I lived in Brooklyn, NY for three years, and when I left, for the only time in my life, I felt like Carrie Bradshaw: in love with a boyfriend who happened to be a city. So, in August 2006, the month that I packed up and returned to Texas, I cut squares of fabric, backed them with freezer paper, and picked up a set of fabric markers. I took blocks to The City Quilter--a place where I had worked part-time, took classes, and hung out with amazing, creative women (and men)--and to a goodbye gathering at my favorite dive bar. Friends and strangers contributed blocks, and I created a larger quilt top by creating blocks from a city-themed fabric.
Just this month, seven and a half years later, I finished the quilt.
It's not beautiful and the design isn't well-balanced, but I love the finished product. Looking over the blocks that others created for me has brought back a flood of memories, many of which I wouldn't have been able to tell you about before looking over the quilt. I created two blocks for the quilt, and one of them, which depicts my apartment, has provided me with a name for the quilt: 163 Jackson Street.
I lived in a three-story walk-up in Brooklyn, just a few blocks from the Graham Avenue stop on the "L" line. At the top of the building was a decorative statue, and while at first glance you might have thought it odd to live in a building topped with a gargoyle, a second glance revealed that instead you lived in a building guarded by a stone turkey.
I started out in apartment 1A, a little studio apartment of approximately 400 square feet. The rent was $900 a month, so after paying that and the rest of my bills, I didn't have much spending money. (I taught in the public schools. Starting pay was $39,000 at that time.) Because paying rent was taking so much out of my take home pay, I got on Craigslist before renewing my lease and found an ad posted by someone who needed a roommate. Two emails later, I learned that the person's name was Dan and that he lived at 163 Jackson Street, two floors above me. I moved in (the larger apartment was approximately 450 square feet), and my share of the rent dropped to $625.
If you look at the quilt block, you'll see that I've drawn some stick figures. The one on the right is me. The little person in the middle is Dan (a short, skinny Japanese guy, definitely smaller than me). To the left is Stephanie, who became my roommate when Dan moved out, and her cat Tonto. Not pictured is Udi, the Israeli roommate who replaced Stephanie and then refused to move out when I did because he intended to become a squatter.
163 was three buildings from the corner of the street, and at the corner was a laundry shop called "Bubble Spa" (see the top right of the quilt block). For part of the first year, I dragged my laundry up and down the stairs of the apartment building to Bubble Spa and paid $3 or $4 a load to use their washers and dryers. Then, I got smart and exhausted (I was a first-year teacher and in graduate school) and started paying Bubble Spa $0.69/lb to wash and fold my laundry for me. Never has anyone folded laundry so well! Of course, paying $14 or $15 to have someone else do my laundry was another reason my money supply was limited. In less popular areas, you could have your laundry done for only $0.40/lb, but I wasn't going to cart the laundry farther than I had to.
Three other businesses are represented on the right side of my block: C-Town, East Met West (that's not a typo), and a 24-hour bodega. C-Town was the closest grocery store, just over a block away from my apartment. When I first moved to NYC, shopping of any kind was stressful, even at a small grocery store. Why? First of all, I wasn't familiar with the brands. I remember going into C-Town to buy a jar of pickles but leaving with none. There were shelves of pickles, and not one brand name I had ever seen before. I had no idea which brands in front of me were popular or even generic. I had to go back home, regroup, and buy pickles during a later trip.
Also confusing was that C-Town did not carry shampoo, toothpaste, or contact solution. I had to buy those things across the street at a pharmacy--imagine a small Walgreens. Directly next to C-Town was a produce shop (C-Town didn't carry any fresh produce either). The produce next door was seasonal and in good shape, but expensive. My dad visited me at some point and bought me a "granny cart," one of those metal carts with four wheels that you can use to lug things around. I would walk fifteen or twenty minutes to a different, bigger, cheaper produce store and come home happier...until I had to get the granny cart and all of my oranges up to the third floor. I stopped shopping at C-Town after a city-wide blackout. About a week after power was restored, I bought some chicken breast. They had gone bad, and from then on I worried about being sold food that hadn't been refrigerated properly.
East Met West was one of two Chinese restaurants in the neighborhood. I got a tofu and pork dish and huge containers of hot and sour soup on a regular business. The food tasted good, cost little, and could even be delivered at no extra charge. Getting Chinese food in Texas requires a car and more money. And, forget delivery.
The 24-hour bodega was my number one neighborhood stop. There, I discovered single-serving cups of Hagen Daz Dulce de Leche ice cream, homemade blocks of tofu, and any other items that I needed to get through the day's crisis.
At the left side of the block are two neighborhood characters. Bruno belonged to an older man who lived across the street from 163. That man, like most of the neighborhood's elderly, had immigrated from the same village in Naples to Brooklyn decades earlier. Daily, I would hear the neighbor yell, "Bruno" in his deep, cranky, Italian-accented voice.
Watching over everyone, of course, was the Virgin Mary. I presume she watched over the neighborhood. I only saw her come out in public one time, wearing a cape of money. There was a parade in her honor, and the parade was no more than two parts long: the Virgin Mary on her trailer and the people walking behind her.
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| Photos by Natalie Parker |
I hated leaving New York, and I hated this quilt top when I first put it together seven years ago. I was obsessed with the ugly parts of it and wanted to re-assemble it, but I didn't have the energy. Now, all I care about are the beautiful parts--the memories and the thoughtfulness of the people who contributed blocks.
