Closing Statement for my Unemployment Insurance Hearing

Addressed to Paula S. Yorke, Administrative Law Judge, NYS Dept. of Labor
 
Title I of the Americans with Disabilities Act prohibits employers from discriminating against qualified individuals. An employer is required to make reasonable accommodation to the known disability of an employee if the request does not impose undue hardship to the operation of the [...]

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New York on $425 a Week

Take a walk across Williamsburg Bridge. Unlike the over-exposed Brooklyn Bridge, littered with hundreds of camera- obsessed tourists, a hike across the Williamsburg Bridge offers one the sense of abandonment in the city of 9 million.
It is relatively empty upon the graffiti- ridden bridge. Cars flow like river rappids under one’s feet, but other [...]

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Stone Creek Ridge

Esther Emerson-Taylor had a green thumb and hair colored the same shade as the skin on a tomato. The annual seeds planted in her garden came back every year like perennials. The heads of her zinnias were as round as a child’s face. Her marigolds grew taller than sunflowers. Rhubarb in her garden was so succulent, [...]

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How to Apply for Food Stamps in Brooklyn

I may be crazy, but I’m no fool. Having lost my job during this time of economic ruin and finding myself in a legal battle with my former employer for unemployment insurance benefits, I had not choice but to apply for public welfare. I marched my ass into the food stamp office here in Bed-Stuy. [...]

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Screwing Up Funding for STD Prevention

The $400 Million investment bang for the prevention of sexually transmitted diseases included within President Obama’s new economic stimulus plan was like legalized prostitution. It is best for our economy that the funding was cut.
It’s hard to fathom that the United States Congress was almost led blindly by the cock suckers of the [...]

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Love along the Rails

 
Elizabeth is Mal-Mal Miller’s real name. The eponym Liz, like with Hollywood actresses, is the preferred calling in Petersburg. Folks in places like the post office or Skip’s gas station call her Liz. Names like Elizabeth sound far too formal for those that speak a country dialect.
“Me and Bill’d go out dancing at the legion [...]

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Naked as a Jay Bird

The top and bottom porches at grandma Miller’s house face dew East. On fair days, when the clover of the Lehigh Valley isn’t under cloud cover, rising suns shed flaming rays of warmth down Goosegreen Street. The glowing infrared beams come to rest on the weather warn wood of Mal-Mal Miller’s house. She hangs her [...]

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