Author Archives: Berniece

I just came up from the mailbox. The small metal boxes line a wall in an alcove next to the stairway. Each tenant holds the key to their box. We also have a key fob for the two front doors and to unlock the elevator so it will go to the basement where the trash and the laundry room are. Another key unlocks our apartment door. You’d be amazed at the the number of locks on our door. When our guests want to leave, they stand puzzled by the door until either Laurence or myself unlock it. The funniest thing is when they try to leave via the front closet door. They open it to see coats, folding chairs, and table boards; and quickly close it again. This happens quite frequently.

We are safe here, and I did not lock the door while I ran down the three flights to the mailbox. As I walked through the hallway back to our apartment in the corner, I felt grateful again that the management had the hall walls painted a nice golden yellow (after years of ugly orange). The hall doors and the elevator door are brown. We pass seven apartment doors before coming to ours if we use the stairs. The elevator is in the middle of these doors. So eight apartments to a floor and there are six floors.

This building was built in 1938. The same year as is the map of Bible Lands that hangs on our foyer wall. (The map came into our possession while dumpster diving with friends in Philadelphia. I’ll spare them from telling you who they were.)

The subway came through in 1934. Before then it was farmland. Clement Moore who penned “The Night Before Christmas,” would sometimes stay with his grandparents at the farmhouse that was razed when the subway came through.

I didn’t want to write about this building – to tell you how we have a new red canvas awning that stretches from the entry to the front sidewalk. It’s caused some of the neighbors to raise an awful fuss at the absurdity of it. We even had a letter from the management telling the tenants to take their problems to them and not to complain to the co-op board. I messaged our friend on the board and told him we think he’s doing a great job. He messaged back, “You are great neighbors, and I am very happy to share our home with you.”

Home. This building on this quiet street in this big city is home. We’ve lived here since October 17, 1997. We rented our apartment for two years and then bought its shares in 1999. (Thanks to the encouragement of the late Jay Bullock and a loan from the late deacon Allen Issac.)

Thanks to the many of you who have graced our home with your presence. God bless! Berniece

P.s. What I really wanted to write about was the beautiful scene along the Hudson River by the lighthouse at Tarrytown last evening.

P.s.s. Comments keep me writing.

We’re on the hill where the grills are. Smoke rises from the barbeques around us. I believe the South Korean meal will be quite different from our chicken shish kebabs. (I looked on in amazement as the mother perched on her haunches on the picnic bench. I could have held the pose for only a moment before toppling to the ground.) The Mexicans started the charcoal, put the bag to burn on top of the grill, changed their shoes, and went down the hill to play soccer. The Romanians (I’m guessing at their nationality) started their fire and then sat down in lawn chairs. Looks to me like they brought “everything but the kitchen sink”.

Muslim women walk. Indian men play cricket. Laurence relaxes in the lawn chair. We reminisce about being here with Benns, Randys, Tims, Bee, the boys. Randalyn and my friendship began in this park. It’s peaceful here – so different from the playground I wrote about this morning. There are trails in the woods. Birds sing. The 40 acres of grass playing field looks dry.

Expensive homes surround the park. I’m guessing by the sort of stores that Asians and Jews live in the neighborhood. (We passed a photographer taking pictures of a young Jewish man. For his Bar Mitzvah?)

After thirty years, I know something about other cultures. Still, I’m ever learning. Still, I get things wrong. I say understanding culture is the biggest challenge and the biggest blessing of living here. It seems to me that the American man and the South Korean woman grilling next to us is in the midst of a cultural misunderstanding right now.

The sun is setting. Tomorrow is the market, so we will go wait for the bus that takes us to the train and home. Thank you for being interested in my musings. Berniece

P.s. Laurence says, “Did you tell them that Donald Trump grew up near here?”

I chose a spot in the shade over by the slow moving sword dancers in Moore Playground. It’s quieter here; however, I still hear a jackhammer, the music of the Korean dancers, and the slap of a tennis ball in the handball court. A grandpa swings his granddaughter, and I see a well-dressed group walking through the park – the Jehovah Witnesses have returned. There’s a volleyball game being played and basketball.

The walk this morning took me past Thai restaurants and a Filipino place where they barbeque on the sidewalk. I saw the can man with his grocery cart. I stopped to admire my favorite yellow roses.

I wonder what’s happening in the Asian food court across the street. They’ve put a sign on the building that says, “S Mart,” along with a huge plastic red crab. An Asian grocery? We already have two big ones in the area. (Welcome to Chinatown.) I walked in the side of the building that’s open. I saw a customer buying food at the Burmese Hut and observed sesame balls, piles of fried rice, and foods for which I have no name at the Chinese buffet.

Several hundred Tibetans, many dressed in traditional dress, filled a section of this park Wednesday evening. We watched as someone lit candles on a decorated cake. Afterwards, they sang happy birthday in their language and then in English to His Highness, the Dalai Lama.

