grew in
my back yard. Leave it up to my wife to introduce
"berries" to our back yard, and change the only
course of nature I have ever known.

Ron Lopez


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A Kensington before me

This is a very old picture of Church Avenue and the Beverly.
If you "Google" the name of the movie on the marquee you could probably figure out what year it was. Do you notice "Ebinger's" next to the Beverly? It was one of the best bakeries in Brooklyn.

After the bakery closed in the early 80's the store actually became a "Citibank. Could you image a Citibank right on Church Avenue?
Boy, did we really command respect a ways back.

And after Citibank closed it became the jewelry store which it
still is today. The News stand is still there today,
at least something survived the 80's.

Oh, and the trolly, get a load of that.
As the story goes, my dad lost his brakes going down the big hill on McDonald Avenue. He wasn't able to stop and hit a trolly broadside on Caton Avenue. In the days before lawsuits, everything worked out fine, and no one got hurt.

Oh, and buy the way. I gave the folks in the jewelry store this picture about ten years ago. I think they still have it somewhere on the wall in the back of the store.

I was never that kind to Citibank though,
and I could never figure out why.

Ron Lopez


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The 1977 Blackout in Brooklyn

I remember exactly where I was that day when the lights went out in Brooklyn. I was on the down escalator at the "EJ Korvettes" on Bay Parkway, down by the water. It's where the Toys R Us is now. Bobby Brennan, Pete Liria and I just stepped on the moving steel stairs.
We were about halfway down and all of a sudden “stop”, we all almost fell down forward too. All the lights in the store went out, while the battery powered emergency lights suddenly kicked on.

Not knowing any better, everyone in the store just left and walked to the parking lot to find their cars. And that’s when we knew something was really wrong, because it wasn’t just Korvettes that was dark. No, it was the rest of Brooklyn including Coney Island.
I clearly remember looking over towards the Parachute Jump and just seeing dark silhouettes of the entire place. Let me tell you, that was something I will never forget.

So we all piled into Bobby’s Plymouth and slowly made our way up Bay Parkway towards Kensington. All the traffic lights were out, so it took us well over an hour to get home. Just a slow crawl through every intersection, hoping no one would broadside you.

Now the block was quite quiet when we got home.
A lot of folks with flashlights walking up and down East 4th street that night. I remember we all just sat on my porch and listened to my mom’s transistor radio while shining flashlights up towards the apartment house across the street. We were probably out that night till early in the morning, listening for any informaton on when the power would be back on.

No, as far as I remember everything in Brooklyn was quite calm the first night. It wasn’t until the second night of the blackout that we heard about the cars pulling down storefront gates with long steel chains along Flatbush Avenue. It was just a lot of fire trucks and police cars racing down Church towards Flatbush that night, along with the smell of smoke in the air from far away fires.

And Kensington was quite peaceful during the whole blackout, and the East 4th street Block Association kicked into full gear.
Heck, I was even one of the “security guards” along with the rest of the boys who patrolled the block late at night with a “Louisville Slugger”. Just to make sure whatever was going on down by Flatbush was not coming here.

And nothing ever happened, no the closest we got to a riot was hearing the sirens of the fire trucks and police cars going East on Church Avenue. No, nothing more.

And Kensington along with Windsor
Terrace stood tall during those three
days in July back in 1977.

And we just read about the
riots in the Daily News.

And Hell, I never did get to buy
That “Boston” 8-track that night.

Because the cash registers
didn’t work without electric.

Ron Lopez


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East 4th Street Block Party

On Saturday July 12th there will be a block party
on East 4th between Beverley and Avenue C.

There is no parking from 8am until it's over.
And that's not usually until later in the evening.

The block will be closed and the kids will be having
a ball playing in the street without cars.

I know there will be some stoop sales too.

So please feel free to vist and take pictures
of the block I grew up on.

And I promise the "skeletons"
will stay put in the closet.

Ron Lopez

Glenn Gruder please come home

Glenn Gruder grew up on my block,
East 4th street. He was one of the guys that I played hockey with during the day and then cards with at night. Glenn always liked to argue about anything and everything, so it made perfect sense that he became a lawyer later in life.
Glenn was an excellent athlete and probably still is.
He was also quite instrumental in my first meeting with
my former wife. And although it didn’t quite have a happy ending,
he was there when it counted nevertheless.

Glenn went to PS 179, Ditmas and then Tilden High School,
a perfect Brooklyn “triple play”. And being a Yankee fan, it only made sense that he went to Willie Randolph’s Alma mater, Tilden.
Glenn attended Syracuse University Law School. So he did finally make it out of Brooklyn, but hell, he was never that far anyway.

So this is where it gets very confusing.
Glenn moved to Smithtown, Long Island after he got married,
and never looked back.

I mean, why would such a powerful Brooklyn soul move to Long Island? He could have certainly fit in “Park Slope”, even though he grew up in Kensington. And all his favorite sports teams were always right here in town. Hell, the Yankees are a subway ride away, the Rangers a skip into the City. Heck, even the Giants are a lot closer than "Smithtown".

