Saying a Lingering Goodbye to Brooklyn

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I'm Now a Covid Refugee from Brooklyn

By Norma Hopcraft

        I went back to Brooklyn from July 10 to 17, to linger over it, romance it, appreciate the good, take note of the bad so I could leave with less pain—and then to leave it all behind. My life as a Brooklyn writer closed on Friday, July 17, when I hopped into U-Haul’s biggest truck, jammed full of my studio apartment’s contents. I drove that monster 400 miles to Rochester, New York.

        My inventory included:

• 1 box of filled-up, written-in journals
• 1 box of blank journals (I can't stop buying them)
• 2 boxes of quilt bits to be pieced together

        I had arrived in Brooklyn on July 10 and enjoyed my apartment organized for two days—my cozy nook, my little abode, my bit of peace in the tumultuous, tossing sea of people in New York City. While I lived there, it was usually quiet—except when the neighbor left her dog unattended and it cried for hours at a time. Except when there were occasional arguments across the courtyard or out in the street. I always prayed, "Please, no violence." 

        There were gunshots the first day I lived here, in 2017, and again this past Christmas. Other than that, this apartment was a refuge from the sea of strangers I passed through every time I went out the door.

The nightmare of moving

        On Monday morning, July 13, I took pictures of my sweet space whole and complete, and then I did my least favorite thing in the world: I tore my home apart to pack. 

        It's not something I had decided upon lightly. I had fled to Rochester, NY as a Brooklyn Covid refugee on March 14. Four months, one-third of a year, went by. From the moment I arrived in Rochester, I began wondering if I would ever live in Brooklyn again. I started to question moving full-time to Rochester.

        It took until Thursday, July 9, for me to come to a decision to move. It’s risky. My employer may require me back in the office at some point. When will that be? When a vaccine is developed, and that will take an unknown amount of time. Another risk: I’m on the hook to pay the Brooklyn rent until a new tenant takes over. When will that be?

        If you know of someone interested in living in Prospect Park South—10-minute walk to the park, 3-minute walk to the Church Avenue B & Q station, 35-minute train ride to Mid-town Manhattan—and who would qualify financially with the landlord, please leave a comment below!

What a studio in Brooklyn looks like

        My studio apartment in Brooklyn has been a great space—in a pre-war building, which means parquet floors, high ceilings, gracious proportions to the rooms. But I felt disappointed in my life there: I had survived living in Brooklyn but I had not thrived: I hadn't been as creative in this studio as I had been in my studio apartment in Paris, where I wrote and revised great chunks of The Paris Writers Circle. Here are some pics:

       Eat-in kitchen, with a window, no less! Not common in NYC!

      Plenty of cabinets and counter space -- also rare in NYC!

      Here's where I lived. My grandmother's marble-topped chest of drawers, on the right, held lots of quilting supplies and journals. My work table is where I tried to sit and write, but usually I felt too restless, too compelled to get out.

     My dressing room (kidding).

My work space. Note the parquet floor.

Being a writer in Brooklyn 

       Here in Brooklyn, I had found it hard to be alone in the apartment and write. I always felt restless, like the tumultuous crowds of people in the city. During the week it was difficult to concentrate on writing before facing the commute on a crowded Q train. On Saturday mornings, I couldn’t stand to sit alone at my worktable and write. I felt I had to get out and see what was going on. The lively streets have a strong allure.

        To be able to write, on Saturdays in good weather I would walk a mile to my favorite bench in Prospect Park. When it was too cold, I’d walk half a mile to a café to write among people and steel myself to not buy a muffin or a scone. Or I’d walk two miles to the Brooklyn Central Library to work among people in a huge room with 18 long worktables.

        Since Covid shut things down, I couldn’t sit in the library or café. And my favorite bench in Prospect Park is inaccessible now due to refurbishment of the Oriental Pavilion (see my post on this decaying architectural delight HERE. I nicknamed it the Sparrow Hotel for all the nests in its derelict eaves.)

                           My favorite bench to sit and write is entangled in the refurbishment of the Oriental Pavilion.

