Tired of winter, we grabbed a bagel and iced tea around 7 a.m. and left Williamsburg via the L train heading east. After transfering among the rush hour hordes at Broadway Junction, we took the A train
to the first stop on the Rockaway peninsula, Beach 67th Street, and made our way to the boardwalk and beach in the neighborhood where we spent our childhood summers from the early 1950s to the mid-1960s, Arverne.
Now it's probably better known by the megadevelopment Arverne By the Sea, which has in recent years filled the vacant and empty lots that once held modest houses and the summer bungalow colonies we came of age in - (here's a pic we took of our bros back in August 1965 in Lincoln Court
and the block between Beach 56th Place and Beach 56th Street, which held the Lincoln Court, Washington Court, Woodrow Cottages and Washington Court Annex bungalow colonies the way it looked this morning, having reverted to nature decades ago)
- with sparkling and attractive pastel-colored homes which look more like Cape Cod or Gulf Coast, Florida, than the borough of Queens. Hopefully, Arverne by the Sea will get around to revitalizing our old block, too.
It was a mild morning, very sunny and a great day to forget about all the snow and ice and cold and sit on a deserted boardwalk and look out at a pristine beach and listen to the sea gulls, daydream about spring and maybe even summer, and think about all the great times we used to have around here.
No comments:
Post a Comment