And what the the heck is "Smithtown" anyway,
do those two bearded brothers make cough drops there?

So Glenn, what gives? Why did you do it? I know you were'nt afraid of Brooklyn, because you were always tougher than the rest.
And if my memory serves me, I think your mom still lives here too.

Oh, I think I know what it was, that terrible apartment house on Avenue C, between East 4th and East 5th. The endless police cars racing up our block, the gun shots at night. Yeah, I have to admit, the 80’s were really scary, even here in Kensington. And if there was one building that was going to take down the neighborhood, it was certainly that apartment house.

But Glenn, you should see that building now,
it's chock full of wonderful smart people.
And I don't think any of them even carry a hand gun.

What? You mean there were others who left too?
Oh right, my cousin Pete left in 1979
Bobby Brennan in the late 80’s
Neil O’Callaghan in the 80’s
Jimmy Brier in the 80’s
Jimmy Spinner in the 90’s
And Nunzio, even before in the 70’s

What the hell guys?
Was it something I said?

Didn't you guys ever listen to Neil Diamond?
"Brooklyn Roads", "I am I said?"

Hello?

Oh right, If my mom didn’t need a place to live, I probably would have moved too. But instead, I ended up buying the house, so she could live out her live here in Brooklyn. Because my mom never really wanted to leave Brooklyn you know.

Well, maybe you got me on that one, yes maybe.

Oh, I see, you have kids in school, and it’s not a good time to move back to Brooklyn. OK, I’ll buy that, because uprooting a kid from school is not exactly the best thing anyway.

But aren’t all your kids in college?
So they're not home anyway.

Oh, come on boys, do you all really like the suburbs that much?

Psst, are there really Owls out by you?
And do they really go “Hoot” at night?
And the ticks?
Can they really make you foam at the mouth?
Or is that rabies?

Oh, come on stop, don’t get mad, I was just kidding.

And I know you're going to stand on that soapbox and defend wherever you live. Because anyone that moves out of Brooklyn will always put down the “boro of their birth”, and prop up whatever “unknown” place they live in now, bragging about how great it is.

Yeah, I guess that’s only human nature.

But just remember boys, your “human nature”
starts with a capital “B” and ends with a lowercase “n”.
And the streets are still calling you,
wherever you may be.

Ron Lopez


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Close calls in Kensington

I was too young to remember my first really “close call”, but according to my mom I was crawling on the roof that overhangs the second floor porch at 399 East 4th. In the days before window guards little kids just climbed out of windows when no one was looking. If it wasn’t for my mom pulling me in, I would have certainly been killed.

Another tale is about the time I got a small ball lodged in my throat. As the story goes, I was gagging and turning purple. And it only came out because my grandparents were holding me upside down by my feet and banging on my back. I’m sure it wasn’t exactly the “Heimlich” but at least
it worked.

And of course every good deed deserves another. And this time it was my mom, and I’m glad I was home. One time back in the late 80’s I walked out of the bathroom to find her on fire in the kitchen.

Now, because the landlord never bought a new stove (that being me), my mom had to always light the burners with a match. Well, somehow a part of the lit match head ended up on the back of her terrycloth bathrobe. With a plume of flames dancing on her back I quickly ran back in the bathroom and drenched a bath towel with water. When I threw it on my moms back she started yelling at me, and asking what the hell what I doing.

Mom had no clue she was on fire,
and thank God it never got past her bathrobe.

So you can imagine after this stuff that we’d be real careful as new parents. And yes we tried our best with all the childproofing work you could do. But like everything in life, there’s always something you forget. And once again I was lucky to be right there when
it happened.

For whatever reason my son liked to hang out in the bathroom while I was taking a shower. Usually playing with his toys or just sitting around. So here I am getting out of the shower only to hear that awful “chocking,” sound that parents fear. Too young to know what’s really going on, my son's just standing there with his mouth open. I quickly look inside his throat and see a small white thing that looks like a cup. With my long fingers I was able to pry it out, once again not the “Heimlich” but at least it worked. And you know what is was? The small ceramic cap that covers the bolts that hold your bathroom toilet to the ground. These things are usually not glued down, and little kids can easily grab them. If you have a small child just take them off and hide them, because they almost became deadly to us.

Yeah, let me tell you about
“close calls” in Kensington.

I’d rather live without them.

Ron Lopez


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Doing Laundry in Kensington Brooklyn

I know why
I hate doing laundry.
Yes, I think I know why.

It all started when I was a kid spending my summers up in the Catskills. Whenever it rained we would somehow end up in the Laundromat in Downsville, New York.
Just sitting there for hours watching the clothes dance through the glass window of the dryer while rain drops bounced off fly ridden window sills. If there was some type of parental torture, I think this was it. No beatings, no screaming, no cigarette burns on my arms. No, just hours in a small town Laundromat while misty rain fell on the mountains. Yes, that was torture, and that’s why I hated doing laundry for such a long time.