Some elderly Chinese chat on the bench beside me. It’s been a quiet week, so while I feel privileged to live here – even that God wants us here – I miss the fellowship with my people.

And now these elderly Chinese are exercising: punch, punch, kick, kick, holler(!) . . .

God bless you in the place you are filling. Berniece

“Roast Coffee, not people,” reads the t-shirt of the barista who just made this excellent London Fog that I’m drinking in Elm Roastery. This place, more like The Meeting House in Segwick, Kansas, is definitely unique to Elmhurst. I walked past the Koreans dancing in Moore Park, saw the drunks side by side on a bench, passed the Muslim woman trailing properly behind her husband, and saw stores with name signs in strange languages. These are the ordinary sights of Elmhurst.

Telling a barista our story. Explaining that I didn’t want to come to NYC, but then God so clearly brought the verse: “I came not to call the righteous but sinners to repentance,” and seeing the barista’s eyes light with understanding while he adds milk to the tea is so far from ordinary in Elmhurst. (His parents were Christian missionaries in West Africa.)

We are mostly heathen in Elmhurst: Buddhist, Muslim, Hindu . . . Every morning a group doing Fulin Gong stands mediating at the entrance of Moore Park. A unique Buddhist Monastery rises a few blocks from us, and I’ve witnessed a group of orange-robed priests waiting for the elevator in our building. Few people in Elmhurst know or have even heard the name of Jesus.

I observe friends gathering in this coffee shop, speaking in languages I don’t understand. I am humbled. I am blessed with the opportunity to let the Light shine here. I wish you were here having coffee with me. (I wish Gospel Tract was here.)

Today you can say a prayer for the work of God’s people in Elmhurst, Queens. Berniece

The river appears moody this morning as we pass alongside it on the Metro North train to Poughkeepsie. Gray, clear, gray, and grayer on the width of it right to the hills on the opposite shore. A mist hangs over the hills. A barge pushed by a tug plies the waters. I see the Point at Croton Park and think about scrambling down the slope to throw stones into the water, or maybe, to pick up colored glass.

For two hours we’ll ride beside this river, one of the prettiest train rides in America. Domino Sugar borders the river in Yonkers, and a notorious prison in Ossining.

“Cortlandt Station will be next.” It’s the only station on this line that doesn’t have a view of the river. Tarrytown, Peekskill, Garrison, Cold Spring, Beacon . . . We sold our car in 2005 and began to ride the train. Since then we’ve become acquainted with these towns that border the River. Their parks, hiking trails, coffee shops, and unique stores charm us. Most importantly, the train takes us to Poughkeepsie where our friends live and where we can do the Walkway Across the Hudson.

Seasons come and go along the river. The new green of spring gives way to the verdancy of summer, the color of fall, and the bareness on the hills in winter. The sun beams a path on the water and then slips behind the hills as we ride back into the city.

“Manitou will be next,” a stop for hikers only. Soon we’ll see the flagpole at Bear Mountain Inn, the ruins of Bannerman Castle, the fortress of Westpoint, and the island where the sisters lived who wrote the song, “Jesus loves me.”

“Yes, Jesus loves me!” Safe travels. Berniece

I thought about the many miles of trails Laurence and I have hiked together while we walked on a wooded path in Forest Park last evening. Laurence’s family has a saying about Dad hiking “Clifty at fifty.” We hiked at fifty and have kept on hiking though we’re past sixty. However, we’re more cautious. (I have a rod in one leg and don’t want one in the other.) We go slower, rest more, use hiking poles, and avoid the most difficult trails.

Laurence and I spent Sunday night in Overlook Lodge at Bear Mountain. Monday, we hiked to the top. The path is part of the Appalachian Trail, and we met a couple thru hikers. They had walked 1,400 miles from the starting point in Georgia. One man told us he began walking the trail on March 9.

An Asian man who stopped to let us by said, “I really admire you.” That encouraged me, and so I tried to pass it on by telling some young ladies who looked winded as we passed them, “If I can make it, you can.”

I got stuck writing about Bear Mountain, but other favorite trails stick in my mind: Lonesome Lake in the White Mountains, Coot Hill in the Appalachians, and recently Rainbow Gulch in Woodland Park, CO.

Trails keep us sane for the craziness of city life. (Like the kaboom we heard one morning this week. A hospital employee Laurence recognized ran the stop sign outside our place. She hit a van. It flipped. The two little boys inside were sitting on the curb when I got out there. No one was hurt.) From Queens to the Pacific Crest Trail 😅, Laurence and I want to keep walking together.

What trails do you enjoy? Only one really matters! Berniece

6:12 a.m. June 17 Elmhurst Avenue Subway Station while waiting on a train to take me to work. I hear the sound. I see the lights. The R train approaches. “This is a Manhattan bound local train. Stand clear the closing doors.” (We joke we’ll be saying this in the Manor: “Stand clear the closing doors.”)

