The View from Kings Point: The Kings Point Writers Club Anthology, 2018

By Edward R. Levenson

The View from Kings Point: The Kings Point Creative Writers Club Anthology, 2018 is the product of the labors over eighteen months of twelve gifted writers, including one artist residing in a senior community. As the Preface illustrates, the range, scope, variety, and diversity of their pieces are truly outstanding. Literary quality shines through everywhere. The title is an allusion to the revolutionary, omniscient perspective called the king’s point of view of Spanish master painter Diego Velazquez in his famous Las Meninas (Ladies in Waiting), which is reproduced in the first frontispiece. We present the anthology as a memorial to our deceased beloved member, A. Irving Rosenberg. May he rest in peace.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Sep 22, 2018
• ISBN: 9781984553836

Edward R. Levenson

Edward/Eddie grew up in Roxbury and Brighton in “Boston Proper” (that is, within Boston’s city limits), Massachusetts. After graduating from Boston Latin School, he received undergraduate degrees in Jewish Education and Classics (Greek and Latin Literature) and graduate degrees in Ancient and Jewish History, Near Eastern and Judaic Studies, and Educational Administration. He taught Hebrew Language and Jewish History in college and Hebrew Scriptures in graduate school before he retracked into teaching Latin and Social Studies in high school. He relocated in 2015 from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to Delray Beach, Florida, where he has been fulfilled, in retirement, in a second career as a writer. In these last five years he has published three anthologies and four multi-genres books. His Personae of Ed: Literary, Psychological, and Spiritual is in the works. A newlywed of four years to prolific writer Reva Spiro Luxenberg, he has edited eight of her books. He is a proud member and officer of our Kings Point Creative Writers Club and Kings Point Writers Club Supplementary, considering them models for emulation.

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Copyright © 2018 by Edward R. Levenson.

Library of Congress Control Number:    2018911112

ISBN:                    Hardcover                      978-1-9845-5385-0

                              Softcover                        978-1-9845-5384-3

                              eBook                             978-1-9845-5383-6

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Rev. date: 09/21/2018

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Preface

by Edward R. Levenson, Editor

September 14, 2018. I trust readers will agree that a nice little anthology has shaped up—a tribute to our Kings Point Creative Writers Club members’ conscientious and dedicated work of eighteen months—and I am confident that there is much to enjoy in the book. I have a sound basis for optimism that our writings will impress the Kings Point community and will put our writing group on the map in Delray Beach, Palm Beach County, and even beyond. My driving ambition as editor has been to showcase—and do justice to—the talent of your neighbors next door.

The literary quality of all the writings is striking, and I go so far as to describe the variety of treatments and the range of subjects as breathtaking.

I now list writers of expositional pieces and poetry in alphabetical order, only being able to suggest the barest taste of the gifts of each.

Joe Bruno writes with subtlety about human capacities and relationships, situations and dilemmas, joys and setbacks.

Laurie Faber writes poignantly about a mother and son, her father, youth, a girlfriend, and a Latino family in Harlem, New York, NY.

Sol Friedman draws on his engineering, historical, and world-traveler background. (Kings Pointers will be particularly interested in Sol’s Elevators That Changed Kings Point.)

Karen Gula graces our work with exquisite drawings and descriptions of their contexts and personal meaning for her.

David Jones, with characteristic British wit and understatement, relates his experiences as a boxer, a swimmer, and a program-seller at the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II.

Bobby Lauri writes about growing up Italian in Queens, overcoming a harrowing childhood, becoming a band manager and meeting celebrities, and witnessing the attack on the Trade Center South Tower.

Ed Levenson represents his multi-genres endeavors in Word Play, Fiction, Memoirs, Reviews, and Humor.

Reva Luxenberg demonstrates, in her biblical legends, her appealing humorous, warm, and wise writer’s voice.

Faye Menczer Ascher, founder of our Club, has a rich account of her stay in Israel.

Pat Regan describes family situations over three generations with skill and irony.

Anne Rockwerk writes about a life of overcoming challenges, developing confidence in writing, strengthening her faith, and enjoying family festivities to the fullest.

And, last but not least, A. Irving Rosenberg—who, to our great sorrow, has left this Earth for his eternal rest—has bequeathed to us expressions of his inquisitive, thoughtful, and noble soul. We dedicate this anthology as a memorial volume to him.

We have debated in the group about the best title for the book. After stubbornly arguing for The Kings Point Creative Writers Club, 2018, I experienced the breakthrough that that should be the subtitle and a catchy three- or four-word phrase should be the title. For the latter, a member suggested Making a Point, playing on the Point in Kings Point. Then another member reported on having employed Google for the origin of Kings Point as a point (no pun originally intended) of departure. Google revealed that Kings Point is a geographical location in Great Neck, New York—but, lo and behold, that it is also a very important term in art criticism about a particular painter’s omniscient perspective: the King’s point of view.

