Millions of people, many beautiful

According to the figures announced by the U.S. Census Bureau last week, there are 308,745,538 people living in the United States. When more details are announced next year, it’s expected that New York City’s population will total almost 8,400,000, a 4-5 percent increase over the 2000 census figure. It may surprise you that New York has almost as many people as the combined populations of the country’s second, third and fourth largest cities: Los Angeles, Chicago and Houston.

If beauty can be defined as the unique rendering of color and shape, with motion that is accomplished and effortless, then I’m convinced New York City also has, by far, the highest number of beautiful people in the country, if not the world.

According to a December 14 New York Times article by Sam Roberts, “Since 2000, decades of white flight eased and the proportion of non-Hispanic white New Yorkers increased slightly, to 35.5 percent. So did New York City’s proportion of Hispanic residents, to just over 27 percent. The proportion of blacks declined by a percentage point, to 23.3 percent, and the share of Asian residents rose by almost two percentage points, to nearly 12 percent.”

That’s diversity, by any definition. And, when you walk around New York and see people small and big, young and old, dressed in all kinds of manner, it’s a beautiful sight.

I’ve been fortunate the last two years to work in midtown Manhattan with a great group of people. I’ve also become familiar with some of the wonderful people who work in various local eateries, and gotten to know some of the beautiful faces that cross my path as I walk around Rockefeller Center, including those of Abudacar and Adrian.

On most days, Abudacar can be found on the east side of Fifth Avenue, between 48-49 Street, wearing a sandwich-board advertisement and handing out leaflets for a discount men’s clothier. With a French-African accent, he told me recently that he arrived from Guinea eight years ago and lives in the Bronx. He said has no family in the U.S.

“I have an understanding with my boss about my pay,” he replied when asked if he is paid by the hour or by the volume of leaflets he distributes. “It works for both of us.”

When it’s not too cold, Abudacar looks distinguished in a fedora hat and sports jacket. He looks pleasantly at passersby with eyes that are probably somewhere between 60-70 years old. Occasionally, he chats with people who seem to know him.

On an eastern corner of Sixth Avenue and 48 Street, Adrian can often be seen holding a sign and passing out leaflets advertising a nearby Irish bar. Speaking Spanish to me just before Christmas, he told me he came from Mexico three years ago and lives in upper Manhattan. He, too, said he has no family in the U.S.

Short with a perfect complexion and Indian features, Adrian said he was 26 years old and works a couple of jobs. Asked if he had any special wish for Christmas, he paused, shook his head and shrugged his shoulders slowly, looked up at me and replied with a smile, “no.”

He also said that, although he gets paid by the hour, he was glad to have December 25 off from work. It’s a busy time of the year for him, he explained, and he’ll rest on Christmas Day.

There are many beautiful New Yorkers like Abudacar and Adrian -- probably over eight million of them.

What do some guys talk about while tailgating?

Most men are not very articulate when it comes to sharing details about a spouse’s health issue or expressing their affection for their partner. But, at the Meadowlands parking lot before last Sunday’s New York Jets football game, a friend of mine couldn’t be any clearer about his wife’s breast cancer or his love for her.

He went into detail about how her cancer was discovered and the surgery that followed. He explained the decision to undergo daily radiation therapy and forego chemotherapy. With some pride, he also pointed out the detailed log she kept of her ordeal and how impressed her doctor was for information that enabled them to chart the best course forward. He also described her subsequent feelings of fatigue and discomfort and insecurity.

“She was crying almost every day,” he told me. “There is no history of this in her family. Her doctor explained that it was probably nothing genetic, and it was not likely to have been caused by anything she did. It could’ve been caused by anything. We’ll never know.

“Sometimes she wonders, ‘why me?’” But, why not? It’s not something that happens just to other people. It could happen to anybody.”

He paused, puffed on his cigarette, and reflected on their lives together.

“We’ve been together for 33 years. This week is our 30th anniversary. When she gets really down, and wonders about my feelings, I tell her, ‘you’re the only woman for me until the day I die.’”