Covid forced me to move out

        In the midst of Covid, in March, I was grateful to have somewhere to escape to. If I had stayed in Brooklyn during Covid, I would have lost my mind. The isolation, the confinement within a small space, the sound of sirens day and night, would have sunk me. I thank my Higher Power for providing an escape—the Rochester home of my daughter and beloved son-in-law and 2-1/2-year-old grandson. We’ve had a pleasant few months.

        When I went back to my Brooklyn neighborhood on July 10, I was immediately struck by one of its strengths: diversity. I saw a Latina girl swing her long black hair, a Pakistani man dressed in a white shalwar khameez, the pajama-like pants and tunic, walking near her, and black and white neighbors: young, old, and in between. It’s a beautiful aspect of this neighborhood.

        I spent a lot of time in Prospect Park the first two days of my July stay. I visited the lake and made this little video of my favorite thing: water reflecting on the underside of leaves.

Turn your volume way up to hear my commentary.

        On Monday the brutal packing work began.

        As I packed, I found things of my mother’s, father’s, grandmother’s that I had put in a drawer and forgotten about. I missed these departed loved ones intensely. I tenderly wrapped a little nut dish my grandmother left to the family. It's cut glass, and its sharp little edges prickled my fingers. She loved cut glass and bought it as an investment. My family sold off all the big pieces when my mother died. I just have this one little dish, and I like to put it in a window where the sun will shine on it.

Nostalgia for the life I was leaving

        As I packed, I felt nostalgia for my Brooklyn life: ballroom dancing on Friday nights; Soho Shakespeare rehearsals (check them out, they have free acting classes online), where I did research for my next novel; waiting on the Church Avenue Metro platform for the Q train; lavender lattes at nearby Café Madeline; filming the profusion of buses and trucks on Church Avenue for my grandson; occasional trips on the Q to Coney Island (pics HERE); walks in Prospect Park; worshipping at my beloved church, St. Paul’s Episcopal, where I was the only white face and was welcomed warmly by everyone while I was fully aware that if these black parishioners showed up alone in a white church, they might not receive as beautiful a welcome—it was true Christianity in action and I’ll never forget it.

        During my recent week in Brooklyn, I checked up on Mr. Kosher. Stories about him HERE. He made it through a Brooklyn winter, day and night, never going indoors, foiling all my anonymous attempts to find him help. Now he’s camped under a huge golf umbrella in Prospect Park, in Drummer’s Grove. He was shirtless the day I saw him. I talked with my pastor, the rector of St. Paul’s, who said he talks with Mr. Kosher too. Mr. Kosher offered him a debit card to pick up smoked turkey thighs for him. That experience turned my pastor into a smoked turkey thigh fan himself. Mr. Kosher may have his debit card funded by his son, who lives far away in the Bronx, or perhaps by his Jewish temple, I don’t know.

      

           Mr. Kosher (his real name is Hosea, like the prophet) is back to camping

            within Prospect Park, instead of spending the winter outside the Prospect Park

            B&Q Station.

         I was happy to sense a new optimism in the air in my neighborhood, Prospect Park South, which is the developers' new name for the north end of Flatbush. It's full of pre-war brick apartment buildings in which so many people live who, when I escaped in March, seemed to have no hope of  prosperity, no chance at economic equity with someone like me. I’d sensed despair, hopelessness. People were always anxious, not knowing if they could make rent that month. It saddened me. So many people in my neighborhood could not afford healthcare. There was a marked prevalence of people limping, of people using canes, of people missing teeth. Many people looked angry. They were trapped in a racist system and had given up hope for a better future for themselves and their children. 

Hoping to make a difference

        I tried to help by getting involved in circlesofsupport.org, an organization that helps people coming out of incarceration and that meets at St. Paul’s. I helped a group through one cycle. Then Covid came, activity was postponed, and I had the lucky option that others didn’t have, of fleeing a Covid hotbed.

        When I returned to Prospect Park South in July, however, I felt a new, positive energy in the air. Now that both white folks and black are demonstrating on behalf of racial equity, people are hopeful of change. Now they feel they are being listened to by politicians who are in a position to legislate a more level playing field. They are not looking for a hand-out, they are just looking for a chance. I felt the new hopefulness. I wanted to stay and be a part of it.

