Author Archives: epdusty

A few years back, I was privileged to hear a talk given by Billy Collins as part of our library author series. At the end of his talk he stayed for a book signing. I approached Collins and asked him … Continue reading →

(with apologies to Franz Kafka) “We’re in the neighborhood and I wanted you to know we have a special for new customers this month.” He stood at the half-opened screen door, dressed in denim pants and with “Home Team Pest … Continue reading →

I was sitting one night eating some reheated egg rolls and pork fried rice. Perhaps it was the MSG or the STPP or some such but I began to imagine I was a dragonfly on the inside wall of a … Continue reading →

Dedicated to Evie Blackhall, who loved L. Carroll and her cats, Thelma and Louise ‘Twas brillig, in Queen Ebbie’s lite lair, Alle the knip was kneppen in the knichen. Aslopin and aslephen the tabby pair Thelma and Louise the tun … Continue reading →

There can be beauty in simple lines, an elegance in gentle curves that mock nature’s works. This the carver knows. His hands, gnarled and nicked by errant strokes, still feel softness in the grain. Eyes, though failing, see symmetry in … Continue reading →

Named for the 1939 New York exposition, the World’s Fair Bar & Grill was located on Locust Avenue in the Bronx. Overlooking the East River, the neighborhood was an industrial hub in the 50s. Hoe, Cresca, Caterpillar, and Steinway & … Continue reading →

A nickel could buy a nice piece of candy in the 50s. I had narrowed down the choice between a pack of bubble gum cigarettes or Turkish taffy. It was a real honey of a choice, spending the nickel I … Continue reading →

The Sanibel pier is a t-shaped structure that juts out from the eastern-most point of Sanibel into San Carlos Bay. One walks onto the pier through a covered entranceway with benches on each side, away from the tangle of rods, … Continue reading →