Although he is a Jets season ticketholder, this was the only game he planned to attend this year. He wanted to be with his friends and check out the New Meadowlands Stadium, but his mind and heart are with his wife only. By the time I returned home after the game, so were mine.

Bob Dylan, again

Last Sunday night at Monmouth University’s MAC center, I enjoyed seeing Bob Dylan in concert with my wife Noreen, sons Steven and Kevin, and friend Dave. It was the 15th time since 1975 I attended a Dylan concert – each of them in a different venue. If you’ve seen Dylan or any other performer 15 times, I’d like to hear about it, particularly if the shows were spread over many venues across a long period of time.

You never forget your first time, and for me it was on November 24, 1975, at the Hartford Coliseum. I drove three college classmates a few hours in a 1970 Thunderbird with worn tires to see Dylan perform with the Rolling Thunder Revue. My friend Patrice and I co-wrote an article about the evening that was published in the local Bloomfield, NJ weekly newspaper.

Three years later - three years before we were married - I drove with Noreen to Nassau Coliseum to see Dylan. From good seats on the side of the stage, she was quite taken by how he rocked. She earned a badge of honor 17 years later, though, when she stood on the hard floor of The Electric Factory for hours with me to see Dylan. I’ll never forget when Patti Smith, the opening act, joined Dylan on stage for a song and punctuated the performance with a kiss on his cheek.

I’ll also never forget the concert in Camden’s E-Center on July 28, 2000, the first time my two sons joined my wife and me at a Dylan show. My mind still retains the image of how excited my 9-year-old son Kevin was to see Dylan perform “Like a Rolling Stone.”

Five years later, I stood on a baseball outfield at Yogi Berra Stadium in Montclair, NJ through a couple of opening acts with my oldest son Steven, who just finished his freshman year at college, and Dave and his daughter just to be a few feet from where Dylan stood on the stage.

Following is my full setlist of Dylan concerts:
1975: Hartford Coliseum
1978: Nassau Coliseum
1981: Meadowlands Arena
1986: Madison Square Garden
1989: Waterloo Village
1995: The Electric Factory
1997: Garden State Arts Center
2000: E-Center
2003: Hilton Casino
2004: Tower Theater
2005: Beacon Theater
2005: Yogi Berra Stadium
2006: The Spectrum
2009: Blue Claws Stadium
2010: Monmouth University

You can never be too sure what you’ll see at a Dylan concert even though set lists are promptly posted on bobdylan.com, but fans attending the shows at New York City’s Terminal 5 next Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday and the Borgata Hotel Casino in Atlantic City next Friday can expect to see the 69-year-old Dylan play guitar and harmonica more than he has in many years. Uncharacteristically, he may stand in the front of the stage holding a microphone and croon through a few songs. The songs from the past 15 years will sound fine, and 1960s classics like “Ballad of a Thin Man” will pack as much punch as ever. Oh, and Bob probably won’t take off his hat during the show, no matter how loud the applause.

She cried, privately in public

Penn Station. Thursday, November 4, 6:30 PM. Starbucks. I sit down, waiting for my latte. The distinct opening notes of Nilsson’s “Everybody’s Talkin’” play, but they’re immediately pierced by the sound of someone very near by starting to cry. I look up and see a young woman across the table from me, head down, muffin half-eaten, sobbing by her cup of coffee.

I look away, waiting for my coffee to finally be ready. Privately, in a very public place, she continues to cry. Then she seems to stop, momentarily. After getting my latte, I sit back down, and she begins to cry again. She doesn’t seem much older than my own children, and I begin to wonder. Did someone close to her die? Did her boyfriend break up with her? Did she lose her job?

I lean over and ask her, “Are you going to be okay?” She looks up, nods, and says, “I’m fine.” As I get up to leave, she looks at me and smiles faintly. I return the half-smile, and walk out to catch a train to Newark, where I will meet my son and go with him to a soccer game. Presumably, she collected herself shortly afterwards and moved on. Destination unknown, but hopefully a happier place.