        These characters in my neighborhood! The lovely people in my church! The stateliness of the trees in Prospect Park! This new hopefulness in the air! All the caché that saying “I live and write in Brooklyn” conveys! How could I not live here forever?

        But how could I not live near my grandson? And the baby that's expected in October?

        I called a friend and told her how torn I was about leaving Brooklyn.

        “You were a lost, lonely soul in New York,” she declared firmly. “I could hear it in your voice. You’re much better off in Rochester with your family.”

        So on July 17, I said goodbye to my 4-1/2 years of Brooklyn life. Those years went FAST. I lived in three neighborhoods in Brooklyn: Bedford-Stuyvesant (for one month), Sunset Park (for one year) and Prospect Park South for 3-1/2 years. I tried to milk my Brooklyn experience for everything I could get out of it for my writing: the feel of various neighborhoods, pictures of row houses and brownstones, lots of scenes in every season from Prospect Park, one of the great parks of the world.

 

        I'll miss Brooklyn.

 

        But I was very lonely there – every face was that of a stranger. The people around me were stressed by being among too many people, and I was stressed to be thrown shoulder to shoulder with so many strangers. As my friend Cecilia says, "New York is a special place with lots of advantages, but emotional support is not one of them." 

        Toward the end of my Brooklyn life, in February and March as news of Covid was increasing, I felt so alone. I was calling my daughter once or twice a day, calling friends, and then not feeling any better. It was unsustainable. By mid-March the sirens, which could be heard day and night even in regular times, were now sounding continuously, day and night. I was frightened, I felt so alone. I knew I couldn’t survive working alone from home, day after day, in a studio apartment, in the middle of a pandemic, surrounded by strangers. What if I got sick? Who would even know? Maybe the paramedics would be too busy to come and help me.

Starting over

 

        On March 14, I fled to Rochester and family.

        I went back to Brooklyn in July, and by July 17, I was packed. That morning I got up early and dressed up a bit—makeup, earrings, a cute top, new slacks, ballet flats—I believe in looking my best when I travel so that, if I need help, people will be more inclined to help me—and climbed way up into the U-Haul, packed with the things I’ll need to create a place of my own in Rochester.

        I turned the key. The engine roared. This beast was huge, taking up almost all of a lane. The rear-view mirrors stuck out even farther. I drove, scared out of my wits, through the narrow, car-clogged streets of Brooklyn to the Verrazano Bridge, across Staten Island, across the Goethels Bridge to New Jersey, across that state in rush-hour traffic to the Poconos, then with growing confidence through vast open spaces in Pennsylvania and New York State.

        I arrived in Rochester safely. My belongings are now in my daughter’s garage and attic.

        And I’m left wondering: where’s my home? Now that I’m in a city of 750,000 people, compared to NYC and its 8.4 million and its 23 million in the New York metro area, with all the arts opportunities it incubates, can I still grow as an artist? 

         I'll be journaling on that topic, and piecing together a new quilt of my life. 

        What will I do with my one wild and precious life?  

        How about you? Have you said goodbye to a special space, a special place, special people, because of Covid? What will you do in your new place with your one wild and precious life?

       

One Response to Today's Difficulties: Pausing

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A Pause Might Lead to Greater Creativity

By Norma Jaeger Hopcraft

How are you doing? What are you doing? Write to me at norma at normahopcraft dot com to let me know. Now that I'm working remotely, I'm no longer commuting an hour each way each day and I have extra time to respond. I'd love to hear from you! What's happening in your life?

I am doing okay -- I thank God, I was able to get out of Brooklyn in mid-March, when the sirens were already sounding all day all night. The sirens were very distressing, adding to the anxiety already in the air in my poor neighborhood, among people who worry every month about making rent -- what happens now, with so many jobs shut down?

I am blessed because I was welcomed to go to Rochester, New York, near Lake Ontario, where my daughter, darling son-in-law, and hilarious 2-1/2-year-old grandchild live.

"Social distancing is so much better with other people," a friend said. 

Very true. I'm grateful for the quiet companionship.

After one week in Rochester, I caught a cold--I don't think it was COVID because my temp never went up above 99.4. "If it's not 100.4 or above, it's not a fever," a nurse told me. I had a dry cough for three weeks afterward though. 

Other than that, I've been fine, cooking up a storm. I made chicken soup yesterday, and baked cornbread, for dinner. Actually, I put so much rosemary in my chicken soup, it's really rosemary soup. I love the flavor mysteries that that tortured herb puts into cooking. There's lots of white wine in my soup too -- a generous helping of Clos de Bois this time.

I'm calling my older friends who are stuck quite alone. I hope you'll do the same.

I'm taking my grandson for walks around his neighborhood. I tell him to look for cats, for dogs, for the daffodils that are finally blooming in Rochester. The small pleasures are growing in importance as the playgrounds, library, the Museum of Play, have all been shut down.

He's learning the names of the flowers: snowdrops, crocus, primrose. He has a little-child lisp, so "crocus" comes out as "cwocuth."

I am cut off from the big excitements in New York City, like taking an acting class as part of the research I do on the theater for my next novel. Museums. Ballroom dancing. All closed.

But hearing my baby grandson say "cwocuth" takes away any regret over not having access to those grown-up pleasures.

I'm grateful for the quiet life I'm leading in the company of my family. Evenings are spent talking a bit, reading a bit. Jane Austen lived like this, and the Bronte sisters. I'm hoping that this quiet life leads to a focus of energy that results in great novel writing that I can leave behind in the world.

So there's an upside to this pause. I'm privileged to be able to enjoy an upside when so many people have lost loved ones and jobs. I thank my Higher Power and hope that people will see that they can get through everything with the help of their Higher Power.

I confess, I've also been watching TV a bit with my family. We're enjoying Shetland, a murder mystery series on Britbox. Except for one episode that I thought too graphic and violent (Season 3, Episode 2), it's been a huge pleasure. I may never get to the Shetland Islands, but I'm very happy to know that such a beautiful place exists.

One thing I can recommend to you is to enjoy Fire Island. I won't be able to go to my hiking club cabin this summer -- the cabin is shut due to Covid-19. But I have pictures for you from a stay there in 2012, just one month before Superstorm Sandy. The pictures will provide a mini-vacation at the beach for you, in time for Memorial Day. Check out the loveliness on my blog, here.

How about you? Any excellent shows to share? Do you see an upside to this quieter life we're living? Do you put lots of rosemary in chicken soup? Write to me at norma at normahopcraft dot com. I'd LOVE to hear from you! Or comment below! I'll be sure to respond.

American Dream: Find a B&B and Make Some Discoveries

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The Traveling Writer Sees Quirky Things in Rhode Island

By Norma Jaeger Hopcraft

Last week I shared my Louisiana music festival with you. I want to recommend Zydeco again! A week ago I invested in a C.J. Chenier live recording made at the New Orleans Jazz Festival.  I’m glad I did. His showmanship is obvious even when he’s not making music on a stage. And his Red Hot Louisiana band doesn’t play a single note that isn’t red hot.

While attending the Rhythm and Roots music festival (the largest gathering of Louisiana musicians outside of Louisiana) in Charlestown, RI, I stayed with my sister in a bed & breakfast in Kingston, RI.

We went for a walk one morning and found out it’s a college town, the University of RI at Kingston. We drifted onto campus and found an arboretum with a fantastic assortment of exotic trees. They were all labeled with their English name, Latin name, and area of origin.

Everyone in my family is a plant nerd, so we really appreciated that somebody, at some time, planned this place, took care to ship in trees that were likely to survive Rhode Island winters, and took the time to make sure each tree had a label.

This arboretum is a great, humane legacy that some person or persons created and shared. I admire that legacy-building instinct, and I’m grateful for it.

Let me share some quirky pictures of the weird trees. I have pictures of the labels for some, not all. Then we'll get into the bed & breakfast.

Look! A tree in camo!

