Avenue J-Walk

There is a terrific irony in my having moved out of Brooklyn as fast as could be managed many years ago and my having spent most of my adult teaching life teaching in Brooklyn. "You know where the action is at" is how a friend put it. Oh, that I didn't have that action! Navigating the streets of Brooklyn takes more nerve, verve and sheer guts than I apparently have any more. Yes, Brooklyn gives you what you can't get anywhere else, and yesterday it almost gave it to me--yesterday I came the closest I hope EVER to come to killing someone.

If you have never travelled in a car along the length of Avenue J, save yourself nightmares and don't go. What was once a fairly sleepy city street has become a magnet for cars, trucks, buses and pedestrians. Where once there was only a stray kosher emporium there is now wall to wall frum shopping and dining. Pedestrian traffic is heavy and never ending. I avoid Avenue J like the plague and snake around through the side streets to get to work, although those side streets are far from driving heaven either, but they are better than going on J. But yesterday I got stuck and had to travel down J.

Avenue J is not a wide street. It has parking on both sides, bus stops every other block and two narrow lanes for two-way traffic. The traffic lights are never coordinated and it can take an easy 10-15 minutes to get from Ocean Parkway to E. 16th. Cars and trucks think absolutely nothing about double parking on this avenue, leaving other drivers to play the game of "thread the needle" with oncoming traffic. Getting into and out of parking spaces on the Avenue should be training for those heading to the world's combat zones. And if you have just seen someone pull into a parking space then proceed with extra caution, because that driver is going to inevitably throw open the driver's side door and emerge straight into traffic without looking and 100% with a cell phone in hand and a conversation going on. If only the vehicles were the only problem.

Strange medical fact: all the people in NYC with vision problems seem to congregate on Avenue J. They don't see when the light is green or when it is red and blithely step into street intersections without looking. They cross in the middle of the street, darting out between cars and trucks. Apparently they have never heard of the rule that when walking on a sidewalk, keep to the right. And here is the real kicker: every one of these people is carrying a cell phone closely held to their ear, concentrating mightily on what Tante Chaya said to Uncle Chaim.

You know who the worst offenders are? The mothers with young children in tow, although "tow" may be too optimistic for what goes on. Take one mother and 3-4 children. Who is holding onto mommy's hand? For starters, mommy has only one hand available, the other clasped tightly around her cell phone. There may or may not be a youngster holding the other hand. The rest of the kids are snaked out in a line behind mommy, except when they aren't. And that is where my nightmare began yesterday. One of those moms had her head up a different part of her anatomy yesterday. She was busy on her cell phone and made the decision to cross the Avenue. The pedestrian traffic signal was on its last blink of "don't walk" when she stepped out into traffic. She did not once turn her head to see if her kids were following right behind her. The screeching of tires was immediate as we braked heavily to avoid hitting her. But the real kicker was that her trail of little kiddies was behind her, one little one wandering off the straight path and heading straight for the moving cars. I came within a real hair's breadth of hitting what looked to be like a three year old. And then I lost it completely. While the mom, still on the phone, is yelling for her kids to get over to her, I got out of the car, marched over to her, grabbed the cell phone out of her hand and hit the off button. I also remember yelling at her that Jews are forbidden to rely on miracles. And then she suddenly seemed to notice her little one, who was busy trying to scratch at a sticker on my bumper.

Did I get an apology? What world are you living in?! Did she immediately and tearfully gather her youngsters up? Well, she did call out to the kids "I told you to stay close to me!" She finally made it across the street, as did all her little ones. And as she got on the curb at the corner she had her cell phone up to her ear again. I'm sure she was telling her friend all about the meshugenah driver who almost did her harm and who almost attacked her, and look who they are giving driver's licenses to today.

It won't solve all the driving problems on the Avenue but perhaps New York State did not go far enough with its law about not driving and using a hand held cell phone at the same time (a law, by the way, that the people in the Avenue J area have apparently never heard of): perhaps what is needed is a new law that forbids talking on the phone while walking in congested travel areas like Avenue J. When I was younger we had a phrase to describe someone we thought had less than the requisite amount of brains and seichel--we used to say that that person "couldn't walk and chew gum at the same time." Substitute "talk on a cell phone" for gum and you've got a perfect description of the Avenue J pedestrians.

I can joke about it sort of today, but yesterday could have been a real tragedy. Had that little one sped up just the tiniest bit or had my reflexes been off just the tiniest bit, I could have killed a toddler. Years back a driver on Fourteenth Avenue in Boro Park made an illegal jump across all the lanes of traffic on a red light and hit my car, where I had just made a legal left turn. Was he hurrying over to see if I was hurt? Was he anxiously assessing what damage he had done to my then 2-week old car? Was he apologetic? None of the above. First, he didn't want to give me his insurance information--"Yiddin can settle this among themselves" is what he said. Like hell. And then the kicker was when he told me that I didn't know how to drive in Brooklyn. He almost got that right, but what he should have said was that I don't like having to drive in Brooklyn.

Readers, New York has many wonderful attractions. Take my word for it--Avenue J should be crossed off of your "must see" list.