Arthur Avenue Wanderings, Day 1

As you may know, for the last couple of years I've worked at St. Barnabas Hospital in the Bronx. St. Barnabas is sits on the edge of the Belmont section of the Bronx, near one end of Arthur Avenue. Arthur Avenue is pretty famous for being the heart of the "Little Italy" of the Bronx, and unlike its Manhattan counterpart it is actually still a proper neighborhood and not a strip of bad, overpriced restaurants and souvenir shops. After working spitting distance from this little gem for 2 plus years it seemed like it was finally time to really start formally exploring and thought I would share my impressions and some pictures with you, my wonderful readers. 

I decided to start my exploration with the Arthur Avenue Market, an indoor market dating back to the LaGuardia administration. I had wandered in there before but didn't really spend a lot of time so this was an opportunity to go a little more in depth. When you walk in the first thing you see is a cigar maker. It's pretty cool to watch them hand rolling cigars from these big piles of loose tobacco. There are actually several cigar shops in the neighborhood. I need to explore a little more about the history of this but I suspect it comes from the influx of Dominican immigrants into the Bronx. Speaking of other immigrant groups, in addition to the many Italian shops in the neighborhood, a number of Albanian shops have opened up. You have to love that about New York!

Next up is the flower shop which also sells plants and lots of vegetable seeds as well. Delving further into the market there's a produce vendor and a shop that sells lots of prepared Italian foods. The really fun part starts with the butcher shop. They have a pretty standard selection of steaks, chops, and poultry, but they also have an amazing selection of sausages as well as a number of items I've not seen anywhere else. The beef feet were particularly interesting as I had never seen beef feet that weren't still attached to the cow. 

Wandering further  you come to Mike's Deli, which sells a great selection of salami, prosciutto, mortadella, and other cold cuts as well as cheese, prepared dishes, and sandwiches. Speaking of sandwiches I had the Hillary Clinton, Which was salami, smoked mozzarella, dried tomatoes, and peppers. It was excellent and one of these days I'm going to have to go back and try some of the others. 

Across from the deli is an olive and pickle vendor and all the way in the back is an excellent pizza place that specializes in Sicilian pies, which is a little unusual in New York. I recent went to a meeting where they had ordered lunch for us from this place and it was excellent pizza. Probably not L and B level (I have to finally try that place next time I'm out in Gravesend, Brooklyn) but really good! On the way out there's also a pastry shop. It looked good, but there's about 8000 places vying for the best cannoli crown and I already managed to find a favorite on a previous pastry expedition. I'm planning on dedicating a later post to the joys of cannoli so stay tuned. Goodnight for now.

 

Did I have something for this?

It's early, it's dark, and I am not going to work today. I have been up since 5:15am finding out what all my insomniac friends on Facebook have been up to and calculating whether I REALLY need to pee (answer? yes.). Whilst engaged in this activity I came across a bit of information that made me smile for a number of reasons. I used to watch Project Runway with Meredith pretty religiously. I started watching it with her when we first started dating. I remember sitting on her bed in her old apartment in Harlem, watching Proj Run (as she liked to call it) on her tiny 13 inch TV. We hadn't watched it regularly for a couple of years, but I would like to think that wherever Merboo is currently residing she would be happy with the outcome of the most recent season.

Turns out last night a woman of color, who is herself fat (I use this term simply as a descriptor, FYI - I'm fat too), won the whole kit and caboodle with a plus sized collection. This is not the most earth shattering bit of news ever, but it made me happy because I know it would have made Meredith happy. She would have been yelling at the TV and high fiving me like most people would during the final moments of a Super Bowl their favorite team was winning. I think this is only fitting to share given that we are having a memorial service in her honor tomorrow. 

I've been having a bit of a rough week with this event happening. Trying to coordinate with family and friends flying in from far flung corners of the country, trying to coordinate with the church and the priest, and trying to get my apartment presentable since my parents are going to be staying with me have all been a bit much. Sleep has been in short supply and my coffee consumption has been off the damn charts. All that being said I am also looking forward to seeing a lot of people I haven't seen in months or even years. I'm also excited to be meeting a lot of people for the first time (ok I'm never super pumped about being around large numbers of strangers, but this is a special occasion) who were important to Meredith.

I'm also really thinking of this weekend as something of a transition point. I feel like I might be able to move on from the mourning phase of this experience after tomorrow. The grieving, the internal process, will go on for however long it's going to and I'm OK with that. The external part though, the holding on to things and fretting over them? I think I'm ready for that to be over. I'm ready to really start living a life that isn't consumed with this experience anymore. It will be a part of me, and she will be a part of me forever but I would like to think there's more to life than worrying about what to do with a bunch of "stuff" no matter how important the person who that stuff belonged to is. I've got a decade of memories that are more precious than any of that. 

Sorry this wasn't particularly funny, but I wanted to get it out. My next project, on the suggestion of a rather smart cookie, will be to chronicle my attempts to (finally!) start exploring the fascinating Italian enclave in The Bronx near where I work. That should be fun!

Also, because you deserve something for reading about my boring old thoughts and feelings and not barfing, here is a joke about poop and drugs: