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SubTitle: Name it.
Posted by: Bob Sheridan (bobsheridan@earthlink.net) on 10/19/1997@13:55hrs:
What IS Staten Island? A noise, a breeze, a smell, a memory?
Staten Island is a state of mind, a ferryboat, a fogbank, a neighborhood, a school. A small island, anchored off the mainland, not a refuge, but a breeding ground, sending forth its children all over. A place to call from memory and to make ancient contact from people who trod the same boardwalk generations ago.
Know what I'd like to see? A sweatshirt with a ferry logo, a ferryboat hot dog, a sheet of crumbuns and the Sunday edition of the Advance. (Was there a Sunday edition of the Advance? Maybe it was the Daily News and the N.Y. Times. Memory sometimes fades).
What else made the Island? Beaches, bridges, boats, boardwalks, bars, beer and pizzaria. Scout camp, Aquihonga, Ten Mile River. Parades, throw money into the horizontal flag; sing Ninety-nine bottles of beer on the wall, marching with the Troop.
[credit to John Steinbeck for the inspiration for the opening line; cf. Cannery Row]
Fondly, RS, San Francisco