And for years I somehow survived in Kensington without ever doing laundry. Ok, well for years my Mom actually did it. But don’t get any ideas, that doesn’t make me a “mamas boy”, I’ve been working since I was sixteen and even bought my own car with my own money when I was 18. So just because my mom did the laundry…ah, um, maybe I’ll stop while I’m ahead on that one.

But when I had my own apartment at 125 Ocean Parkway,
well, I was really on my own you know. Piles of dirty laundry and no one to do it, sometimes forced me to buy new “Hanes” at Silverrod. Because I hated doing laundry you know, and I blame it on those rainy days in the Catskills.

So one day while I was growing mountains of laundry in my apartment I walked by the Laundromat at 403 Church Avenue.
There was a sign in the window that said “drop off”
79 cents a pound.

“What is this?”
“You can actually have someone else
wash you clothes besides your mom?”
“And all you have to do is pay for it?”
“Oh man this is great! “

So I started dropping off tons and tons of laundry.
One time I dropped off 65 pounds, wow, this is fantastic.
And it lasted for years, and they actually separated colors, shirts, underwear and socks.

And once again I dodged the lethal bullet of “doing laundry” and I was almost 40 years old. Just an endless wave of someone else doing my “dirty work” while others suffered watching clothes spin in a dryer. Yes, for years I was the “luckiest man on earth”, and the only “Tide” I knew came in at Coney Island.

But soon it would all come crashing down on me,
yes, my days were numbered.
I was getting married again,
and there was room for a washer
and dryer in our basement.

I remember looking at them at the PC Richards on Atlantic Avenue.
The Maytag logo looked very familiar, and was making me sick.
“My God, those machines in Downsville were all Maytag’s,
and I can never forget that logo”

The delivery was for the next day,
and I was hoping they wouldn’t fit down the stairs.

“Didn’t you do your laundry in college?” said my wife
“I went to college in the city, I never left home”
My wife just rolled her eyes.
You see she left home at 16 and never looked back.
I left home at 16 and took the F-train back the same day.

We were both just so different.

“When you put in the detergent make sure you don’t pour it directly on the clothes. Because if you do, you will probably leave white blotches on all the colored clothes”.

And I learned real fast that if you ruin something.
It’s better to just throw it in the trash,
and not show your wife.

“Ronnie, have you seen our new bath towels?”
“No, I haven’t, maybe we took them upstate by mistake”.

Yes, I was running scared and raking dirt over my footprints.
This whole “laundry” thing was going to catch me.
A washer and a dryer tell no lies.

“Ronnie, what happened to my dress?”
I remember looking at the splotches
on my wife’s dress as I started to sweat.

“I put the Tide in maybe too soon?”

“Did you pour it on the clothes before the water filled?”

“I don’t remember, I don’t remember”.

This was all so awful and tragic, a man who re-built his own car engines and stopped 90 mile per hour slap shots a few years before,
is now being questioned about “laundry”.
What has my little world come to?

But like everything in life there is a beginning and an end.
And for me the end was called “Maytag”, and it was time to grow up.

I was going to love doing laundry,
no matter what it took.

I don’t know what happened, or even how. But somehow I actually started to enjoy washing clothes. Maybe it was the smell of those white things you put in the dryer, or the sound of the washer. I don’t know, but for some strange reason it was all just so easy and didn’t give me nightmares anymore. Water before clothes, no detergent on the jeans, Yeah, me and my big white Maytags, we own the world. And I do fold clothes better than you.
Oh yes I do.

I guess it’s the same thing that happens
to people in jail. You just give in and learn to
accept it. Yeah, instead of becoming a prison lawyer
during my life sentence, I studied laundry.
And I love it more than ever.
Oh yes I do.

Now if I can only remember to separate the whites
from the colors and the towels from the skirts,
I think I may learn to love it a little bit more.
Because whites don’t look good when they’re
light blue, and detergent still makes strange
white splotches. And my wife may still be
checking to see what’s in the trash.

Ron Lopez


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A Glass of Frank's Wine in Kensington

Frank Verbito lives across the street from me at 400 East 4th street. Frank bought the house way back in 1978 and has been a fixture on my block ever since. You may have seen him from time to time, he usually walks around shirtless during the summer and can usually be found doing concrete work on the block.

Frank is very proud to have worked on the construction of the World Trade Center too, especially the original “bath tub” that survived much of the destruction on 9/11.
If there was anything that would have survived that day, it would have been Frank’s concrete. Because concrete is Frank’s specialty you know, and he takes pride in his work.

Now besides concrete, Frank also loves to work on the garden in front of his house, and from time to time he makes homemade wine from the grapes he grows right here on East 4th street. You see Frank was born in Italy and lived on a farm, so anything plant or wine related, Frank has a real knack for. And especially homemade wine, let me tell you.

