The Point: Always new, always the same
I have a postcard in my little collection of Albany ephemera that shows the junction of Madison and Western avenues – the Point – in the early 1900s. It’s very green, tranquil even, with a wagon parked...
View ArticleThe Albany Sinterklaas Festival
Sometimes I want to grab this city by the lapels and give it a shake. Case in point: Santa Claus. Santa, it appears, may have first set foot in the New World here in Albany, New York. A baker’s account...
View ArticleBeginnings
The first time I saw Albany it scared me. It looked dirty, crumbling, crowded. I should note right away that my introduction to the city was to go apartment hunting in the student ghetto – hardly...
View ArticleOne storm, one tree, two ideas of childhood
The last of the old tree is gone. The guy with the grinder came and removed the ragged stump two weeks ago while I was out shopping. I got home to find the corner of my yard raked strangely smooth, as...
View ArticleThe girl in the vestibule: A different kind of holiday tale
It began, as so many other stories begin this time of year, with the sound of jingle bells. How my husband heard them in the dead of night I don’t know. We had a wreath of bells on our front door, and...
View ArticleA whiskey-sauce-tinged salute to the Miss Albany Diner
If the Miss Albany Diner’s recipes were served up in some nondescript building, say, a strip mall in the suburbs, the place would still have a line out the door for breakfast. And if that 1940s car...
View ArticleLand banks: A vision for Albany
I moved to the Capital Region in 1994 to attend graduate school. I stayed because I fell in love with the city of Albany. Travel around the country and you’ll see far too many towns that could be …...
View ArticleIt’s my party and I’ll Wang Chung if I want to
I’m sitting in bed – my preferred writing workspace – trying to think of something to write about turning 40, and I’m coming up empty. I feel like I should say something, but I’m just not that kind of...
View ArticleThe Albany left: It’s the right thing to do
Like accents, baseball loyalties, and barbecue recipes, driving customs vary from one place to the next. In rural Texas, drivers will pull onto the shoulder as a courtesy to let a faster car pass. In...
View ArticleIf you haven’t been down to the Capitol in a while, now is a good time to go.
I’m a connoisseur of state capitol buildings. So far I’ve been to more than 30 of them. When my husband and I visit a new statehouse (he’s a capitol geek too; it’s one of the things we found we had in...
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