This tree has beautiful bark in flowing lines.

This blue beauty is a Korean fir.

Here it is in close-up.

Not sure of the name, but it sure looks like green fireworks.

This is a larch, from Central Europe. A bit quirky-looking.

There were neat gates and structures throughout the arboretum.

Not sure what this is, but it sure does have strange roots.

The Traveling Writer Recommends the Sheppard B&Bs

We stayed at Sheppard’s Campus B&B, run by the Sheppard family. It was in an appropriately Victorian house and decorated with antiques. I always enjoy looking at this type of house and furniture, and I enjoy even more thinking how glad I am not to have to take care of any of it.

We had two terrific breakfasts and enjoyed the company of our fellow guests. We also enjoyed exploring the grounds.

A splendid house, both inside and out.

I love the weathered brick.

A compass rose built into the porch floor.

Tons of antiques and healthy potted plants.

A bird cage from India. Felt quirky to find it in Kingston, RI.

Close up of the front door.

Splendid hydrangeas, and all kinds of other beautiful plants, in the gardens.

One of the Sheppards had created a lovely garden around the house. Since I used to be a passionate gardener, and my sister developed one worthy of a House and Garden spread, we made a point of exploring the garden’s paths and noting the different foliage combinations that this gardener had fostered.

I sat in one of the seating areas to make a phone call and to just soak up the sight of sunlight on leaves. This is something I starve for in my life bouncing between Brooklyn and Manhattan. It’s one of the most gorgeous sights on earth, and this peaceful garden filled my soul up to the brim. Then a groundhog came out from under the porch and sat in the sun, to top it all off.

How about you? Been to a good B&B lately? Comment below!

In Search of the American Dream: a coffee shop, a new but forever friend, and...

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How I Gained a Sponsor in France

By Norma Jaeger Hopcraft

I'm hoping you'll come on a journey with me, the Traveling Writer!

Here we continue the story of how I got to live in Paris for a one-year creative writing sabbatical...

I was hoping so much to get to Paris. I carefully calculated expenses, then converted everything to euros. At that point, the exchange rate was steep: 1.35 US dollars to buy 1 euro. It caused me some anxiety. I could just barely make it at that rate. What if it went up?

It was serendipitous when it finally changed to 1.15 to 1--and stayed there.

In hopes of someday being in Paris, I studied French online – “Learn French with Vincent.” It was a terrific course of study. I learned that the French do not have a word for “ninety.” Instead they say, “four times 20 plus ten.” It seemed a bit cumbersome to me, but it was their language, who was I to judge?

I was filling out the forms for the French visa – they were in French, so I had to use Google Translate to make sure I was filling out the blanks correctly.

But there was one big hole in my visa application: I still needed a French sponsor. All my networking with church friends had not provided one. I’d been told by my one contact in Paris, the pastor of a start-up Protestant congregation in the Latin Quarter, that I needed to find a homeowner in France.

How does one go about doing that, exactly? Even in our miraculous age of technology, it would be impossible to find a trustworthy landowning French person who would trust ME enough to write a letter to their government that basically guaranteed that, if I became destitute, they would keep me off the streets and out of the French government’s hair.

It was a sticky problem I couldn’t solve on my own. So I asked HP for help. Weeks went by. 

I explored coastal Connecticut on occasion and went back to New London, Stonington, all the picturesque places that reminded me of my mom and dad's twenty years in Mystic.

Mystic has tons of adorable houses and gardens.

It wouldn't be coastal Connecticut without whaling vessels.  Here's the Charles W. Morgan, restored as a whaling ship, docked at the public pier in New London, CT.

People swarmed over the ship.

19th Century sailors added to the festivities.

An 19th century sailor scooting back to the pier.

The ship's wheel, a rather important feature.

It wouldn't be an 19th century ship without tiny bunks and people saying, "How did they fit?"

More pics of coastal Connecticut here.

On Memorial Day I took a break from cleaning out my mother’s condo and went to the Green Marble Coffee Shop in Mystic for elevensies. 