I remember it was a hot summer night back in about 1992. I was in between marriages and did a lot of hanging around on the block at night. And much of the “hanging around” usually took place in my garage, or my friend Mario’s a few doors away. Either working on my car or one of Mario’s, just passing some time until the next day. I guess you can say it was my form of “therapy”, and it probably saved me a lot of money on "dead end" dating too.

Now, that night I was using a hand held sledgehammer for something, it looks kind of like a hammer except the head is about the size of a can of corn. Maybe it weighed about four or five pounds too. A real swell tool for pounding the hell out of a engine pulley when you don’t have a date on a Friday night.

So here comes Frank from across the street with a
big glass of homemade wine in his hand.

“Hey a Ronnie, come on anda hava soma wine”.
“Its gooda and will make you sleepa tonight”.

I looked at the glass, it was about
twelve ounces and was filled to the top.

“Come on Ronnie trya”.

So I took the glass from Frank and took a sip.

Forget anything you can buy at Walgreen’s,
this stuff was real alcohol. No, nothing they'd
serve at "Picket Fences", this stuff was deadly!

Well, before you knew it I finished the entire glass,
and not thinking much about it I continued to pound
the hell out of the engine pulley I was working on.

Just “bam” “bam” “bam”,
iron to iron, steel to steel.
Real manly stuff that
gets your hands dirty.

And it was all going so well
until a silly little thumb
got in the way.

Now, you ever see one of those old cartoons when someone hits their thumb with a hammer. You know, the thumb swells up real fast and turns a real dark purple. Real funny stuff, right?

So there I am pounding the pulley with the sledge hammer, and then “POW”, my silly little thump gets hit. I pull it out of the engine compartment and show it to Mario, we both can’t stop laughing because it’s just like in a cartoon. Except instead of the “Coyote” in Roadrunner, it’s Ronnie Lopez from East 4th. And my thumb is real and not owned by “Warner Brothers”.

Frank’s wine was in full effect,
I hit my little thumb; It was all very hilarious,
and yes I went straight to sleep.

Now Saturday morning was a real different story.
No wine from Frank and no silly visions of a cartoon in my head.
No, my thumb hurt like hell and was swollen to the size of a golf ball. And no, it was not very funny anymore, and I used about a bag of ice to kill the pain.

And today some sixteen years later I still have a little purple mark under my fingernail. A constant reminder of a Friday night in Kensington, and a glass of Frank’s wine, and learning the hard way that a hand held sledge hammer just didn’t mix well with both.

Ron Lopez


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Before there was YouTube in Kensington

Long before “YouTube” or even “America’s Funniest Home Videos” there was just your memory along with your mind. A constant loop of digital imagery or video tape that’s stored deep inside the bowels of your grey matter, No, there’s no need to send this stuff to “Iron Mountain”, because it’s going with you when you’re six feet under someday. And no matter how many times you try to drag “it” into the trash and empty it. It’s still there, and never goes away.

Now for me growing up in Kensington Brooklyn, it’s a mixed bag. Tragic days, good days, bad days and an assortment of mind laden images that still cause me to start laughing to myself on the F-train. You ever see someone on the F-train start laughing to themselves without wires going into their ears or a book in their hand. It’s real scary, right? Like the people on the street you see walking towards you while they’re talking to themselves. You just keep looking for that wire or cell phone somewhere, only to be horrified when they have neither.

I’ll try my best not to start laughing to myself the next time,
because I know it must be scary.

But before I promise anything that I might not be able to deliver,
let me tell you about some of our dirty little East 4th street secrets.
Those pre-YouTube moments that still cause me to giggle and
scare my fellow riders. Those ten second “movies” stored
deep in my brain that may just bring me to the confessional at
IHM 40 years later.

They are tales of East 4th, and they are legendary

The Speeding Cab and the Dummy
(Halloween Night 1972) East 4th street.
The life size dummy just sat there on the fender of a Plymouth Duster in front of my house. As the speeding cab barreled down East 4th, we pulled it with a heavy piece of fishing line that we were holding across the street. The cab made a horrible skidding sound and the cab driver’s face was frozen in horror, his eyes were wide open along with his mouth. The dummy fell under his front bumper and was dragged down to Ditmas Avenue. We found its head on someone else’s lawn dummy the following week.

(The image of the cab driver’s face)
Forgive me father for I have sinned.

The Fourth of July (1975) East 4th street.
Bobby Wilson, one of the fathers on the block and our “delinquency” mentor was lighting about a gross of bottle rockets with a blowtorch. All the rockets were on the ground lying sideways. He started shooting them down the block towards Beverley Road. People started scattering as they were being shot, except for Martin, an elderly man about 90 years old. As he approached Bobby Wilson with a cane in hand, cursing. About two dozen rockets safely made their way between his legs leaving a trail of blue smoke about
a hundred feet long.

(The image of the bottle rockets going between Martin’s legs)
Forgive me father for I have sinned.

The X-rated movie being shown on the O’Callaghan’s
house across the street. (1980) East 4th street
Too much beer and lack of girlfriends led to this sorry tale that still surfaces at weddings and funerals. A super-8 projector and a Swedish Movie equaled a moving image being shown on the façade of 400 East 4th. Thank God my mom was sleeping.

