Searching For My Roots...

In recent months, I've been commenting on my ancestry in small and large conversations.  The more I've been talking, the more I've been wondering about my family's roots.  Many stories have been handed down via hearsay, and old tales.  However, there hasn't been much factual information like pictures or solid names and events to associate my family to beyond my mother's parents.  My father's family background is a whole other story.

With this new age of information, all you have to do is get a name and some sparse information and see what happens.  Well I did just that.  I spoke to my mother recently and took the information she gave me to start some searches.  Eventually I ended up on two family history search sites.  That eventually lead me to find relatives that span from the state of Georgia all the way to Cleveland, Ohio.

I called my mother and was able to confirm some of those findings in confirmations with my mother.  I then searched local phone directories out of state and called at least three phone numbers.  I also located two others and reached out to them on Facebook.  So far...no one has called back or friended me on Facebook.  It's a little disappointing, but to be fair from their side of the equation...how can you inquire with a complete stranger...even if they claim to be a relative and know a few names in your family tree?

I will update as this progresses...if it progresses at all?  It's Labor Day Weekend...I hope everyone tries to bear in mind the 100 year plus history of Labor Day here in America.  It was a day off given to Americans by Congress, after overworked laborers protested during the Industrial Revolution.  People lost their lives standing up for fair wages and even days off.  The social battle between labor and management led to our government finally getting involved after lives had been lost during some conflicts.

As a settlement, overworked Americans who had worked endless hours were given ONE extra day off for the year...pretty laughable when you think about it.  Happy Labor Day weekend!  Cheers to my once missing and now found family members.

A Flat Tire On Your Bicycle?

When I was an adolescent, say 10 or 11, and had my first bicycle, I remember going over to the local auto mechanics store with my buddies and buying a patch kit for my bicycle tires.  Some of the nickle and dimes stores also carried patch kits for bicycles.  Either way if me or one of my friends got a flat tire, we would whip out the little $1.00 kit and sit down and fix our flat in less than 15 minutes (you had to account for some glue drying as instructed).  Next thing you know, we'd be back up and riding around with our buddies again.

Well last summer, my younger kids had a couple of flats in their bike tires.  I went to a local department chain store and much to my surprise - they did not have any bicycle tire repair kits.  All they had were replacement tires - both the inner tube and the outer tire, but not patches to repair a poked hole in your tire.

What's even more fascinating is that when you shop for bicycles...I remember that the $100 to $150 mark usually meant that you were getting a good, serviceable bicycle that could take a decent beating and still hold up for a few years.  I shopped for bicycles two summers ago and found out that even some department store bicycles in the $200 and $250 range weren't good bicycles.  There were a lot of complaints for bicycles under $150 and when the price went north of that mark, the complaints didn't really improve all that much.  That was especially for department store sold bicycles.  The issues surrounded the frame and gears that came with such inexpensive bicycles.

I found both scenarios mind blowing.  First, I'm going to lose some brain cells for thoroughly searching for a bicycle for less than $200.  Then when I do find a bike, if I ever get a flat tire on it, I'm going to have to buy a whole new tire and tube as a replacement, if the tires on this bike ever gets a flat.

Feel free to write in if any of you have experienced the same.

Bounce, Rock, Skate - The Disco Rollerskating Era!

I really do feel sorry for this younger generation that is in their teens and 20's.  Just go to any club or bar where they are hanging out and all you see is them doing is standing around and texting one another.  It's pretty amazing.  Now it's not that I haven't observed us "older" folks in bars or clubs, whipping out our cell phones and tapping away.  It's just different with us older folks.  We don't "live" on our phones.  We sort of tap it, fill in some information and then move onto the next social interaction that we were involved with.

When I think back to my teen years and the way my generation interacted with one another at pizza shops, soda shops, dance clubs and of course - Roller Skating  rinks.  Yes it was great to be a teenager in the mid to late '70's and early '80's and have a bunch of friends that joined you at a roller rink.  We were part of the disco rollerskating generation.  You could find roller rinks in cities and suburbs alike.  My generation interacted with one another through dance moves on the skating floor and social clicks at the tables.  Heck - even standing in line was part of our learning how to socialize, attract and interact.