I was sitting at the outdoor tables, sipping the best coffee ever – Sumatran Italian Roast – when I saw a woman approach the door of the coffee shop.

“She seems like an exceptionally nice person,” I thought. “It would be nice if we had a chance to chat.”

The Search for the American Dream Takes a Twist

She came out a few minutes later with coffee and a newspaper. She “happened” to pick the table and chair next to mine.

“America in Denial” was the huge headline.

“What’s America in denial about?” I asked her. Seemed like a great opening gambit.

It turned out well for me.

“Gun control,” she said, and we so easily started to chat. I really liked this person! She was a wonderful human being. We were enjoying great rapport, trading stories and jokes. So when she asked me what I was up to, I answered honestly.

“Well, my mother just died two months ago. I’m cleaning out her condo for my brothers and sisters – her home is unbelievably jammed. Anyway, I’m working on that but I found this book. A Writer’s Paris. It says if you’re an American writer, you really have to go live and write in Paris. I want to very badly. I have the opportunity now. But I need a sponsor, and it has to be someone who owns property in France.”

There was a bit of a pause.

“I own three properties in France,” she said.

I felt as though the sun stood in place for an hour. I sensed that HP was on the move again!

We talked about it, and I knew it would be a huge risk for her to trust a total stranger to uphold her reputation with the French government.

I invited her and her boyfriend to meet me for dinner for three nights later.

We met at the Captain Daniel Packer Inn in Mystic and talked some more. Once again, my impression of Hope was that she was an exceptional human being, that she was very much considering sponsoring me.

During dinner she said that her former husband, a Frenchman, and she had been divorced several years ago but that they still jointly owned a house in the Paris suburbs, a chalet in the French Alps that was inaccessible five months a year, and some other land. She laid it all on the line and said that at her word, he would be willing to sponsor me for my visa to France!

It was a night for lots of thank you’s to HP.

I went back at it with the French paperwork. I asked Hope’s former husband to provide a copy of his mortgage, his gas or electric bill, his French ID card, and a signed letter that he’d keep me off the streets.

The leap of faith both these people took is still stunning to me. Would I have done the same for a stranger? Hope and her ex are very fine people and set a high example for me.

Needless to say, I’ve kept in touch with her and sent her an honorary copy of The Paris Writers Circle. It probably wouldn’t exist except for her and her ex.

Next week: my favorite pics from Paris, and how I ended up living in Barcelona after a year in Paris.

A Shove & a Great Landing--Paris! In Search of the American Dream

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This Traveling Writer Got a Shove Out the Door!

By Norma Jaeger Hopcraft

I was mad as hell at the time, but it turned out to be the best thing that could happen.

Here's the first installment in the story (and pics) of how I ended up in Paris on a creative writing sabbatical for one year. I had never dared to dream of such a thing. In fact, I told myself that I would never go to Paris because the Parisians had an attitude I didn't like and I would not bother with them as a result.

Hah! This is a story of how my Higher Power took me beyond my wildest dreams.

First: the loss

It started with the loss of my job due to a merger. I worked like a stevedore on a crowded dock to come up with another one. But it simply did not happen.

I was living in a Cape Cod cottage in New Jersey at the time. I loved that house. More important, it loved me. I felt so good there, especially when sitting on the screened-in porch on a summer's night, reading with a soft white light and bugs bouncing off the screens. It was the one sign of any sort of success in my life. I had a tiny piece of the American Dream.

As my savings dwindled, I realized I would have to do something that it broke my heart to do: rent out my beloved house and go live with my mother.

To be honest, I cursed my HP for not giving me a job so I could stay in the house. I did NOT want to live with my mother. What a sign of earthly failure. To go back to my parent's house at my age really annoyed me. All I needed was a job, but HP didn't bring me one.

I cleaned every nook and cranny of my house--to prepare it for SOMEONE ELSE. I cried a lot and stomped around a lot. It was one of the hardest times of my life. My fiance and I had broken up not long before, my 84-year-old mother wasn't well, and now the one thing I wanted most--to live in my adorable cottage--was slipping away from me. My decades-long search for the American dream felt more thwarted than ever.