(The image of the movie on the front of the house at 2AM)
Forgive me father for I have sinned.

My cousin Pete falling down the Subway
steps by Denny’s (1976) McDonald Avenue
It was a winter day and the steps were full of ice. Pete was walking in front of me with his briefcase. He slipped on the first step and them went down the entire staircase on his butt holding the briefcase.

(The image of Pete sliding down the steps
on his ass holding the briefcase)
Forgive me father for I have sinned.

Chipping my new paint job with a
swinging ax (My garage-1979) East 4th
I couldn’t see my face, but the guys all did. Some ribbing by my good friend Glenn Gruder while I was compounding my Plymouth Barracuda caused me to “playfully” swing an ax at his head. Something went very wrong during that procedure and I ended up hitting the side of my own car instead.

(The image of my own face after I hit my car with the ax)
Forgive me father because I missed Glenn Gruder)

Bobby Brennan falling up the steps
in the Beverley with popcorn (1973)
Beverley Theater Church Avenue
This one I still can’t erase no matter how old I am. There he is, all 6 feet five of Bobby Brennan walking up the balcony steps of the Beverley during a Planet of the Apes movie. All of a sudden he trips up the steps and all the popcorn goes flying up in the air. Like snow it gently falls on everyone’s head. His cup of soda also goes airborne and lands on someone nearby.

(The image of Bobby and the popcorn flying up in the air)
Forgive me father for I have sinned.


Neil O’Callaghan hanging from the fence
of the Greenwood Cemetery upside down
(1977) Fort Hamilton Parkway
Now I wasn’t there for this one, but I sure heard the story a million times. Neil O’Callaghan and his friend Bobby S. were cutting through the Greenwood Cemetery after school. According to the story, the security guards let the dogs loose after them. Neil and Bobby both ran and tried to hop the high green wrought iron fence. Bobby made it over, but Neil got his sneaker laces caught on the points on the fence tips. He ended up hanging upside down on the fence along Fort Hamilton Parkway. Bobby was laughing too hard to even help him, and everyone driving by was stopping to see the freak show.

(The image of Neil hanging upside down from the fence)
Forgive me father for I have sinned.

Forty years since my last confession at IHM?
I think its time, I think its time.

Ron Lopez


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Top Ten reasons why Proselytizing doesn’t work at Greenwood playground

#10 All the cheaply printed books
get wet under the sprinklers

#9 It’s hard to listen when that
"satanic" Mister Softee music is
playing in your head.

#8 The kids are usually keeping an eye
out for the IRS to make sure they don’t
close Little Totino’s again, so you can
talk but they won’t look or listen.

#7 My children are fascinated by
plastic limbs rather than Jesus.

#6 I thought Giuliani cleaned up
this kind of stuff.

#5 Our “hover parent” blades
will slice you apart.

#4 Try offering a free Nintendo DS
instead of crayons, my son's
not that stupid.

#3 The “Mitzvah Tank” will jump
the curb any second.

#2 Marty Markowitz's
picture is not in their books.

#1 My kids don’t listen to adults
anyway, believe me.



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Talkin' Dumpsters with Joe from Brooklyn

This summer we were lucky enough to get into a half share at a beach club out in the Rockaways. The place is called the Silver Gull Beach Club and it’s where they filmed the movie “The Flamingo Kid” with Matt Dillon back in the 80’s.

Now this place is nothing fancy, and has certainly seen better times back in the 60’s. The entire building complex is made of wood and about half of it sits on pillars pounded deep into the sand. The “Cabana’s” themselves are these little six by ten foot rooms and are all situated right next to one another. People can decorate and fix up each room any way they like too. Refrigerators, water coolers and blenders are all a common sight as you walk by other people’s Cabanas. Not to mention tons of beach toys, tanning lotion, and beer. I hear that Saturday nights down at the Cabana are real wild too, yeah, that’s why we leave at 4:30 PM.

Now the people at the Cabana are really something else too, just picture “Saturday Night Fever”, “The Golden Girls”, and “Goodfellas” all rolled into one. Let me tell you, I’m from Brooklyn and yet feel totally out of place there. It's like 70's Bensonhurst on steroids. And Kensington was kids stuff compared to Bensonhurst in the 70's.

“Hey if you’re from Brooklyn, how come you don’t have a
Brooklyn accent?”

“Well, actually I grew up in Kensington, and no one on my block really had a Brooklyn accent”. And besides my mom never had a Brooklyn accent, so I guess I picked it up from her”.

Now, this whole Brooklyn accent thing sometimes makes me look bad with my own people you know. And I can only blame it on my mom. Although she was born in Brooklyn, she spent her childhood in Mahanoy City, Pennsylvania, where my Polish Grandfather was a coalminer. My mom never had an accent of any type and could have been one of those voices you hear on telephone prompts. You know that “non-accent” voice that everyone is comfortable with because it can’t be labeled.

