Throughout its pages, DO-OVER, a coming-of-age love story, brings to mind the passion and tragedy of West Side Story, and the comedy of Grease. With its unforgettable characters and "50s" dialogue, it alternately brings tears to your eyes and a smile to your face.
The title, DO-OVER, comes from a "Brooklynese" term used by youngsters playing street games when asking for another chance or "do-over" if things don’t turn out the way they had hoped. This "do-over" theme appears throughout the book as the main character, Frank, makes critical decisions about life, loyalties, and love. Once discovered, love soon becomes the driving force in his young life.
The story, set in a special place and time, Borough Park, Brooklyn, in the 1940s and 1950s, tells of Frank’s hilarious and sometimes heartbreaking first encounters with girls, love, and sex. His love/hate feelings about his Italian heritage and the macho standards his peers inflict upon him play an important part of the story, as does the various prejudice’s (some unconsciously inherited) he encounters. As time goes by, Frank’s anxieties and emotional experiences during his early school years, high school, and then naval boot camp, add to the turmoil in his life. Sporadic violence and racial strife also become part of the picture, as do strong friendships and fierce loyalties. All play a roll in his emotional struggle to achieve maturity and find the one true love he so desperately needs. Eventually, Frank has to make a decision between loyalty and love. Despite a tremendous tragedy that occurs, which tests his loyalty to the fullest, love prevails.
Although most of the story takes place in New York City (Brooklyn), and the dialogue strongly reflects Frank’s ethnic heritage and that particular span of time, it will not only be of interest to people with the same ethnic background, or those who grew up during that era, but also people who grew up in other parts of the country, as well as other generations and ethnic groups. After all, hasn’t everyone experienced warm family surroundings, growing pains, anxieties, prejudices, death, loyal friendships, and first encounters with love and sex in their lifetimes?
It was a span of time. From the early 40's to the mid 50's. When ten weeks of summer vacation seemed like a lifetime. It was a neighborhood. From 46th street to 65th Street and from 8th Avenue to 13th Avenue. Until 13th crossed New Utrecht Avenue, then the boundary became New Utrecht. If you lived in that neighborhood, you lived in Borough Park, Brooklyn. Once in a while you drifted into the other middle class neighborhoods like Bensonhurst and Bay Ridge. You usually had relatives living in those neighborhoods. The poor people lived in Red Hook or Williamsburg--.so we were told. The rich people lived in Mill Basin and Midwood. You didn’t go much into those neighborhoods.
The fields of play were the block you lived on or the local playgrounds and schoolyards. The streets, sidewalks and stoops were used for playing a variety of games. When you were young the games were Stoop Ball, Box Ball, Box Baseball, Triangle, King, I Declare War and Hit the Penny. All you needed was a Spalding High Bounce Ball, better known as a "Spaldeen." The two distinguishing characteristics of a Spaldeen were that it was the color of bubble gum and it had a rubbery smell. Candy stores would get Spaldeens by the box loads and if you were shrewd enough you would pick out the firm ones from the soft ones. Like you did when your mother sent you to the fruit store for peaches. If you got tired of playing ball, or, if in the course of the day, you lost the Spaldeen down the sewer, you could always play Marbles or flip Baseball Cards.
Going up to the corner candy store to see the masked Duncan Yo-Yo rep do his routine was another summer ritual. That marketing ploy got everyone to buy new Yo-Yo’s. The masked marvel, using his vast Yo-Yo skills, would "Rock-the-Cradle," "Walk-the-Dog," go "Round-the-World," and make it "Sleep," much to the awe and delight of the gathered crowd.
As you got older the games you played became Stickball, Punch Ball, Kick-the-Can and Johnny-on-the-Pony. In your teens it was Handball, Softball, Baseball and Roller Hockey.
Handball, Softball, Stickball, Roller Hockey and Punch Ball were usually played in the parks and schoolyards, although, you could play Stickball and Punch Ball on your block too. Baseball was played at the Parade Grounds, an area of parkland near Prospect Park that had many baseball diamonds. The best team that played at the Parade Grounds was the Ty Cobbs. The Ty Cobbs fielded teams in five different age groups. It was sort of like the minor leagues, when you got older and better, you moved up to the next level. The best players in Brooklyn played for the Ty Cobbs. Joe Torre, Joe Pepitone and Stevie Lembo, a 50’s Brooklyn Dodger, once played for the Ty Cobbs. A guy I hung out with, Lefty Acato, played for the Ty Cobbs. Lefty was a damn good ballplayer. So good that we made him bat righty when we played, to even up the sides.
You wore Levi dungarees, white tee shirts and Keds sneakers during those hot summer, teen-age years, always striving for the "James Dean" look. When winter came you abandoned the Keds, donned Engineer boots, and put on a motorcycle jacket, ala Marlon Brando. It made you look tough, even if you weren't.
On special Sundays, like Easter Sunday, you put on your gaudy-colored, baggy-pants "Gingerella" suit with the one button jacket. The pants had a 3-inch rise at the waist, saddle stitching down the legs, pistol pockets in the back, and a 12-inch peg at the cuffs. The color of my Gingerella suit was rust. The final touches to the "costume" included a white dress shirt with a "Mr. B" collar, a skinny tie, and French toe, "cockroach killing" pointy shoes.
The girls wore things like tube tops, peddle pushers, felt skirts with pink poodles on them, Fuchsia or Chartreuse colored iridescent satin jackets with matching shoe laces, and bobby socks.
The elementary school you attended was identified with a number that was preceded by the initials P.S., which stood for Public School. I went to P.S. 160. So did all of the other kids on my block. When you graduated elementary school you went to a Junior High School that usually had the name of a President or General. I went to Pershing Junior High School (P.S. 220). Lincoln, Lafayette, Madison, Midwood, Fort Hamilton, and New Utrecht were the names of the neighborhood High Schools.
