Stories I Tell Myself
Linda Brody Bakst on Brooklyn, growing up, identity and more
Category: Gentrification
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NOTE: I submitted this piece to the Brooklyn Nonfiction Prize and it was selected as a finalist. Yesterday was the reading and though I did not win, I am proud to have participated. It always feels a bit risky to put yourself out there, but if you don’t you can’t grow. My family has been…
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I arrive at the corner of Bleecker and Sixth Avenue with a decision to make: continue clearing out Aunt Clair’s apartment or head home. I take a breath after running around to three banks to close out Clair’s accounts and dropping off her cable equipment. Despite the sunny skies and unseasonably mild weather, I am…
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Note: This is an edited and reworked piece that I thought was timely. I continue to struggle with what is happening in our nation. The combination of Covid-19 and racism is toxic. I can only hope that we come through it to a better place, having begun to reckon with our history. I will look…
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When I was in graduate school I lived on 80thand Columbus Avenue in Manhattan. It was 1980. It was my first exposure to gentrification. I hadn’t heard the term before, but it was taking place before my eyes as the block transformed brownstone by brownstone. Drug addicts, homeless and working class people were displaced by…
