a fine memory...

HO ARE YOU?
WHO WHO - WHO WHO

Back in time to 2002, that's the year I moved out of Manhattan to Brooklyn into my own studio apartment, up until then I had been with a roommate, and I really didn't enjoy the company of that Cuban lady who rode home in a taxi one night and brought the driver up for a roll in the hay in the middle of the night...and who used to go into my room when I was at work...It takes a lot of worry finding an apartment, one you can afford one close enough to work with train access etc.  At the time I had sold my car since the parking was such a nightmare in the city.  

It took me about one month of looking, calls, digging thru the rentals in the back of the Village Voice, the Onion, and the NY Post.  I hit ever bulletin board and then finally in the Jewish Press I found some basement apartments.  So I went to see a few on my days off...one I didn't think I could do it was big but the floor was not level my head felt swimmy in there...another I really liked it was in Flatbush my job was in Canarsie area off Rockaway Parkway....so the location was great and even tho I told him Im a vegetarian he said "but that's not kosher." 

So he discriminated against my lack of religious practices.  Brooklyn is home to a very large Hasidic Jewish population and they own most of the businesses, and they are the main slum lords of the city and they own a lot of the property and rentals. So I kept looking, then I saw an ad for Coney Island, Atlantic Ave, SeaGate.  IT was way out on the end of the island  on Norton's Point off Gravesend Bay...and one of the main shipping corridors into the city and the old house was right on the water...

THE price was right!! It was a mile or more to the train station tho...22 blocks, and all passed right through Housing Projects, "the projects". 

                                                                           The F  train to work 

So I went, the owner was retired FDNY captain and he was Jewish but not Hasidic...just your everyday Jewish dude who allowed me to take the apartment because I was an EMT and that goes hand in hand with fire department as in NYC they run the EMS its part of FDNY.  So I got the Studio! I had to pay first and last plus a $525.00 deposit....it was a 20 x 20 ft basement studio apartment..IT had it's own exterior entrance, street side parking, and the beach and the ocean right outside. 

                                                        3848 with the grassy yard

It looks from this recent google map shot the brick building has been torn down It was a separate rental and while I lived there the tenant died and was in there 3 days before anyone realized, he was in very poor health.  So I guess they tore the building down it was never rented again while I was there. 

                                            this is the building from the ocean side 

I HAD no furniture it was not furnished, but it had one dresser in it, he said  he would have that moved out and I could pick up the keys on Friday and pay my deposits, so I put him off till Saturday the start of my days off and he agreed.  I said if you don't want to move the dresser leave it and I will use it, so he did. 

So I had a friend who had a Dodge Caravan and she brought it on moving day and she had a mattress set that she had replaced and it was stored in plastic in her garage, so she brought it for me, along the way we hit the curb side "shopping", I found a hollywood bed frame, a big bedside lamp, a bedside table, an eating table and 2 chairs, an ugly cabinet, and a weird modern style rocking chair by the time we arrived at my new place...her van was packed with my "new" Furniture!! 

That's a radiator I used for my headboard. 

I painted it yellow as you can see it on the left edge of the photo...I eventually got this quilt for my bed and I still use it to this day...The artwork was yard sale finds, that seascape is now in my sis's home out west. I gave it a more updated look a few months after the move and this is the way it was until 2006 Oct when I gave up my lease. 

The basement had a row of windows that faced the ocean side of course I couldn't see the beach being at ground level from inside and there was a concrete fence around the yard, but when I walked up my steps and turned to the left I could see the ocean the beach and  Staten Island  the other side of the Bay...and the Verrazzano Narrows Bridge...

And I could hear the ocean at all times...

                        I had one corner as my "office" area with the old desk top computer and a                                                                  found office chair. 

On the next day we went for one more haul driving around and found a wicker book shelf, and few more things I could use! So for ZERO money I furnished my apartment.  I hit the dollar store for a few things, and actually she also brought me some kitchen things a set of plates, some odds n ends cutlery a can opener, and the lady who I had been sharing with forced me to take her Microwave with me, she wanted to get a newer model.  My friend also surprised me with a full size sheet set and a comforter...and I had some towels I had brought from home, and a tiny TV set, old 12" one and had used it in my bedroom in the apartment share and SO I had all I needed to set up housekeeping in my studio...and it was quite cozy.  

My Vermont Rock Maple table found on the curb and mis matching chairs and the microwave.


My kitchen was not always this cool looking, it was dark brown and horrible, I asked if I could redo it and he said Okay.....so I put contact paper on the cabinets

And you can see that door on the left with some bohemian beads that I used to lower on nice days when I wanted my entry door left open...the little door on the right is the bathroom it had a large walk in shower.  

As a surprise my sis ordered a HUGE tv for me, it was 26 inches and I was able to squeeze it into the shelf unit with a couple tweeks, and I had a vcr/dvd combo that I still have and use today that I purchased at one of the many electronic stores in the city.  

                                          Very blurry of the small tv and shelf unit

 Im still looking for the picture of the rocking chair,  and the big tv, I hope I can find, it, 

Life in the city for me was not easy I did my job then had my days off and I stayed to myself...I had no TV connection so I used to rent movies at Blockbuster, and my sis used to tape CSI for me.  So once she got a tape filled she would mail it to me, and I would binge watch all of the episodes on my days off, sometimes she took out the commercials and she would get like 8 hrs of video for me...

Sitting in my rocker with my feet up the remote  for my 26" tv in hand, the sound of the ocean crashing outside my open windows, and the theme song...

"Who are you, who who who who"...I loved it. What a treat. It was the original series, and they had some really interesting episodes.  

So today after I came in from mowing the yard had a shower sat down and  said Im gonna watch some tv, and put it on and guess what I heard....on the old antenna tv?

WHO ARE YOU, WHO WHO WHO, and now I'm rocking in the arms of a good memory. 

                                            Had so many beautiful sunsets...