We discussed this term in the group—and "Eureka! (We’ve got it! [Literally, in Classical Greek, I’ve got it!]). Change the word order to the word play the view from Kings Point and we had our title, albeit with the omission of the apostrophe of King’s in the King’s point of view." Our title has received unanimous approval as The View from Kings Point. The King’s point of view is the revolutionary omniscient perspective featured in the 1656 painting Las Meninas (Ladies in Waiting) of Spanish master Diego Velazquez. See the first frontispiece for the print. The subject of the painting is Infanta Margarita, daughter of King Philip IV of Spain and his wife Queen Mariana of Austria. Infanta Margarita has the central position in the painting. She is bathed in light in the foreground and is wearing a white gown. She has stopped in the studio to visit the artist who is seen on the left side of the painting.

The cover design, effected by Xlibris master-designer Joel Cobb, features a prism splitting the sunlight of Inspiration into hues of rainbow colors representing our different contributors. The idea of the globe in the middle of the rainbow containing the name of our Club is based on a modern imitation of Las Meninas, in which a globe is resting on the shoulders of Infanta Margarita, not her head. See the second frontispiece.

Editor’s note. I have allowed local autonomy, such as in the case of Anne Rockwerk’s transliteration of Yiddish words. My consideration of the reader’s ease of reading has been paramount, as in my using Arabic numerals for numbers under 100.

The View from Kings Point

Table of Contents

Preface

Irving Rosenberg

Obituary Of A. Irving (Irvin) Rosenberg

The Insanity of Love

My Irma Storm Adventure

The Driver’s License Adventure

Be Brave and the Unseen Will Come to Your Aid (a Chinese

Saying)

Joseph E. Bruno

Biography

Assembly Line 3

More Than One Way

Ephemeris Plasoptera

Laurie E. Faber

Biography

Slopes

Gray Tidings

A Solid Reminder

Hope in Harlem

The Roller Coaster

Isidore Sol Friedman

Biography

From a Farm to a Summer Resort

My Philippine Experience

Elevators That Changed Kings Point

Karen Gula

Biography

Karen Gula’s Descriptions of Ten of Her Art Pieces

A Lion’s Roar

Two Birds on a Pine Tree

This Is the Life

Collage

Circles

Just the Waves

A Loving Girl

Engagement Night

A Still Life

The Lane in the Village

David Jones

Biography

Blackberry and Apple Pie

Two Great Swimming Disasters

Disaster One:

The Oversized Swimming Trunks

Disaster Two:

Robbed

The Program Seller and Queen Salote

Smith of Lambeth

Robert Lauri

Biography

Childhood Disasters

Duncan Yo-Yo Competitions

My Gift of Electric Trains to Frank Sinatra

Witnessing the Attack on the Trade Center South Tower

Edward R. Levenson

Biography

Less is Indeed Less (Word Play)

Save the Turtles—a Joy (Fiction)

I Was a Thief (Memoir)

"Are You Being Served?" (Review)

It’s Time for Me to Start Wearing My Hearing Aid, II (Humor)

Reva Spiro Luxenberg

Biography

Methuselah Tells All

The Creation of Man

Adam’s Mate

Eve Gives Birth; Cane and Able

Methuselah and His Wives

Noah

Faye Menczer Ascher

Biography

Tales from Israel

Patricia Ann Okulski Regan

Biography

One Hundred Bathrooms

Bookcases

The Echo Inn

Anne Rockwerk

Biography

So I Think I Am a Writer

Someone That Changed My Life

Having Faith

Rosh Hashona; Brisket

An Unforgettable Bar Mitzvah Weekend

A Weekend Wedding at the Ritz Carlton Hotel, Palm Beach

Irving Rosenberg

Irving.jpg

Obituary Of A. Irving (Irvin) Rosenberg

(1921-2018)

The Kings Point Creative Writers Club members had the pleasure of hearing and reading Irving’s essays. We miss him terribly. He had lived in Florida for thirty-five years prior to his death on March 29, 2018 at the age of ninety-six. Irving had a smile for everyone he came in contact with. He was a pleasant, easy-going, supportive person.

Irving had been born in Newark, New Jersey. He attended New Jersey Law School (now Rutgers, Newark) in 1948 and became an attorney with a private practice in Union for over fifty years. He retired in 1998. He served in the U.S. Navy during World War II. He is survived by his son Jeffrey; his brother Jerome; their wives; the wife of predeceased son Dr. Elliot; six grandchildren; and six great-grandchildren.

May his memory be for a blessing!

KPCWC, August 2017

The Insanity of Love

Of special interest are the fortunate ones who fall in love and whose vision of their beloved ones is distorted by the need for reproduction and survival of the species, assisted by imprinted tendencies always in the background ready to influence the vulnerable persons’ thinking.

This subject is nicely covered in Benedict Carey’s Science article in the New York Times on May 31, 2005, entitled Watching New Love As It Sears the Brain.