Yeah, that was my mom’s voice, and I blame it on her.

So here I am talking with Joe from the Cabana next door. Joe’s Brooklyn accent is so thick it makes me sound like I’m from Westport Connecticut. Yet, Joe grew up in Midwood not Bensonhurst, so now I’m just as perplexed as he is.

Joe and his wife also wear “private carting apparel”. You see, Joe owns a “private carting” company along with his dad, so they can be seen with their carting “apparel” from time to time. A nice big drawing of the company truck along with a gigantic dumpster gets the message across. And when you’re form Brooklyn and hear “private carting” you just learn to be extra friendly and polite.
It’s all just very natural you know.

And me, well I love to talk. And when it comes to business, what the hell, we can talk right?

“So Joe, how’s business?”

“Let me tell you business sucks right now”. “No one is renovating, no one is building, things are dead”. “The banks aren’t giving out money, so no one is doing nothing”. “But I’ve been through this before, it’s gonna pick-up soon, no problem.”

“Can you do anything else until it picks up?”

“Yeah, you know what we’re starting to get, and it breaks my heart to do it”. “We’re getting jobs out in Flatbush and Canarsie clearing out foreclosures, you know dumping everyone’s stuff in the garbage”. “Let me tell you, the banks don’t want nothing in those houses, so we have to clear them out”. “It’s like the total opposite of what we were doing, but at least it’s work”.

Yeah, who needs to see "Saturday Night Fever"
or re-runs of "The Golden Girls" when you have
the Cabana. And who needs to read the
business section of the New York Times
when I have Joe from Midwood.

Ron Lopez


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Shooting myself in the "Skuut"

The “Skuut” thing really works.

Now I know it’s not going to get my daughter a college scholarship or free tuition for kindergarten. But I have to tell you, I'm pretty fascinated at what the Skutt did for her bike riding skills. After about six months of pedal-less bike riding on the Skuut, she was able to actually ride a two-wheeler without training wheels yesterday. And I think that’s pretty good for a three year old kid. She certainly kicks my ass, I learned to ride a two-wheeler at nine or ten. Just a big over-sized goofball with training wheels on a full-size bike, riding down the sidewalks of East 4th back in the 60’s.

At least no one ever took pictures, that’s blackmail material for sure.

Yeah, so there she is, just one push and she’s off. No falling down, no wobbling, no full body amour. No, just a nice smooth ride without her training wheels, and “I want to go faster” from her little mouth. And of course the only way she knows how to stop the bike is by dragging her feet like she does on the Skuut.

No, she has no clue so far about the brakes.

And there I am running after her as she tries to pedal faster, “pedal backwards for brakes”, “pedal backwards for brakes”.
And still she uses the tips or her shoes to stop the bike, scraping the leather right off.

Oh well, more white shoe polish to buy at Walgreens.

So there you go, the non-believer that I was, now praising the virtues of the “Skuut”. The funny wooden bike-like thing that I only saw in Park Slope and thought was just another “must-have” for those people that live on slanted streets.

Yes, I was totally wrong about the “Skuut”, it will help your kid learn how to ride a two-wheeler faster. Yes, I was wrong.

Now, if only there were some kindergarten bike riding scholarships, I’d be in luck.

Ron Lopez


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The Roses of Kensington

The Rose bush in front of my house has been there since
the beginning of time.

From my first day of kindergarden at PS 179 to my last day of College, it has always blossomed. It has endured countless hits from stray hockey pucks and baseballs. Not to mention being a holder for an empty beer bottle or two during the 70's. The damn thorns are so sharp they can go right through the thickest of leather gloves, and they love to scratch the paint on your car if you get too close.
Yes, that rose bush has always been tougher than "nails"
and almost legendary on East 4th.

Recently I ordered one of those pictures from the city, they are tax photographs of every house taken back in the late 30's. I was fortunate to get one of my house. It is amazing to see what wonderful detail the house once had. My "Home Depot" glue on moldings are a far stretch from the original wood ones,
but oh well, thats progress.

After getting over the lost detail of my house,
I turned my attention to the garden in the front.
And there it was, just a little smaller,
but still it was there.

Yes, that same old rose bush.

And you know what, I never maintain it.
I have no clue when it comes to plants.
I just let Mother Nature take over.
No, Mr. Brooklyn only knows Plymouths
not plants.

And I know someday when I'm long gone,
it will still be there. Just scratching the
side of a "Hydrogen" powered car and
being the subject of another blog in
the far distant future.

Yes, that same old rose bush,
it will always be there.

Ron Lopez


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Rust Never Sleeps in the Catskills

I really love these old Plymouth Barracudas you know.
I even spent a very good part of my younger years here in Kensington restoring a couple of them in my garage. One of my earlier stories (Building Warriors in Kensington Brooklyn) is about the restoration of a few of these old Plymouths.