Trick or treating in NYC

During the 1960s, in the years before the Greenwich Village parade, Halloween was an evening that in New York was primarily special for the city’s children. I lived in the Amsterdam Houses neighborhood, between West 61-64 Streets and Amsterdam-West End Avenues, for most of that decade and recall what it was like to trick or treat in the “the projects.”

It was easy. It was scary.

It was easy because my building had eight apartments in each of its 14 floors. Since there were six 14-story buildings and many more four-story buildings in the neighborhood, it didn’t take long to fill up a shopping bag with candy. During a typical Halloween, in fact, I had to go back home a few times just to empty my bag and make room for more. Like the neighborhood, our results were pretty diverse. Some neighbors gave us packaged candies, others home-baked goodies. One family invited us to bob our heads in a pail of water for apples. Many weren't home or simply didn't answer the door.

The scary part wasn’t the costumes. Most of us simply wore a silly mask and, if we were fortunate, a matching costume. One classmate, however, claimed his mom made his costume “out of dirt”…whatever that meant. The neighborhood was well lit and few people tried to frighten kids by ambushing them. No, what scared us was the sight of Skeeter, the neighborhood bully. He and his gang of hoods walked around swinging socks filled with white powder. When Skeeter confronted trick or treaters, he usually demanded they hand over their candy. Most kids did, lamented their loss, and then continued on. Later on, we realized this was what retailers called shrinkage.

I wonder what it will be like trick or treating at Amsterdam Houses and other New York City neighborhoods this Halloween. Will Skeeter, assuming he is not in jail or dead, be giving away candy? Will anybody be bobbing for apples? In New York, is it still an evening that is primarily special for the city’s children?

25 years with a Fiero

When I rolled a 1985 Pontiac Fiero into the driveway shortly after purchasing it in late September 1985, a teenage neighbor excitedly said, “Wow! A sports car!”

Well, not quite. The Fiero was sporty-looking, but ours came with a four-cylinder engine that turned out a modest 98 horsepower. These were more readily available, fuel-efficient and affordable than the better performing six-cylinder Fieros, so when GM offered low-interest financing to clear showrooms for new 1986 models, my wife and I made our move on a hard-to-find black five-speed manual transmission Fiero. We always liked the Fiero’s distinct looks and were attracted to their plastic bodies, which didn’t dent and wouldn’t rust.

I told Craig, the Queen City Pontiac salesman, I didn’t want the dealer advertisement on the car. “Ah, and some people say I drink too much,” he told me when I picked up the car, and discreetly pulled off the sticker before I drove home, smiling as Stevie Wonder’s “Part-time Lover” played on the radio.

I was back several times during the next few years, sometimes for one minor problem or another or an oil change and tire rotation, and a couple of times for recalls. Mike, the raspy voiced service manager who smoked too much, got to know me by first name, which probably wasn’t a good thing. Nick, our local Bloomfield mechanic, also got to know me on a first-name basis after replacing the clutch -- shortly after the warranty ran out, of course.

My wife learned to drive a manual transmission on the Fiero, which proved a nerve-wracking (and linkage-pin breaking) experience for her. It was normally, however, the car I commuted to work with on the Garden State Parkway. My most memorable experience was driving five hours on Route 22 during a fierce January 1987 snowstorm. The mid-engine Fiero did just fine while other cars whined and struggled, and I knew we would be together a long time.

I occasionally would put a car seat in the Fiero and run errands with my young son, sometimes taking him to his pre-kindergarten class in it. To prevent dirt on the bottom of his shoes from scuffing the Fiero’s passenger seat, I would place a small towel under his car seat. Twenty years later, I still have that towel in the Fiero, under the passenger seat. I can’t imagine, though, a parent of any 3- or 4-year old letting their child ride in a Fiero today.

