Brooklyn and Gerard's Favorite Spots

As I told you all when I have no news on the adoption home front I plan on posting something about Gerard or myself or our families. Well when we were in Brooklyn for J's funeral this was the first time Gerard had been back there in 10 years. So Gerard is a very quiet man. He loves being able sit in the back yard with Dottie. Traffic is not something that he loves to deal with as well so the daily life of living in Brooklyn for him was not one that he really enjoyed. He hated the traffic, parking and the fact that it took so much time to get anywhere. See this is one of the reasons why he moved to South Jersey. I like to think it was for me but I am sure that fishing and peace and quiet were high on the list.

I have to say I never minded going to Brooklyn with him but he just never like to go. Maybe I would feel differently if I had grown up there. Before J died I asked him if we could go to Brooklyn so that I could take pictures of where he grew up for Little Bean's scrapbook. He would always tell me one day. Who knew that day would come and the need for us to be in Brooklyn would be a sad one. We drove to Brooklyn via the magic carpet (AKA Gerard driving too fast for anyone but me and Nel. I never mention that I brought my camera because we mostly we sad that J passed and out of respect for Eddie and his family. I do not know what even made me bring it.

Gerard looked at Nel and I after the services and he asked me "Do you have your camera." See Aunt Nel does not live in Brooklyn anymore either but she does miss the driving around and buying certain things that you can only get in Brooklyn. So I told him "Yes I brought it." He asked me "What do you want pictures of maybe all the cars in the street and no place to park?" I told him that I wanted pictures of everything that he remembers that was good about living in Brooklyn. He thought for a minute and then we were off driving around Brooklyn.

When I think about this now I think this was the perfect day to do this see J loved Brooklyn and even after her children moved out of Brooklyn she would never leave because that was her home. This was also Gerard's family's home up until 10 years ago. Well here are the pictures that I took I hope you all do not think this is too boring but I think that knowing where a person comes from and the different experiences that he or she has had gives you a different perspective on why that person may act the way he or she does.

For Little Bean it is my hope that I am able to photograph many of the good things about Russia. I want to make sure that he or she knows that a place is can not be all good or all bad. I think after this day Gerard also figured this out. He is still talking about the 4 of us driving around Brooklyn and there have been no complaints.

We would go here for pastries and stand in a line down the street at Christmas time




The best bread in Brooklyn. If you live in New Jersey and are from New York this is one of the main topics at dinner the bread in New Jersey is never as good as the bread from Brooklyn (That is the truth)



Pastosa Raviolis. If you ever get a chance to eat them buy extra these are the best Raviolis there are in the world.


Gerard's House in Brooklyn. His dog Bobo would sit in the window and watch everything that happened on the street.



Gerard's Grade School Saint Thomas of Aquinas. This is where Gerard, Eddie, AM and his cousins Billie and Jackie (Aunt Nel's boys) all went to school. They would walk there everyday and have lunch at Lenny and John's pizza store.



Aunt Nel's House she lived around the corner from Gerard when he was a child. This is one of the things that he loves the most being close to his family. Aunt Nel still lives in the same town as us and we love it when she drops by to see us.



One of the funny things that I noticed was that most of these places centered arround food. Even his Aunt's House she was and is still always baking or cooking something for him.