I cursed as I packed my "must-haves" into boxes and dragged them out to a big rental van. I drove to my mother's house in Mystic, Connecticut one night and limped to bed, mightily P.O.'d.

Then the gains

I woke up the next morning and felt my mother's love drifting up from her bedroom directly below mine. I said, Thank you, HP, this is exactly where I need to be.

I took care of her in hopes of keeping her going for years more. But after just six weeks there, she suddenly took a turn for much worse. But just before that happened I found a book. To be continued!

How did the triple tragedy of losing my fiance, my mother and my house bring me to Paris? Stay tuned! Next week, more of the story.

It seemed like every vista in Paris had something beautiful and graceful.

I'm especially enamored of the scalloped pattern of the cobbles. Crowds tore these up during the French Revolution and the German occupation to create barricades.

The Quirky Story of Working for 30 Years to Make My American Dream Come True

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Making My American Dream--A Successful Writing Career--Come True

By Norma Jaeger Hopcraft

If you like this post, would you Tweet it? Use the social media bar at the bottom of this post. Thanks!

How hard is the journey of a writer?

It’s been extremely difficult—and extremely rewarding.

You need to take your work to a writer’s critique circle. Agents are looking for people who have been through the critique process, the more years of it the better. The writer’s circle hopefully is a supportive environment in which people help each other write better. There are guidelines for critique groups online.

But no matter how much you tell critiquers to find at least two positive things to say about a piece--and if you can't find two things you're not thinking hard enough--people are quirky. They adore the chance to criticize.

It was difficult for me to hear the criticisms. Painful much of the time. Often people are not careful about following critique guidelines--like saying at least two positive things. It can hurt lots when all they say is negative.

But if you’re a writer – and I define that as somebody who exhibits dogged perseverance in getting words on paper – you’ll want to get better. You’ll take each criticism seriously, examine it, accept or reject it according to your instincts, and use most of the criticisms to become a better writer.

It was also difficult to be rejected by literary magazines. I got two things published then nothing--for years. I don’t have a huge “platform” – Google that and get to work on building your own. Without one, agents won’t take your novel on.

It was frustrating to put in a 30-year apprenticeship and not see the results I wanted—fame, fortune, people fawning, the 3 Fs : )

But writing has been highly rewarding too. I’ve gotten to know amazing people in my writers’ circles. I've gotten to know them better as we shared our writing and our unique issues and perspectives came to the fore.

I wrote about the joys and sorrows of critique groups in my novel, The Paris Writers Circle (see the top of the right navigation column).

In it, I poke fun at the critiquers I've experienced. I laugh at the pain. I try to help writers see how--sometimes years later--you can use the junk in your life to make jokes for people to enjoy.

Writing has helped me sort through my bizarre baggage and use some of the anguishing or odd circumstances of my life as material in stories. This helps me to connect with readers.

Writing keeps me company when I’m alone and also connects me with other people better than not writing does.

For example, writing took me on a bus to circumnavigate the United States. I stayed in 20 cities over seven weeks. I’m working on the memoir about it. You can see quirky stories and pics from that trip if you go to 2011 in the right-hand navigation column.

Writing took me to New York University. I graduated magna cum laude not too long ago with a B.A. in creative writing and literature.

Writing took me on a creative writing sabbatical in Paris for one year. It took me to Barcelona to live for three months.

Writing makes me more alive as I seek, in Henry James’s words, to be someone on whom nothing is lost.

So it’s a hard journey but worth it.

Now for quirky photos. These are from a photography group that taught me to "glance" with my camera (my phone). You just walk along and take photos without putting the camera to your eye. You walk and shoot. People get caught on film not posing. I've put my favorites out of 50 photos here. Next week more. A few are a bit bizarre, but fun:

For one second this patch of Times Square looked deserted.

Times Square -- everybody's in motion.

Flowers as architecture.

Downtown and Brooklyn -- my direction home.

Snacks everywhere

Playing to the door, not the crowd. Maybe he got reverberation from the recessed entryway.

Caricatures for sale. How about you? Do you like NYC? Times Square in particular? Comment below!