Shortly after our second son was born, our family acquired its first minivan, and the Fiero became the third set of wheels in our fleet. That meant my wife and I drove it only once or twice a week, when we felt like it. On other days, it napped in the garage, while our newer, more practical cars jealously hung out in the driveway, getting wet in the rain or baked by the sun. Today, our other cars and some other drivers have come to respect the Fiero, which I roll out to the bus station or gym about once a week. I have the oil changed every year in a Monroe service garage by Chris, who never looks forward to it for some reason.

My two sons still haven’t driven the Fiero that’s older than them, even though they’ve mastered the manual transmission of a 2006 Scion tC that dad encourages them to drive occasionally. They seem afraid of the Fiero, perhaps fearing they will break it. “It’s going to be yours one day before too long if you want it,” I tell them. “You might as well start driving it.”

“Long may you run., long may you run.
Although these changes have come…”

(above photo) New Fiero with under-30 Charley in autumn 1985

Vacationing where you work

The forecast at the Jersey shore for Wednesday was fair, probably too windy and overcast to enjoy the beach. My wife suggested we leave our Long Branch NJ vacation spot for the day, go to New York City and catch a Broadway show. It sounded like a great idea, but who wants to spend a day off where they commute to work? I did -- and we had a great time!

We saw a matinee performance of West Side Story at the Palace Theatre. I’m familiar with the 1961 Oscar winning movie, and the dancing and music of the Broadway revival was a treat. It was also nice to hear the couple seated next to us say how much they were enjoying their first visit to the city and how helpful everyone was to them.

Before the show, I took my wife to a favorite lunch spot, Margon on 46th between 6-7th Ave. It was like having a homemade Cuban meal in a small but bustling lunchroom. We enjoyed the meal and even learned about other good eating spots from a man and woman on lunch break who shared our table.

After the show, we sat out the rush hour, literally, with a beer at a sidewalk table a few blocks from the Port Authority bus terminal. We enjoyed seeing the sea of commuters walk by, and I told my wife I was looking for Charley to walk by any moment.

We rode the subway to 23rd and walked a few blocks to the High Line, the former elevated freight train tracks now an unusual city park, where some women illustrated the same cityscape that a few men photographed.

A few blocks later we were at Hudson River Park, a growing stretch where joggers and bicyclists outnumbered pedestrians, and took in a sunset over the New Jersey horizon that reminded me of a famous 1976 magazine cover from The New Yorker.

We wandered into the West Village and stopped for coffee and snacks near Sheridan Square, continuing to observe the interesting array of buildings and people. Finally, we rode the subway uptown to Penn Station and caught a train back to Long Branch.

Who says you can’t play where you work? I will probably look back at Wednesday in New York as one of my favorite vacation days of the year!

The new football fan caste system

Long-time New York Giants and Jets season ticket holders attending exhibition games at the New Meadowlands Stadium this month can be excused for feeling confused. After navigating to their new seats, they may not recognize any of the faces sitting by them, or be able to read the numbers of the players on the field.

Perhaps troubling to New York/New Jersey area football fans may be a sense that their presence at games is no longer about loyalty to their team. A tradition of rewarding long-time fans with the opportunity to occupy the best seats in the house has been severely compromised. In its place, a new caste system based on money – lots of money – has been implemented.

Besides significantly increasing the game prices for all its tickets, particularly the best seats that have been held by its most loyal fans and their families, the Giants charged between $20,000 and $1,000 per seat simply for the privilege of being able to buy season tickets at the new stadium.

The Jets charged up to $30,000 per seat for these “personal seat licenses” that awarded its loyal fans the privilege of obtaining prime season tickets in the new stadium. Unlike the Giants, the Jets did not slap a PSL on upper concourse seats, but informed these fans that their tickets could be revoked at any time for any reason for a refund.

The two football teams are heralding the start of a new era in the New Meadowlands Stadium they share. But, many of its fans may be lamenting the end of an era when nearly all tickets cost approximately the same and the best seats usually occupied by its most loyal fans. Now, these fans may find themselves sitting far away from the action while the location they formerly enjoyed is occupied by a new, wealthier fan.