How can this young generation learn any of those skills?  How can they learn how to actually talk, dance or simply interact with one another?  They are too addicted to their smartphones/mobile devices and actually call a group electronic chat "socializing".  For those who know me present day, it is hard for them to imagine that I was actually a very shy kid.  I didn't like standing up in front of a crowd and talking.  I was always cool talking among my circle of friends, but I wasn't that way around strangers.  Getting involved in athletics and going out to the dance clubs or roller rinks forced me to extend my friendliness out towards people, outside of my comfort circle of friends.

Personally, I think roller rinks should be brought back simply as a national mental health emergency.  Force these kids to spend less time on their phones and more time interacting with one another, exercising and learning some cool dance moves at the same time.  My most favorite song of the rollerskate era had to be the "Bounce, Skate, Roll, Rock" by Vaughan Mason and Crew.

Here are two links:  link #1 and link # 2 that you can view and get an idea of what that era was like.  It would be nice to see today's younger generation getting out there and interacting with one another in a more dynamic way.  My advice to young people today...bring back the roller rinks and disco rollerskating.  Fellas, learn how to talk to a young lady with some manners and in English, not abbreviations.  Oh and your pants have to be worn up to your waist in order to rollerskate.  As for the young ladies...learn how to dress and look sexy without having to come all out of your clothes and rolling your pants down at the waist. Style and form and function will never get overrated in a roller rink.

Rollerskate dancing..it's crazy, it's fun and it's still very, very cool.  Now let's all just bounce...rock...skate...roll...

Corn Beef And Hash

I spent the past week vacationing in Florida.  We were actually able to spent time on the east, central and west coast.  The Floridian restaurant food was awesome at all locations.  One thing that I did notice was that the corn beef hash, a simple breakfast food here in NY, was prepared slightly different from one place to another.

Growing up my mother would make a simple plate of corned beef, scrambled eggs and some hash browns on Saturday and Sunday mornings.  Even when I went to a friends house or many NY restaurants, the presentation of a corn beef hash order was ever so slightly different, but pretty much looked like the same basic meal that I had as a kid.

But not in Florida.  Their corn beef meals varied as drastically as my Google image search on the topic.  I know not everyone may even like a simple breakfast like corned beef and hash.  But, for those of us who do, you have to admit that when you wake up hungry in the morning and need a quick hot meal to hit the bottom of your stomach - this one sure does the trick.  Add on some southern style grits...and now you're really hitting the someone in the gut.

Oh yes, I did mention grits.  If you don't know, or you don't like, just drive south of the border in the US...and you'll soon find out just how much Southerners love them!  Grits were a staple in my home for many years.

Does anyone have a home made recipe for corned beef hash that they would like to share with the rest of us?  I never cataloged any of my mother's recipes for it.  If any one does have, please feel free to share.

Pizza and A Milkshake For 1 Dollar

I remember when the local pizzerias around my neighborhood would sell us a slice of pizza and a milkshake for exactly one dollar.  It was a great bargain at the time.  It stayed like that during my 4th, 5th and 6 grade years and gave me and my schoolyard friends good reason to avoid the lunch in school.  It was also a magnetic way of getting dozens of me and my friends together at lunchtime to hang out and cause a little mischief.  However, when I attended 7th grade, a new pizza shop on 14th Street raised the price of the pizza/milkshake combination by one nickle.  That was a pain in the neck.  Who wants to carry around a single nickle or a dime to make a combo package?

Either way, the price increase became one of those turning points in my life when I realized, that even something as seemingly untouchable as a slice of pizza and milkshake were also going to be affected by inflation.  Candy bars, bubble gum, potato chips and soda had already gone up in price.  But as a kid, I always felt that the price of pizza and milkshakes would never go up.  But they did.