And when we go upstate to the Catskills, I am always on the lookout for these old beauties. But unlike when I was single, neither the time nor the money exists anymore for such projects. Yes, as my mom used to say, "Once you get married, it's no more, "Good Time Charlie". Yeah, she was right, the only way I can take these cars home now, is on the flash card of a digital camera. And besides, the EPA would have me in jail in 2008. I hear that painting a car in your driveway is now considered a "crime" rather than a hobby.

Oh well, at least it kept me away from drugs.

So here are some pictures of an old Plymouth Barracuda that must have been in the woods a little too long. I found this car up in Grand Gorge, New York. Personally I think it is rusted way beyond repair.

But who knows, just find a "Good Time Charlie" with a lot of time on his hands and extra money in his pocket, and you may just have another old "Warrior" on the road again!

Ron Lopez


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Losing my little Giraffe

"Hey mom, what year was it again when I lost my rubber giraffe over at Grand Union"?

"You know Ronnie, that must have been about 1960, because you were three years old at the time, and never let go of that thing". “You just carried it everywhere”.

Yes, my little rubber giraffe.
I remember chewing it on a daily basis. I’m sure it was chock full of lead paint, and probably gave me some kind of twitch or “involuntary movement” later in life. Or even worse, was the reason why I never made it to any of the “sp” or “gifted” classes that you call them today.

Yes, my little yellow and brown giraffe would be one of those toys you’d see on the 10 O’clock news at night. Just blame it for everything that goes wrong, even if you did forget to do your homework and study.

Now, this story is a real, real, old one. In fact it's so old,
I can hardly even remember it at all.
Hey, give me a break, I was only three when it happened!

For those of us who lived in Kensington for a while, the new “Foodtown” on McDonald and Albemarle Road was once the “Grand Union”. The Grand Union was the biggest Supermarket in Kensington and certainly dwarfed anything on Church Avenue at the time.
So when my mom had to really go shopping, she plopped me in my stroller and rolled me about three quarters of a mile to the Grand Union. And of course I would never leave home “without it”,
and that “it” being my little lead based giraffe.

Now the funny thing about the Grand Union is that it was almost identical to the Foodtown before they did the renovation.
The hotdogs were in the same exact place, along with the steak and chicken. They never really moved anything, that store was basically the same layout for 50 years or so. Which of course always gave me the opportunity to tell my son or wife the story about my
little giraffe.

“Hey Andres, you see where these steaks are?
When I was three years old I left my little rubber giraffe here”.
“And no one has ever seen it since”.

Yes, through my foggy memory I remember holding the giraffe and leaning over in the shopping cart by the steak. I was holding the damn thing in my left hand and reaching for something.
And yes, I do remember actually putting down the giraffe with the steaks. Why the hell did I do that?
Oh right, it was the lead paint I must have been chewing.

Well, when we got home from Grand Union that afternoon, guess what I was missing? My mom searched through all her bags and it was nowhere to be found. She even called the store and spoke to the manager, or at least that’s what she told me.

“Oh, a lost and found, I’ll be right over”.

And now, this is what they call “mother’s love”. My mom actually walked all the way back to Grand Union to look for my giraffe.
And sadly returned empty handed.

I was devastated, my little rubber giraffe was gone forever.
I certainly lost the "lead" of my life.
The year was 1960, and it was never the same without "it".

Today was the first time that I have been in the newly renovated Foodtown. I was shocked to see that they actually moved everything in the store around, including where the meats have always been.
My wife has been telling me about it for weeks now, and I must say they are doing a wonderful job. The store really looks great, it's like shopping in the suburbs!

And as I left the store I couldn't help but remember my little rubber giraffe. Thinking that someone may have found it behind the meat compartment while they were renovating the store. Just a half chewed faded yellow and brown rubber toy, sitting in the same dark spot for forty-seven years. With it's two litte eyes just staring into space, and always wondering what ever happened in the "Grand Union" that day back in 1960, when it was left behind.

Ron Lopez


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The Last East 4th Reunion

It's been a while since our last mini-reunion. This picture was taken in August of 2001, just a few weeks before my cousin Pete (on the right) had to dodge falling jet parts as he ran out of the WTC on 9/11.
I guess time never stops for anyone, including all of us. The picture on top was taken sometime in 1976 in my Mom's top floor apartment at 399 East 4th. The picture below was taken at my cousin Pete's house up in Goshen, New York. Thats me on the left, still living on the block, Bobby Brennan, on Wantagh, Long Island. Nunzio Competiello living near Newburgh, New York, and Pete in Goshen, New York.

I guess it's true, about 75% of the block and Kensington, Brooklyn
left a long time ago.

Ron Lopez


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Google "street view" through Kensington and WT

Ok folks, here's something to do on a rainy day. The latest version of Google's street view is really fantastic. You can virtually drive up and down every block in Kensington and Windsor Terrace and check out the sites. The whole experience gives you a wondeful "360" view. You may even be able to find some familiar faces too. The picture above is my block East 4th between Beverley and Avenue C. You can also see my friend the "Profit" sitting in front of the Margaret Court across the street from my house. The "Rev" only dresses in the cleanest "white" as everybody knows!
Ron Lopez

Dreaming of Brooklyn in the Catskill Mountains

You know my dad, grandfather and uncle Manuel from East 2nd, were real big deer hunters when I was a kid. And for those who are familiar with the “Buzz-a-rama”, my uncle Manuel was Dolores Perri’s dad. He was a big man who stood about six feet five, and had a loud booming laugh and shoulders broader than the side of a barn.

He was certainly one of those uncles that you always wanted to come over and visit. Just laughing and telling stories and making you feel special, even if you were just eight years old.

And hunting was a real big deal for them. Every November when
I was a kid, we would go upstate to our house for hunting season.
As the men wandered off into the woods carrying their rifles.
We were given specific instructions not to go outside, and also
not to make too much noise, even inside the house.

Just a bunch of “hunter-gatherers” as the women and children
stayed back in the den.

Now for whatever reason my brother Joseph, cousin Pete and I just never got into the whole “hunting thing”. I mean we certainly were exposed to it every year, and even traveled back to Kensington with a deer tied the roof of the Rambler more than once or twice.
And if you want to talk about some strange looks from the Blanks next door, just hang the deer in your garage after you pull it off the roof of your car I tell you.

Yes, the men in my family certainly showed the “natives” of Kensington a thing or two about hunting. "New York Times editors" and "Ferry boat captains" had never seen the likes of the Lopez family, on a quiet street just known as East 4th.

Yeah, a large buck hanging inside the garage in the back of our driveway, and sawed off deer legs for all the kids to play with.
These were the only Novembers that I knew as a child
growing up here in Kensington Brooklyn.

In 1965, my grandfathers best hunting companion, my dad,
died at 39. Leaving the tradition solely on the shoulders of my uncle Manuel and grandfather. And as the years rolled on Pete and I just never showed much interest in the sport my grandfather loved so much. No, for us it was hockey pucks and roller skates, and weekends down at a hockey court simply known as “Avenue F”.

And my uncle Manuel, well, he hunted less and less too, I think he just missed his best friend, that being my dad. And the times up in the Catskills just weren't the same as they were before, especially for my grandfather.

“So young man, would you like to go hunting with your grandfather this year?” I remember the day my grandfather asked me that question, I think I was about 15 at the time. And feeling that maybe that would be something “special” for him, especially after the death of his son ten years before. I reluctantly said yes.

It was always a dream for my grandfather to hunt with his grandchildren you see. And the fact that my dad was gone along with my brother put added pressure on my cousin Pete and I to just do the “right thing” for our grandfather Paco.

Now, we were never afraid of guns, and even used to shoot old cans of tomatoes for target practice once and a while. But the whole idea of shooting a 200-pound deer just wasn’t something I was really interested in. Dragging it through the woods and cleaning it with a knife and my bare hands like my dad? No, that just wasn’t for me, nor my hockey playing cousin Pete.

I remember my grandfather carefully explaining to us where to shoot the deer that day upstate. “It has to be somewhere above their front legs, this way it cannot run away from you”

We politely listened to my grandfather, and then went on our way into the snow-covered woods of the Catskill mountains. I know my grandfather must have been very proud that day. Seeing his two grandsons now hunting with him, just as his own son did so many times before.

I walked over the ridge and sat on a large rock that overlooks a valley. It is a beautiful view and is near where I built my own house back in 2003. I just stared at the snow-covered mountains in the distance, and dreamed about being back in Brooklyn playing hockey.

As my dad’s gun was resting across my lap, I slowly turned it sideways and emptied the bullets from the chamber. I put each one in my pocket and then gently laid my fathers gun on the ground beside me. I just stared at the mountains in the distance, and never saw a thing. After a few hours I returned to the house and met up with my cousin Pete. Never mentioning it to him, we all sat together and had
our dinner.

I never told my grandfather what I did that day. Because I didn't want him to know how I really felt. No, hunting was something my father loved. And I just couldn't feel the same, no matter how I tried.

That was November of 1975, and the last time I ever went hunting.

I remember the phone call my mom got that morning. It was October 16, 1976. I was getting dressed in our apartment on the top floor of 399, getting ready for another day of college in the city.

“Oh my God, No, Oh my God, No”

My grandfather Paco died that morning. In our house upstate, a massive heart attack and 20 miles from the nearest hospital.

It was about a month before hunting season.

And as for my cousin Pete and I.
Well, we never did go hunting again, no that all ended with my grandfather and the day I emptied the chamber of the rifle.

But at least my grandfather’s dream came true,
even if it was for only one day.

It was years later when I heard my grandmother telling my mom the story. About how my grandfather never found the bullets in my dads gun that night when he was cleaning it. And about how he found them in the pockets of my hunting pants instead.

It made him laugh that night because he always knew
I could never shoot a deer.

But most important, he was so proud to go hunting
with his grandsons that day. About it being the last
thing he’d like to see before he died.
Even if it was for only one day.

Ron Lopez


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