New love, Carey writes, can look for all the world like mental illness, a blend of mania, dementia, and obsession … that prompts out-of-character behavior … that could almost be taken for psychosis…. Romantic love is a biological urge distinct from sexual arousal. It is closer in its neural profile to drives like hunger, thirst, or drug craving … than to emotional states like excitement or affection.… When you’re in the throes of this romantic love, it’s overwhelming. You’re out of control. You’re irrational.

A powerful biological imprint within my Hierarchy of Needs, similar to Freud’s Id, is the force behind the need to reproduce the species. It makes persons believe they cannot exist without The Other. It causes the subject to become hypnotized into a sexual relationship leading to reproduction and often some sort of continuing relationship.

After the hypnotic state has passed, very often the parties wonder what they first saw in each other, which is what their friends had said from the beginning. However, this emotional high, especially experienced by those in their early adulthood, is one of the most exciting and magical stages of their lives.

A review of what a person needs to feel being loved, and what is required of the other to provide the basic elements which will create this feeling, leads one to recognize why true love, as herein defined, is rare. Under the most favorable conditions we may find that only half of the requirements are met on each side of a relationship involving two people who seek at the surface what really should flow from the deep.

Elements of the State of Being Loved: Security, Trust, Caring and Closeness, Pleasure, Knowing Self, Increased Self-Esteem.

Actions Promoting Love: Responding to the Needs of The Other; Respecting the Other; Humility to Be Intimate, Courage to Make Commitments, Understanding the Other, Allowing Him or Her to Grow.

The combination of these components, put into practice, results first in love of one’s own self and, as a consequence, the ability to love another or others.

KPCWC, September 2017

My Irma Storm Adventure

Living alone and being on in years, I still was prepared to sit out the oncoming storm despite advice from my son to seek shelter. I had called a few emergency centers and the phones were quite busy or did not answer, so I gave up trying.

My apartment in Kings Point is on the first floor and prone to flooding and all of my windows are poorly fitted and apparently vulnerable to strong winds and rain. Out of the blue, I received a phone call from my two nieces, temporarily staying in their Kings Point apartment, that I should join them and an elderly lady friend of the family, to wait out the coming storm together.

This was on Friday, September 9, and I gladly accepted. The storm was expected to climax on Sunday, so I prepared to spend time with my nieces, Janet and Marcia, and lady friend Laura, plus my niece’s two beautiful green parrots.

I was assigned a sofa in the living room for sleeping and I settled down.

Over a breakfast discussion I learned that Laura had been a school teacher so I discussed my writers-group experience. I asked Laura, What would you do if one of your eighth-grade students decided to get up and walk out of the class? That had been part of a discussion at a meeting.

Laura immediately responded, I would not stop her, but since I could not leave the class unattended, I would arrange for another student to try to go along with her to the principal’s office. This was generally in accord with our group discussion on the subject.

During the day on Saturday Janet developed a cough and needed to take some medicine to alleviate the condition. I asked her if the parrots could catch her cough and she broadly smiled. I had hit on something.

Janet said I had a similar cough on another occasion and it seemed that one of the parrots also seemed to be coughing so I took her the vet. He said Parrots do not cough. The bird was just imitating you." That was a revelation to Janet about her affectionate pet.

On another occasion I saw the birds pecking at each other, almost as if they were mildly fighting. I asked Janet what they were doing and she said they were preening, cleaning each other.

I thought that it was amazing how these parrots must have been programmed to do that or that it was actually thoughtful and caring attention they naturally directed toward each other. Either way, it was an example how what we call Nature provides behavior for the enhancement of the survival of the species.

Eventually the parrots and I survived the Irma Storm, which mainly hit Florida’s West Coast, and I returned to an almost normal routine after taking care of things that had been disturbed.

KPCWC, October 2017

The Driver’s License Adventure

A critical point has been reached in my life here in Florida. I am 96 years of age living alone, and my only method of outside physical movement is my car. My New Jersey license to drive is about to expire in two months, and I have to decide whether to attempt to get a Florida license or wait for a problematic trip to New Jersey since such traveling would be very stressful for me.

It happened that my son Jeff was visiting me at the beginning of October, along with his wife, and he suggested he could try to help me get a Florida license. His information, from a friend, was that all that would be required would be an eye test, which I would be able to pass without difficulty since I did not need eye glasses for driving.

So this past Tuesday morning, October 3, 2017, we fortified ourselves with papers verifying my residence in Florida, automobile registration, birth data, and passport documents, along with other items, ready to take the authorities on. Jeff drove my car to the Palm Beach County Administration Building on Congress Ave, Delray Beach. It houses the licensing bureau among other governmental departments.

Now to find a parking spot. It looked like some great sporting event was taking place with no parking spaces at all near the entrance. Finally a spot in the distance materialized.

Jeff opened the car trunk, lifted out my three-wheeled walker, and off we went, winding our way through the rows of parked cars. There at the entrance a few people were sitting and as I walked by one fellow, I asked, How long a wait? He sort of scowled and said, Two hours. This looked like it was going to be tough, we thought to ourselves, as we beheld rows and rows of people inside.

At the front processor’s desk we were given a number to wait for the initial interview. A young lady sitting