So that inconvenience of carrying around an extra dollar, or loose change to continue to buy my lunch time food is by far a bargain at today's prices for that same combination.  I'm sure the generations before me bought a slice of pizza and a milkshake for even less.  Here in America...it's just one of those things.  The inevitability in the rise of prices in capitalism...sort of like the inevitability of a heavy thunderstorm at some point in the year.

My mother would give me a couple of dollars to ensure that I had lunch money.  Today I'd have to give my kids anywhere from $10 to $15 dollars to do the same.  Seems like some innocence has been lost.  It's not a wonder why the kids today have nothing but dollar signs in their eyes.  They too need to survive as the economy becomes more steep.

Egg Cream Soda's At Rosie's

As a kid growing up on the streets of the Lower East Side, there's one experience that I wish my kids could have had.  That experience was being served an Egg Cream soda drink from their favorite neighborhood convenience store like me and my generation had experienced.  Today there isn't any store you can walk into and buy penny candy, a box of jacks, a box of Cracker Jacks, Lays Potato Chips and paddle ball and then wash it all down with a Egg Cream soda served right from the fountain.

The Egg Creams were always served in a fancy drinking glass that were throwbacks to drinking glasses from the 1950's.  Every time you sat in Rosie's and had a drink, you always felt like you were going back in time to an earlier period in New York City history.

Rosie's is long gone from East 7th street.  But the art of making a good Egg Cream isn't gone.  The basic ingredients are still milk, seltzer and a good chocolate syrup.  There are various arguments on which ingredients that go in the glass first and which syrup that you should buy.  No matter how good or bad you made that egg cream...unless you have a nice, thick, old style glass to drink it from.

If anyone knows of any other ingredients that can be added to an Egg Cream outside of the ones above...please feel free to share.

My First Knish

My immediate family is from the South.  We are African American.  Our family palate consisted mostly of Southern country style foods, much like you see in some of today's modern Southern restaurant chains.  However, I remember having my first knish down on the Lower East Side, that my mother bought from a street vendor.  Having that knish was the first of many steps that I would take throughout my life in trying out different foods from many different cultures.

I remember that it wasn't even a whole knish.  I had to split the knish with my sister who was older than me. I'm pretty sure that it had a little mustard on it and I remember my mother looking at me, waiting to see if I even liked it.  I did.  The part that I liked the best was the skin in the corners.  It was always nice and chewy.  The bland potato stuff in the middle was only offset by the dabble of mustard.  As time went on, I eventually discovered cheese in placing cheese in a knish.  Definitely much more flavorful and interesting.

The advantage of growing up in downtown New York City was the fact that there were so many Jewish delis in the area, so you were guaranteed a pretty good knish no matter where you went.

But the genius of that whole experience was that my mother engineered that moment.  She was teaching us to try different things and to not be afraid, or confined to any one thing.  As we walked to different places along the streets, my mother was always quick to stop in and get me and my sister to try something different.  Jewish, Spanish, Asian or Caribbean food - anything was possible when it came to my mother making sure that we tried different food from different cultures.  Whether the food was bought from a store or given to us from neighbors - we tried everything.

Food sharing was a great conversation starter.  It drew people together in a conversation no matter where they were standing.  They could have been on a bus, a train, in the hallway of your building, or while shopping at the supermarket.  Of course mostly the women from that generation cooked.  But some of the men from that generation cooked too.  They usually had a specialty...like cooking on Thanksgiving or barbecuing during the 4th of July or Labor Day.

Today's generation don't know their way around a kitchen all that well.  If the food packaging doesn't say microwavable, just add water or heat and serve - these young people are lost.  They get their food starter conversation started - in a restaurant.  It's so much more impersonal at that point.  Because none of their spirit is involved in the process.  The food is being cooked by someone else in the kitchen

What is one of your favorite dishes to prepare for guests or family?  Feel free to write in and share.  :-)