I haven't been out of my house in weeks. This afternoon I hobbled to the dining room to let the dogs out...when I slid open the door, I got hit with a blast of hot, humid air. There was something about the smell that took me far away. I closed my eyes and thought of Fordham Road at night in the 70's.. Coming out of the air conditioned RKO into hustle and bustle of the street and walking among a real multicultural crowd. Black girls and their afros, the rest of us, long and straight. Bell bottoms or straight leg Lees with permanent front seams, platform shoes and tube tops or halters. Button earrings, large Lucite rings. The music streaming out of the open car windows was as varied as the ethnicities on the sidewalk. Rock, Funk, Disco, Salsa...it was all good. Conversation mostly English, but smatterings of Spanish here and there. It started to get less crowded the closer we got to Webster Ave. Passing by Fordham University, we'd cross the street to go to White Castle if we didn't stop at Gorman's before we started home. We would never turn down Hoffman, it was always Fordham to Crotona and 189th and then down 189th past "The Rides" to Prospect to the schoolyard. Later on, after Keith Plaza went up, the route changed slightly to down Crotona and cut through the Big Schoolyard to Prospect, and then late 70's Arthur to 187th.. There were always people out in the neighborhood. Women sitting on beach chairs in front of the buildings, guys hanging at the corners, in front of social clubs, English and Italian, Albanian and Yugoslavian...and we, the Prospect girls, were always in the schoolyard. Sounds of music, conversation, window fans. Ducking the drops of water from air conditioners in windows lucky enough to have them. We were lucky to have had that. To have experienced the good, making the bad more tolerable, easier to forget. It was a great time in a great place. I miss it probably more than I should.