The Luna Park Gazette

"Yoga is the journey of the self, through the self, to the self." -- The Bhagavad Gita Was there really a time in my life when I could do the wheel pose? I have this vague, but distinct memory of being able to do Urdhva Dhanurasana or Upward Facing Bow with the greatest of ease. You get on your back, put your hands on the floor behind your head and use your arms and legs to push until your body forms an inverted U. Simple, right? Not only do I remember doing it, I remember how I used to enjoy doing it. I liked how it stretched out my back and gave me a different view of the world. Did I imagine all that? I’ve been going to my gym for cardio workouts—they recently hung up a heavy bag, thank God—but I haven’t gotten back to the weights yet, so I’m using bodyweight exercises for my strength training. It’s been a while since I’ve done the wheel pose—before I needed glasses and hearing aids--but I figured it was something akin to learning how to ride a bicy...

“ Fall down seven times, stand up eight .”—Japanese proverb Well, there’s another reason to hate Bernie Madoff. Last week, a particularly vile white-collar crime story came to an end when Madoff, the infamous fraudster, finally did the right thing and departed from this life. And on that very same day I nearly ended up in a straitjacket. Madoff, who was serving a 150-year prison sentence, ran what is believed to be the largest Ponzi scheme in financial history, taking in celebrities, universities, institutional investors and just about anybody else who crossed his path. The Madoff nightmare broke in December 2008 and, as a financial news reporter, I wrote a number of stories related to the scandal. In fact, I covered a half-day conference that was dedicated solely to Madoff’s misdeeds. The people who had organized this event wanted to offer advice to financial professionals who were concerned about being sued by Madoff’s victims—which should you give an idea of the sc...

“You are not stuck unless you decide to be.” – Wayne Dyer As a born and bred New Yorker, I’m accustomed to strangers approaching me to make even stranger requests. People tend to be begging for money, asking for directions or trying to save your soul. I usually give folks in that last category directions straight to hell. These stranger interruptus experiences have been severely curtailed by COVID-19, as it’s kind of hard to run into people when you hardly run out of your house. And it’s really tough to rattle a tin cup on Zoom. While I’ve saved a bundle in small change during this freakish time, I’ve also been so hard up for human contact that I’m tempted to allow some religious loon shriek bible verses at me—as long as he’s wearing a mask. The other day I was caught completely off guard when I walked into my gym’s locker room and this shirtless stranger actually…spoke to me. “Excuse me…can you take my picture…?” I paused for a moment as I slowly realized...

“The very first Easter taught us this: that life never ends and love never dies.” – Kate McGahan Gosh, that hurts. I got my second coronavirus vaccine shot yesterday and my arm is still smarting. But it’s Easter Sunday and there is a feeling of rebirth in the air, so I’ll gladly take my lumps if it means escaping from Covid Hell any time soon. And this is the day where we celebrate the man who suffered all manner of hideous abuse and rose from the dead. A sore arm ain’t so bad in comparison. Once again I went down to NYU Langone in Sunset Park for my injection. I bounded into the waiting room Saturday morning all ready for a long day of doing nothing, which it was what happened on my first go-round. The place had been mobbed that time and I fully expected to be stuck in the jammed facility until early afternoon. I had packed a bag with the New York Times, a novel I’ve been reading, my journal and my phone charger. People who go on camping trips don't pack this...

“The soldier above all prays for peace, for it is the soldier who must suffer and bear the deepest wounds and scars of war.” – Douglas MacArthur Connection with family is vital for my mental health, and even more so now that we’re living under the weight of Covid-19. Today I was fortunate enough to get a call from my niece Kristin that gave me such an emotional lift I’m still feeling it nearly 12 hours later. I was charging my phone in the living room when she called, so I had to do a mad dash from the bedroom to pick up, but it was worth the effort. Our conversation ran the gamut of family business, work, politics, and entertainment. At some point, I mentioned that I had just finished watching Band of Brothers , HBO’s fabulous World War II miniseries. Band of Brothers , which was made 20 years ago, tells the story of Easy Company of the U.S. Army 101st Airborne Division as they parachute behind enemy lines in the early hours of D-Day. My father was a veteran of the...

On January 29, 1979, 16-year-old Brenda Spencer opened fire on the Grover Cleveland Elementary School across the street from her house, killing the principal and a custodian, and wounding eight children and a police officer. Spencer barricaded herself in the house and when a reporter from the San Diego Union Tribune reached her by phone, the teenager said she shot up the school because "I don't like Mondays. This livens up the day." The line inspired Bob Geldof, leader singer of the Boomtown Rates, to write “ I Don’t Like Mondays ,” which was the number one song in 1979 in the U.K. for four weeks. That incident and those words came back to me last week after a mass shooting in the Atlanta area killed eight people, including six Asian women. A police spokesman told reporters at a press conference that the alleged shooter had claimed the shootings were not racially motivated and that “he was having a bad day.” A bad day? Really? We’ve all had plenty of bad da...

I wondered if Robert Jones ever got his shot. I got my first dose of the COVID vaccine on Saturday, a year to the day after I walked out my office for the last time, as the coronavirus rolled into our lives like a toxic fogbank. That was Friday the 13th and my floor was virtually empty, since most of the staff had taken advantage of our company’s offer to work from home. I wasn’t wearing a mask back then, which seems unbelievable today, but I was washing my hands every five minutes. Broadway was going dark, the St. Patrick’s Day parade had been cancelled, and the world was shutting down. I had entertained some bizarre notion of going to my boxing class after work that day, but my auntie scared me out of it. My gym recently reopened, but there are no classes yet and who knows when they’ll ever start up again. I miss all the people in that boxing class and I hope like hell they’re all healthy and safe. I left the office that day thinking I’d be back in a month or so. I mi...