It remains to be seen whether long-time New York/New Jersey football fans will tolerate the new caste system for long, or simply take advantage of the many opportunities to spend their recreational dollars elsewhere.

The sound of music

In New York City, the streets are filled with the sound of music.
Walking west of 5th Avenue on 46 Street, lunchtime,
the sound of Billy Joel could be heard clearly.
Same songs, same voice, same band.
But it was a different guy, with different musicians,
sounding better than the Piano Man himself probably would today.

Same spot, two weeks earlier,
bunch of guys played music without instruments.
They sang, thumped a beat, kept harmony,
with the help of a tape loop that provided backing music.
But the tape was the same guys thumping a beat,
keeping harmony, with only their mouths as instruments.

East and up a few blocks, a couple days earlier,
a larger ensemble of older guys with a woman,
entertained a lunchtime crowd with…
Jazz? Ragtime? American standards?
Perhaps – but feel-good music, definitely.
Passerby saint who came marching in,
heading west on 51 Street in no hurry,
danced to it with a big smile on his face.

Of course, Lady Gaga also graced midtowners
with her presence of a present of a performance
at Rockefeller Center Plaza earlier in the summer,
as did the window-pane rattling Irish rockers
The Script and others on the NBC Today show.

Last December, a Mexican man on guitar and woman on accordion,
sang a few songs under matching black fedoras on the F train,
collected a few dollars and hopped off at the next stop,
exchanging Christmas cheer with riders.

San Juan Hill, where Amsterdam Houses stand,
was also alive with the sound of music back in the 1960s.
Puerto Rican doo-woopers crooned in harmony for passing neighbors,
even for little boys who listened but pretended not to see.
In midtown today, only the age of the listener is different.

Did the Jets already win the Super Bowl?

Has anyone had their employment terms extended a few years because your company’s owner expects you’ll do a great job, even though you’ve only been onboard a short time? I didn’t think so.

Well, the New York Jets announced yesterday that Rex Ryan, with just one season as head coach behind him, and general manager Mike Tannenbaum, still looking for a first division title after four years on the job, had their contracts extended two and five years, respectively.

Excuse me, but did I just sleep through the second Super Bowl win in Jets history? Did Ryan and Tannenbaum already fulfill owner Woody Johnson and Jets fans expectations that the team, built to win this season, deliver the franchise’s first Super Bowl in 42 years?

The Jets certainly were impressive late last season, winning five of their last six games and two more in the playoffs before losing the conference title game to Indianapolis. Let’s not forget, however, that a stretch in which they lost six of seven games left them with just a 4-6 record by Thanksgiving.

Ryan has gotten a lot of media attention with his bold statements. He certainly is an interesting character, as we’ll find out on the Hard Knocks TV show this summer. Is he a great NFL coach? It’s hard for most New York sports fans to make that judgment after only one season. Johnson seems to think so already, however, and extended Ryan’s contract.

Tannenbaum has also shown a willingness to shake things up and take some risks with free agent signings, trades and cuts. Some, like the Brett Favre signing, didn’t work out. Most recent actions have been taken to get the team back to a Super Bowl immediately. The Jets haven’t done that yet, but Johnson is already rewarding Tannenbaum with a long-term extension.

Perhaps Jets fans and other New Yorkers would enjoy working for companies with owners like Johnson, who reward high expectations rather than performances. Let’s hope Johnson’s confidence and Ryan and Tannenbaum’s contract extensions are justified with a Jets Super Bowl win.

LeBron James, pollo grande

He passed up the opportunity to be a New York hero,
the king of the great city,
perhaps to avoid the pressure cooker.
Instead, he’ll stand for the Heat in Miami,
where it may be a lot cooler than Hell’s Kitchen.

His face won’t be on a large billboard on Times Square,
and he’ll never ride in the Thanksgiving Day parade,
or have a sandwich named after him by an 8th Avenue deli.
But, there will be a new set of jerseys
with his name available for sale,
he’ll be welcomed in chic South Beach clubs…
and the locals may even create a big chicken sandwich for him.

