Fountain Ball

Upstate Manhattan kids invent new sport: "Fountain Ball"

Last July I was passing through the north end of Fort Tryon Park and noticed a fascinating development in the playground near Dyckman and Broadway.   That playground, like many in the city, has splash fountains for kids to cool off in.   The FTP fountains though are a little different:  a large ring of a dozen or so vertical jets of water that shoot up from holes in the pavement and reach twenty, maybe twenty five feet in the air.  they look like decorative jets that you might see in front of the Bellagio in Las Vegas, or in front of a corporate office somewhere.  

Anyway, while I was walking by, some kid's big plastic beach-ball rolled into this maelstrom of rising water.  The ball was immediately sucked in and hurled upwards, where it stayed suspended near the top of the jet for a surprisingly long time (seemed like a good thirty seconds or so) -- anyway, long enough for the ball's owner to laugh delightedly, and call out to his buddies to take a look.

Before you knew it, one kid's accidental discovery suddenly became a copy-cat sport.  

Three or four other kids ran to grab their own inflatable objects (other beach balls, balloons, whatever) and thrust them into the jets.  Up they rose, up they stayed: twisting, floating, finally falling.  Placing their bare feet over the sprays, the kids then discovered they could alter the force and direction of the water, and begin to control how long the beachballs and balloons remained aloft, how much bobbing and spinning they did, and so on.  

It was beautiful, like seeing the watery equivalent of a pipe organ being played by a group of barefoot child musicians.  The next evolution will either be world records (longest time aloft, highest reach, etc.) or my personal recommendation:  an artistically choreographed waterjet and beachball show.  

Any artists out there want to take this on?  

Dyckman Is Cooking!

Ok, either I visit Dyckman less than I think I do, or I'm just not observant.  (Probably the latter).  But I swear there has suddenly been an efloresence of restauranting and bar-building on Dyckman street.

In addition to such now established destinations as Mamajuana and Il Sole, I note Dyckman now sports a sushi restaurant, a new Mexican place, a wine bar, and a regular "bar" bar -- the latter's moniker being "Dyckman Bar" or some such.   Clearly, some gustatory investigating to do....

To quote my favorite restaurant reviewer from the future:  I'll be back...

The Neighborhood Makes Us Feel This Way

Yesterday as the sun began to sink towards the Palisades, a gentleman who introduced himself as Michael Whitfield began his own private, personal celebration of the splendor of Manhattan North.  

A former speed skater (he competed against Dan Jansen in the 1988 national trials for the Calgary Winter Olympics) real estate broker, and former resident of the area, Michael was driving through Upstate Manhattan and found himself overwhelmed by its incredible beauty in that moment.  Parking his car near the entrance of Fort Tryon Park, he donned the roller blades that he kept in the trunk, turned up the music on his car stereo, and began to pirouette, swoop and glide to the beat, making himself as graceful as the hawks circling and diving high above him.  

His skill and joy soon elicited much favorable comment and even some appreciative photography from dog walkers, sight-seers and general neighborhood arts afficionados.  "I'm amazed at how much love I'm feeling from everyone" he told me later.  

Since he was dancing what evidently the rest of us were feeling, I asked if I could take his picture.  Here he is:    

When Lilacs Last In Manhattan Bloomed

In April, around the bend in every lane in Fort Tryon Park another vista is heralded by a fresh scent.

Yesterday, a stroll beneath the overlook of Fort Tryon brought me to lilac.  Lots of wonderful, soft lilac, in full bloom.  Petals just past their fullness had just begun to dust the pathway with a confetti of purple.

How many visitors to Manhattan -- or even other Manhattanites -- would imagine that a neighborhood exists where two minutes from one's apartment where on a warm preternaturally early spring afternoon, a bench awaits them, offering eternal moments of serene privacy, a majestic river view, greenery in all directions, and a gentle breeze wafting spring's lavender herald to one's nose?

Such a neighborhood exists.  Two of them, actually.  The are in Upstate Manhattan -- the bucolic sub-boros of Hudson Heights and Inwood.   Life is so splendid here.  How can one not delight in it?   I have been delighted by it for a dozen years.

Welcome to the neighborhood -- the most beautiful, most surprising neighborhood in the most dynamic borough in the most alive city on the planet.   A place I am incredibly amazed every day to call home.