Rob S. Friedman
July 2024
NYC Open Space 143
It’s ironic, looking back, that there were no safety bars on any of the windows of Parkchester’s MetLife buildings. Restrictive covenants, yes.
But somehow my grandparents, with their blend-in faces and hardly traceable last name, got a sixth-floor lease from the insurance conglomerate.
Their windows looked out over Metropolitan Oval, a New York City green space with ancient graves and benches that served as an oasis
for the aged on their schlep to Woolworth’s or the Finast, gone now like the newsstand where grandma bought the papers every morning and her four
packs of Pall Mall coffin nails. Crossword pencil in her hand, cigs and coffee was breakfast because, she said, she couldn’t eat on an empty stomach.
Rob S. Friedman 