“Is that, is that…James LeBron?” a Miamian will ask.
“He’s so big!”
“Yes, yes, it’s him. I’m going to name a chicken sandwich after him.
I’ll call it the…James LeBron pollo grande.
Maybe he will come in and buy one,
and my sales will increase.”

Why would a budding 25-year-old legend pass up the chance
to play 40-50 games a year at the mecca of basketball?
Would someone with ambition settle for someone else’s place,
and page three of the sports section in his new town?
It’s puzzling to New Yorkers,
but they’re getting over it at a typically fast speed.

Miami is getting over it, too.
It’s not hard when its sports fans don’t get on to it in the first place,
their minds already on Hurricanes and Dolphins.
Except for a few of those cafes and sandwich shops.
“Have a James LeBron pollo grande --
it’s not cheap, but it’s big.”

What this World Cup is teaching us

The interest in this year’s World Cup tells New Yorkers, “The rest of the US is no longer very different from you, as our country becomes more diverse and more interested than ever in events beyond our borders.”

According to published reports, 19.4 million people in the US saw the US-Ghana game last weekend, which made it the most watched soccer match in US television history. Even when the US is not playing, this year’s World Cup matches are averaging almost 5 million viewers.

By comparison, last autumn’s World Series featuring the Yankees and Phillies averaged 19.1 million viewers per game, and this spring’s NBA finals between the Lakers and Celtics averaged 18.1 million viewers. The Stanley Cup finals this spring between the Blackhawks and Flyers averaged about 14 million viewers. Keep in mind that, unlike the baseball, basketball and hockey showcases, none of the World Cup games have aired during prime time.

(If you’re wondering, 27.6 million people in the US saw this winter’s Olympics gold medal hockey game between the US and Canada -- and this winter’s Super Bowl game between the Saints and Colts was the most-watched American TV program ever, drawing 106.5 million viewers.)

For the first 52 games, the number of people watching this year’s World Cup on ESPN was up 58 percent over the last World Cup in 2006, and up almost 10 percent on Spanish-language Univision. Also interesting is a report that the average age of World Cup viewers is 15 years younger than that of the average Olympics viewer – 37 versus 52.

Clearly, New Yorkers who are crowding bars and cafes to watch this year’s World Cup matches, even when the US is not playing, are no longer mainly the “foreigners” who followed past World Cups. They are in the company of die-hard American sports fans at the Jersey shore, in the midwest and on the west coast. That says a lot about New York – and the US – today.

World Cup fever

The World Cup is my favorite sports event, hands-down. Every four years, no matter what else is going on in my life, I look forward to reading about it, talking about it and, when I’m not working at my office, watching it.

And so, it appears, do an increasing number of other Americans.

All 64 matches from South Africa will be shown on US televisions, but bars and restaurants across New York City and other areas are planning to screen the matches for patrons who prefer to catch the action with friends and other fans – even though kick-off times will be either 7:30 AM, 10 AM or 2:30 PM.

World Cup fever has gripped me so badly this year that I actually think the US team can go far in the tournament, perhaps all the way to the July 11 final! That sounds delusional when you consider how much more talented the teams from Spain, Brazil, Argentina, Germany, Italy and some other countries are.

I believe the Americans will hold their own this Saturday against England – major underachievers in World Cup history and among the most overrated teams in this tournament -- and advance past Slovenia and Algeria. After that, who knows?

I’ve been fortunate to attend a handful of World Cup matches in my lifetime, four of them at the Meadowlands in 1994 and one memorable US-Iran match in Lyon in 1998. This US team is much stronger than the 1994 edition which was eliminated by eventual champions Brazil 1-0 on July 4 and the 1998 team which lost all three of its matches in France.