At night you hung out in Lazareth's, the local Ice Cream Parlor, or in front of one of the many local candy stores in the neighborhood. There were many nights that you and a couple of your friends harmonized on the corner, singing the latest popular songs that were being played on the radio and neighborhood juke boxes. Later on you hung out in Pool Halls, which made you feel tough, even if you weren't. It was important to feel tough growing up in Brooklyn.
On Friday nights you went to Confraternity at the local parish church, St. Francis De Chantel, located on 57th Street and 13th Avenue, where you danced with your girlfriend. If you didn't have a girlfriend you could always flirt with some of the other neighborhood girls, or try to pick up one of the new girls that would occasionally show up.
You occasionally went out of the neighborhood to places like Dubrow's, Juniors on Flatbush Avenue, or to Nellie Bly along the Belt Parkway. Besides having the world's best cheesecake, Junior's was also a good place to pick up "liberal Jewish girls."
The Belt Parkway was always a good place to take a girl when you wanted to "make out." The guys referred to it as "submarine watching." You would park your car in one of the parking areas along the Belt, put the radio on to the Murray the K show, and then see how much you could get away with. If you happened to see a submarine, it was a bonus.
During the day� you hung out in P.S. 160 or Pershing's schoolyard, or in the park on Ft. Hamilton Parkway and 53rd Street. The neighborhood movie houses you frequented were the Loew's Borough Park, the Loew's 46th Street, or the New Garden. Once in a while you went to the Loew's Oriental on 86th Street. You had to be careful when you went there though because that was out of the neighborhood. When Rock and Roll became popular you went downtown to the Brooklyn Paramount to see the Allen Freed Rock and Roll Shows. At one of those shows I saw a young, blind rock and roll singer named Stevie Wonder. Stevie was too full of rhythm and exuberance that day. He got too close to the edge of the stage and fell off of it. We tried not to laugh....but we did.
You never had to go home for lunch on those hot summer days because there was plenty of food available in the local stores and the vendor carts that meandered thru the neighborhood. You could get sour pickles from a barrel in the local grocery store, Charlotte Ruse’s and slices of Sicilian Pizza from the Italian bakery, and ice cream from Joe the Ice Cream Man's Good Humor truck. If you preferred a scoop of your favorite flavored ice cream pressed down into a sugar cone with chocolate sprinkles on top, you got that at Heschie's candy store. The candy store was also the place to go for Skinny Pretzels, Jaw Breakers, Malteds, Egg Creams and Cokes. Cokes were also available in soda machines at all the gas stations in the neighborhood. The best Egg Creams in the world were made in Borough Park....so we thought. A snowball, which was shaved ice in a cup with fruit flavored syrup poured over it, was also available off of the street carts that plied the neighborhood. Cherry, strawberry, lemon, lime, cocoanut, coffee....you name it....the Snowball guy had any flavor you desired. And for an extra nickel you could get "the works," which was all the flavors combined.
If you had a date with a special girl and wanted to impress her, you took her to Jahn's Ice Cream Parlor in downtown Brooklyn for an Ice Cream Soda, a Sunday, or the "Kitchen Sink." But only if she was special, because you would need additional money for carfare to get there.
Trolleys, trains and buses were how you got around. We didn't have subways in our neighborhood; we had elevated lines, better known as "Els". The West End, Sea Beach, Brighton Beach or D trains went to Coney Island. The Mc Donald Avenue trolley and the trolley that ran along New Utrecht Avenue went to Coney too.
There were so many things to see and do at Coney Island. There were dozens of rides, located in the side streets and on the boardwalk, to go on. Rides like the Cyclone, Wonder Wheel, Ferris Wheel, Bubble Bounce, Whip, Bumper Cars, Parachute Jump and the Merry-Go-Round, to name a few. You could also visit the Penny Arcade and get your fortune told by the mechanical gypsy in the glass booth. Or go to Steeplechase Park with the mechanical racehorses and the Fun House that had a rolling barrel, mirrors that distorted your reflection, and air blowers that blew the girl's skirts up.
On the way home everyone stopped at Nathan's, located on Surf and Stillwell Avenues, across from the train station. There you bought delicious hot dogs, corn-on-the cob, roast beef sandwiches and French fries in a paper cup.
If you rode those same train lines in the opposite direction from Coney Island, they would take you to downtown Brooklyn and Manhattan, or "the City," as everyone called it. In downtown Brooklyn you would shop in stores named A+S, Russeks, Mays and Martin's. In Manhattan you could change trains and go to the Bronx or Queens...wherever the heck that was. For a nickel you could go anywhere in the city by trolley, bus or train. Everywhere but Staten Island, that is. You had to take the 69th Street or the 39th Street ferry to get there. And what a trip it was! That cost a nickel too, but with that nickel you also got a wonderful view of New York harbor.
For that same nickel you could take a bus to the Botanical Gardens, or go to Prospect Park where you could catch tadpoles, or row a boat on the lake. Or, you could take in a ballgame at Ebbets Field, home of the borough's beloved baseball team, the Brooklyn Dodgers, also affectionately known as "Dem Bums".
Yes, New York City....and in particular, Brooklyn....was a great place to grow up. Especially in my neighborhood, Borough Park. Besides all the diverse places and things to see and do, it was a pretty place. The parks and neighborhood gardens were immaculately kept. Tall sycamores, oaks and maple trees protected our streets and playing fields from the blazing sun during those dog days of summer. I didn't know it then but it was a special time....in a special place.
