The Salty Dog 2015

This says it all !

        It won't be long before it's 2015 and I plan to be in Brooklyn the last day of this year and the first day of the New Year, celebrating my last supper of this year having the best burger at my favorite place. Coming back to Brooklyn means home and any time I can visit the Salty Dog only makes it more meaningful. It isn't just a bar or just a restaurant but it's the people,
        From the moment I take a first step over and into The Salty Dog, I always first notice the wooden floors and then me eyes sweep the room taking it all in, the firetruck, blazing a deep red, the brick walls and the bar. The bar at times looks lonely, waiting. It sits and waits for elbows, smiles, pats on the backs of friends, hugs, kisses on cheeks and orders of big beer mugs.  Here it comes, a frosty one and a big man grabbing the cold handle after a long day and taking that first swallow and just as he does a buddy walks in, pulling his thick blue jacket off, nodding his head and another beer is set up. The voices. Two men who share a same kind of job, now relaxed at home with who they know. Home as in the neighborhood place to be.
        As I continue to walk to the back, I notice a few servers on each side waiting to see where I want to sit, not where they want me to sit. That's a nice feeling. No one is pushing me to sit in a section. Ah, I am comfortable. Adjusting my eyes to the dimly lit area I see some familiar faces, smiling and welcoming. They know me, as a visitor who comes up every few months or sometimes longer. It  doesn't matter. I'm just as good as any regular. They know what I order but ask anyway to make sure I didn't want anything different.
       Then they look to the other side. My guest, usually a kid, but once in a while a friend I grew up with and no matter who or what, we are treated as friends, as long time neighborhood friends.
      I'm a listener and a watcher and I see how people are treated at The Salty Dog, how they are spoken to, smiled at. Warm hearts. It's almost like saying, Who loves ya baby?  At times I forget why I'm there as I get lost in looking around. The photos on the walls, a fireman, history, buildings and a fireplace with a dalmation.
That dog who never moves but reserves in silence a place, a place for newcomers, almost makes me want to walk over and pet him, but all of this means, There's No Place Like Home.
Thank you Salty Dog

Today, I Needed a Reminder

       This morning my son and I talked about stuff way before Boston's bombs went off. Our conversation was about crime and how I am so tired of it all, not unlike many. In the background I hear his baby boy with words that pop through as only a new baby learning can say and makes the subject matter forgotten momentarily. That's happiness, a baby's voice, smile, touch and sounds, makes the world better.
    Brought back to crime and other life matters we also talked about my son's bike race recently, again interrupted by the baby's voice and of course I would loudly say I love you, or make some silly sounds in return. I love the kinds of chats my son and I had today and it was almost two hours. It seemed like we haven't talked in such a long time, but we did, so maybe it was just a time when we were without interruptions with the exception of the baby. There it was again, his mimicking my sons' words. I remember smiling and forgetting my feeling about the senseless crime in our nation and what brought it about.
   We ended with taking more about an upcoming visit, a new baby on the way, another little brother and possible a family vacation time when everyone could be together, Saying I love you to one another, we hung up.
   It was within an hour that the Boston news filled my television screen and I was brought back to the conversation with my son, yet quickly pushed it away with knowing someone one or more did this on purpose. What the hell is wrong with people ? That lump in my throat was filled as my heart went to families and children, coming in from school with parents who work. What were kids feeling and thinking?  How do they take care of their immediate fears and questions ? Who will protect them when moms and dads can't be there?
     Many hours later my son sent me something that I needed to be reminded about, especially today. He said it was something he borrowed from another persons Fb page. Mainly it was a reminder as in today's explosions, people ran back to help. Now as I write this I listen to the eleven o'clock news and an interviewer is asking a local man who returned from Bostons marathon, specifics. This young man said people ran back to see what was going on. Yes, I had to put that out there-BUT-
     I remember seeing while many did go back to look as people do, there were some who ran to help and  many who stayed in the medical tent, not knowing if another bomb was close by and many EMT's police and firemen, and doctors and nurses who ran to help, pull barricades down, tend to the injured, tend to the emotions of people and in a final breath, tend to the dead.
     As a driver with kids in the car, when accidents happen, traffic slows down and usually not because it has to, but because people slow down and look. If I have kids in car, they ask me to slow down or turn around so we can get closer. I want to get ahead faster, knowing gawking is not what's needed, but kids don't get it.
     So in the end there are more people who are good than not, and yes, probably like you who saw today's news, you were reminded of 9/11. Those pictures came back vividly for me too and I remember working that day in mental health, in a group room, how everyone leaned on each other two hundred miles away. I spoke on the phone with my daughter who was crying as I held the lump in my throat down, knowing I wanted so much to be with her, but she was another two hundred miles away in another direction, closer to where a hijacked plane went down.
    As I sat slumped in my chair a supervisor passed by asking if I was alright and yes I was, but he said he'd take my group while I talked with my daughter. People helping. I went back to my group and saw how many people with illnesses wanted to , and some couldn't help but to make that, their crisis. Yet we were still there to help and support. Just like today and in the next days ahead, people will be there to help, emotionally, financially, medically, and in any way possible. Moms and dads, sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, friends will all be there for one anther too.
     Teachers will have a job of it with kids in school. People were killed today, senselessly. Kids will think about other schootings' and not feel safe.Teachers have to be ready as they usually are to be careful and sensitive to let children know that as decent adults we will always do what we need to to help and protect our children, that we will take each day, a day at a time and they those kids have friends, and adults to help them, after all,as adults, we understand ?