You've started me on a trip down "Memory Lane." I was born in Jersey City and so were my parents and grandparents. We could see the Statue of Liberty from my grandparents' kitchen window (they lived upstairs, we lived downstairs.) All the houses were similar -- duplexes with a narrow alley between them. I lived there only until I completed eighth grade in 1960 but I knew every family on my street, Bidwell Avenue, that had kids: The Duffys, the O'Connors, the Rydwins, the Coogans, the Parseghians, the Lanagans, the Kearneys, the Wards, and the Reillys. Oh, and Gigi Up-the-Street and Karen Up-the-Street, too. We played outside every day: box ball, stoop ball, roller-skates (where's my skate key?), or walked to Bayside Park. We took the bus to Roosevelt Stadium for ice skating; we walked to the public library on Hudson Boulevard (I think it's Kennedy, now), swam at the CYO pool, and in the summer hung out sometimes at the Bayonne Pool. (Ooh, that pool scene was fun -- the PA blasted Connie Francis singing "Lipstick on your Collar" and I was wearing lipstick for the first time, behind my mother's back.)

I remember lining up for flag-raising every morning at Sacred Heart School, running to the 12:20 low Mass in the church basement on Sundays. I loved going to the movies in Journal Square: those plush balconies, Oriental rugs, and chandeliers in the Loew's and the Stanley. I used to walk to the stores on Ocean Avenue between Bidwell and Bayview: Joe's Delicatessen, the shoemaker's, Aiello's (fruits and vegetables), the butcher's, Mrs. Pinkowitz's notions, Eddie Cox's News and Candy store (had a fountain and nickel cokes -- NICKEL cokes, dear God I AM old), and the A&P on the corner.

We played on the street unsupervised by parents who trusted us to be where we said we would be. But it was a different world. Would any parent today allow two 12 year olds to take the Tube into Manhattan every Saturday morning to a class for the High School Entrance Exam?

My favorite image? I remember the Holy Name Parade in Lincoln Park on one cold Sunday, how beautiful our city looked then, the women in fur, the men and boys marching with their crisp pennants, and children dressed in their best. I loved the camaraderie in the air as people shouted their hellos to each other.

My time in Jersey City was short, but its impact on me was tremendous. I had what you'd have to call a happy childhood.