I’ve had almost twenty-four years of riding the early morning Saturday train. It’s ordinary life, but still I feel humbled that I have this blessing of being with people of every tribe and nation. People God loves. (Ok. So I’m a little bugged how the men pushed past me onto the subway car and took all the remaining seats. This isn’t Kansas.)

Each bench seat holds six adults. They are rather squished together in this post pandemic time. One in six wears a mask. A man without a home curls down on half a bench. Some sleep. Some play games. A man reads. I catch eyes looking at me that quickly turn away when I happen to glance at them.

“This is Roosevelt Island.” Have a good day. God loves you. Berniece

Sunshine glints through the trees onto the park bench where I sit. Birds chirp. The dogwood’s flowers are greenish now. However, it’s a city scene of small stores, Thai restaurants, a subway station, traffic, trash trucks, and parents walking their children to school.

In the park/playground, eight women dressed in red, exercise to music I don’t understand. The large group of South Korean ladies moves in harmony in another area to different music. Beside me, a lone Chinese man slowly points a sword in his alone dance. Behind me, music begins – a lonesome wailing. I hear a fan pop 🪭 and move to watch the five women, each with two fans, slowly wave, close, and pop open the deep blue, bright red and white, and yellow fans. Such a pretty sight!

Little children swing. The park employees clean. Lone people exercise. There are other groups. Music throbs. A bicyclist passes through, and (no kidding) a man trims his toenails (we live our lives in the open in NYC).

I used to bring Little Bee here. (I miss her.) One time her and I met a Christian outreach team from Guntersville, Alabama, here. They knew about The Barn that our friends rent out. Anything is possible in this small park just two blocks from home. Tibetans dance Wednesday evenings. Competitive basketball games happen on Sunday. The best hacky sack guys play here most evenings. There’s a volleyball net and a ping pong table. Drunk bums hang out here; church groups show compassion to these.

Come and see! Berniece

We’re on the Q53 bus, passing under the J train station at Myrtle Avenue. Laurence tells me that if we got off here, we could buy cheese perogies like grandmas at a European market. He went there one Saturday when I was working.

“Iglesia Christiana Jesus Vive,” reads the storefront church sign outside the window. The young husband and father besides me works hard and his head falls towards my shoulder as he slumbers on the bus. Laurence is bouncing in the back row. The family is exiting at the next stop, so he moved up beside me. Some get off. Others get on here at the A train stop, and a Muslim couple dressed in white walks down the street. I wonder what white signifies.

We’re coming to Howard Beach where we’ve stopped with friends at New Park Pizza after an outing to the sea. We’ve celebrated at Lenny’s an Italian restaurant in Howard Beach. The Italians are family oriented and fun, but sadly they also have a label for being prejudiced.

The Bay. O the Bay. I stop writing when we reach the bay. Across the way, planes take off from JFK. Fishermen fish and sometimes, we see kite sailing.

Next stop: “Jamaica Wildlife Refuge.” That wild, serene place brings peace to the chaos of city living. This is our destination tonight. Berniece

I do not know why we were gifted four days alone in Colorado. We didn’t anticipate such, nor did we desire it, but it happened. The plane landed in Denver, and we drove away from the airport to a state park in a new Toyota mini van. We spent our time outdoors, awed by the beauty of mountains and red rocks, gulches running with water, and hiking trails through Aspen groves. We walked on a mesa and saw rainbows. Lightning split across the sky. Old timers told us Colorado was greener than it had been in 15 years. The peace of God truly restored my soul in a place of such majesty and quietness.

We found God’s people in a Denver guesthouse where we worshipped on Sunday along with the houseparents and seven youth girls. It was a secure place and we’ll long remember the blessing of fellowship. (We relate to mission settings.)

Afterwards, we went to Kansas. That’s where the relatives are. It will always be home (to me). I like to sit on my folks’ front porch and ponder how l walked through the halls of the overgrown hospital across the way. The hospital’s windows are darkened and ghostly.

My dad came home from the hospital the day before we arrived. We spent quality time with them and also with Laurence’s parents at the Manor. Tea on Main, meeting the Penners twice in a barn setting, my family stopping by, visits with cousins, reading to the great nephews, biking around Halstead, and bumping into unexpected friends, etc., made for a wonderful time.

The plane landed at LGA and shortly we were home in Elmhurst. The best place of all. Friday we boarded the Rockaway Ferry at Wall Street for a 55-minute ride to the beach. We walked in the sand and ate empanadas on the boardwalk. Waves dashed against the shore; the grandeur of the sea made it seem like it is the best place to be.

The air has cleared. Customers at the farmer’s market today commented, “It was like the end of the world. The most bizarre thing I’ve ever seen.”

Now I need to take care of the two quarts of dill pickles I’m making with the small local cucumbers from the market. Thank you for being interested. Berniece