I was impressed watching the US come from behind in the second half to beat Turkey in Philadelphia 10 days ago. I believe Bob Bradley, a New Jersey guy and former Princeton player and coach, has prepared the Americans for a good run in this tournament.

Enjoy the World Cup!

Doing lunch

Besides an attractive job, what’s the best part of working in New York City?

Lunch!

After 30 years of mostly brown bag and cafeteria lunches in New Jersey, I’m taking advantage of the chance to eat lunch out almost every day in midtown Manhattan. I’ve been to over 60 different eateries in a year and half, but it feels I’ve hardly scratched the surface of possibilities.

The people who prepare lunch in these establishments are consummate New Yorkers – fast, good, pleasant, proud and from diverse backgrounds. As an Asian-eyed man at a Madison Ave. deli told me with a Spanish accent recently when I complimented the way he prepared my salad, “I a professional.”

Virtually any type of food is available within a few blocks of my office. The biggest surprise is that the lunches are relatively reasonable (usually under $10). Another surprise? How easy it is to get any kind of salad imaginable, also for reasonable prices.

Of course, I’m not referring to restaurants where a hostess seats you and a waiter takes your order. In the places I typically patronize, you order your meal at a station, pay a cashier, and then find a place to eat inside or a plaza to sit at outside – an attractive option on a nice day.

My favorite lunch spots? Margon on 46 St. between 6-7th Ave., and Sophie’s in the atrium on 3rd Ave. between 49-50 St., both which serve great Cuban food. At Margon, it’s like having a homemade meal in a bustling lunchroom. At Sophie's, you can listen to a pianist and hear a waterfall in the indoor atrium. Not surprisingly, it’s hard to find an empty seat at either place.

Surprisingly, though, I haven’t gained a pound since I began working in the city!

James, Jalisa's dad

For over a year after I started working in midtown Manhattan, the first smiling face I would see on a typical day was that of James, the security guard in our building’s lobby. James had an infectious smile, the kind that made you feel glad to finally arrive at the office after a long commute. There was a slight space between his top two front teeth, and that gap made his smile seem wider across his face.

The happiest I ever saw James was when he announced he had just become a father. He explained that his daughter, Jalisa – a combination of the names of her parents, James and Lisa -- was born the night before and she was doing just fine. Our office chipped in for baby gift, and he was delighted and grateful.

James was also a beaming father one day when he surprised us by bringing Jalisa into our offices. He smiled non-stop, and Jalisa seemed just as happy to be in her dad’s arm. Although only a few months old, we could see she had inherited her father’s great smile.

James was not so happy another time when he confided that, because of a fallout with Jalisa’s mom, he had moved out of their home and not seen his daughter for several days. He was nearly as sad the last time I saw him earlier this spring, when he explained the circumstances that led to his no longer working in our building or anywhere else yet.

Near the end of our conversation, however, when I asked him how Jalisa was doing and if he was seeing her regularly, James again flashed his familiar smile.

“Oh, she’s doing just fine, thank you.”

What’s this about?

Some people have said my status updates on facebook are too short, not realizing these write-ups are bound by the 140-character limit of twitter, where they are typically first posted. This blog is simply a way for me to expand on some of the observations I share on facebook and twitter.

If you’re curious about some of the people, places, and events that I see while working in midtown Manhattan, relaxing at the Jersey shore, or living in Mercer County with my family, I hope you will enjoy my occasional blog posts -- and, occasional they will be.

What’s the significance of the title “1400 characters”? First, it indicates that these blog posts will be about ten times longer than my typical facebook and twitter write-ups. Second, it represents what these write-ups will probably focus on: the many interesting people I cross paths with, especially when I’m in New York.

I don’t particularly like writing about myself, nor do I think most people care much about what I’m up to on a typical day, which is why my facebook and twitter posts are usually written in the third person. You can expect the same with these blog posts, just with more characters, and typically more about characters. Once a journalist always a journalist, I guess.

Thanks for indulging me as I continue enjoying what I’ve always taken great pleasure in: writing. I’ve reached 1400 characters -- time to go!