The Luna Park Gazette

"But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you." Matthew 5:44 For the last few days I’ve been trying to remember where I was standing on 9/11 when the planes hit the World Trade Center. I pass by Ground Zero every day on my way to work and as the anniversary drew closer, I'd walk by the Brooks Brothers store on Church Street and see if I could find my exact location on that most hideous day. I had to imagine that the towers were still there and try and recall if I was closer to Church Street or Liberty Street when I watched smoke pour out the North Tower and when the South Tower exploded into flames as the second plane hit the building. I had just come from my gym near City Hall and was on my way to my office, which back then was at Liberty Plaza—right across the street from the Trade Center. That was my father's 80th birthday; my mother was at Lutheran M...

We never go out after dark. Whenever I visit my girlfriend in the Bronx, I always plan on staying in. It's a simple set-up. She cooks a fabulous meal while I hog the remote and HBOverdose on all the movies coming out the TV. We've never formally declared that we won't leave the building until sunrise, but that's how things work out. The neighborhood around Pelham Parkway is not the safest place in town and frankly there's not a hell of a lot to do...except get into trouble. I’ve almost gotten used to the blasting boom boxes, roaring motorcycles, screaming sirens, shouting from the street at all times of the night, and the regular rumble of the No. 2 train clattering on the elevated tracks just two blocks away. I can tolerate the noise, but only from the safety of my girlfriend's apartment, and an incident this past weekend really brought that point home, so to speak. On Saturday we had gone to see “Ruined,” Lynn Nottage’s haunting play that takes place at a brot...

One night, nearly years 30 ago, I was out on a date in Times Square. I had taken my then-girlfriend to see a comedy called “Mornings at Seven,” which was quite popular at the time. It was my date’s birthday and we had started off with dinner at a small French restaurant, went to the show, and then walked around Times Square like a couple of tourists from Ohio. It was a warm spring night and even though Times Square--the so-called "Crossroads of the World"--hadn’t been Disney-fied yet, the place still had a magical feel to it. Or maybe I was just in love. As we walked down a street somewhere in the theater district, we noticed that people coming in the opposite direction were stopping in their tracks and staring at man who was walking a few yards in front of us. It was really a cinematic moment as we got closer, anxious to know who he was and why he was getting all this attention. There were several people with him and they were all entering a club. We caught up wi...

So there I was, hanging off the side of an ancient Indian cliff dwelling at New Mexico’s Bandolier National Monument, praying I wouldn’t slip and fall to a hideous death, when my cell phone started ringing. I couldn’t believe my ears. The phone’s obnoxious trill was so unnatural, so out of place in this ancient, spiritual location. It was like playing a kazoo at midnight mass. I hardly use the damn thing and someone’s calling me now —of all times—when I’m inches away from becoming the lead story on the 11 o’clock news? (Assuming it was a slow news day.) “Someday I’ll laugh at this,” I muttered into the rungs of the wooden ladder that were the only thing between me and oblivion. Normally I can’t resist a ringing phone. Even in my most misanthropic moments—and I’ve had quite a few of those—I have a Pavlovian drive to answer a telephone’s siren call. I just have to know who is on the other end of the line. However, on this day, that phone could have rung, whistled, howled, or sung the ove...

There must be something about Union Street. Twice in the last month I’ve been struck on the R train trying to get to or from my office and both times the fertilizer hit the air-conditioning unit right at the Union Street station. They got me coming and going--literally. Is this place haunted or cursed in some way? Did an angry wizard stub his toe on the way down the steps and put a whammy on the whole station? Did some old shaman or witch doctor lose his Metrocard down there and decide to give it the evil eye? It was probably some old ratbag nun who croaked on the platform while religiously pounding the bejesus out of an emotionally-scarred child and who was then condemned to bollix up my commute until the Rapture sucks all the chosen up to Paradise. If that’s the case, I’ll gladly perform a citizen’s exorcism and drive the misbegotten battle ax back to the nether regions of hell from whence she came. Better yet, I’ll send her to the G line. That’s G as in “God, what have I done to des...

I see these two whenever I take out my wallet in search of my Metrocard; and each time I think, “oh, yeah, them …” “Them” is a photograph of a couple; a man with a shaved head, kind of like yours truly, his arm around a lovely dark-skinned woman, who is possibly Hispanic or South Asian. The man is wearing a dark suit, a white shirt and striped red tie. I can’t see what the woman is wearing, but she has a terrific smile. “ I love you! ” is written in fading ink on the back. I have no idea who these people are, but one of them went through the Rector Street train station at least once because that’s where I found this photo. It was face down on the warning track at the platform's edge that tells riders if you step beyond this point you’re going home in a sandwich bag. I don’t know why I picked it up, seeing as how I’m a hyper-hypochondriac and your average subway station floor could double as a germ warfare laboratory. I can just picture my late mother seeing reach me down for the ph...

If the train I was riding on Thursday morning had been a horse, I would have put it out of its misery. But then again, if I had been riding a horse, I probably would have gotten to work a hell of a lot sooner than I did. I work in Lower Manhattan, and normally it’s not such a bad ride from Bay Ridge Avenue to Rector Street. I get in the first car and usually slide right into the double-seat near the motorman’s cab. If I get the seat that’s flush against the wall, my morning is made—which should give you an idea of what my life is like. I get this seat so often I tend to think of it as mine and I get rather peeved when some thoughtless vulgarian decides to plop his or her carcass on my prime spot. I feel like a co-pilot on an airliner when I'm in that seat, ready to take control of the train just in case the motorman rips off all his clothes, puts on a busby, and skips down the track singing “Pass the Biscuits, Mirandy” at the top of his lungs. That’s never actually happened, mind y...