Well he was my friend was saying that New York should secede from the union he
said they wouldn't be missed and he said were all backwards and everything and
then he was saying all this stuff about how we should get tough on Muslims and
not allow him in this country and everything well I mean that's that's part of
it. And if you don't agree with them you get a lecture like you're in a college
classroom. That's why I'm not really sure what I'm gonna do about the
friendship. And he was saying my mayor was a communist and everything. I mean
that's really crazy and if you disagree with them you get told that you're
wrong and then he said I shouldn't vote Democratic I should vote Republican and
everything. He was trying to tell me how to vote and I told him I'm going to
vote the way I want to and that's it. I mean the guy doesn't like it when you
disagree with them you just get lectured. And I don't think that's right either.
Kathleen Polkabla
On Sep 21, 2016, at 1:00 PM, Rosemarie Chavarria <knitqueen2007@xxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
Hi, Kathleen,
I wouldn't end a friendship over someone being a republican. Gees louise.
Just because people have different beliefs, that doesn't make them evil.
Rosie
On 9/20/2016 11:50 PM, Kathleen Polkabla wrote:
Thank you for sending this article it was good. Wow. I think I'm glad I
wasn't there. Oh boy. And I had thought about going there Saturday to visit
people. I think I'm glad I didn't. Because I would've been stranded over
there and I couldn't of gotten back to Stuyvesant town. What a mess. You
know that's pretty lucky that's not not more damage has been done to the
building. But they've got a repair all those windows and that's going to be
costly. 15 apart apartments. And thank goodness Malibu donated food. And the
Red Cross helped out and I think they were paid. And our mayor even came to.
Even though one of my friends in Ohio keeps insisting he's a communist and
he keeps stressing New York. It's a typical Republican that listens to Rush
Limbaugh and stuff. And I'm really getting tired of him trashing people that
aren't Republican. It's really crazy. I hope I don't have to end the
friendship with him but I might have to.
Kathleen Polkabla
On Sep 21, 2016, at 12:20 AM, Devon Wilkins <theharness@xxxxxxxx> wrote:
Thanks, Nancy. I have just forwarded this to a friend of mine in Fresno
who used to live in New York City. Devon.
From: ourplace-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:ourplace-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] ;
On Behalf Of nancy Lynn
Sent: September-20-16 11:16 PM
To: "Undisclosed-Recipient:;"@freelists.org
Subject: [ourplace] Bomb Rattles Nerves but Strengthens ties at Building
for Blind
Some of you may not know, but the bomb that exploded on saturday night in
the middle of New York City was very close to an apartment building where a
lot of blind people live. I thought you’d find this article interesting.
Bomb Rattles Nerves but Strengthens Ties at Building for Blind. By ANNIE
CORREAL, SAMANTHA SCHMIDT and LIAM STACK; Jack Begg contributed research..
Roselyn Olivares was standing in her kitchen when she heard the explosion.
A living room window cracked. Glass shattered in the bedroom. Ms. Olivares,
who is blind, called out to her partner, asking her to peer outside their
living room window, which overlooks West 23rd Street in Chelsea. 'Tell me
what you see,' Ms. Olivares, 76, said.. Over the course of the next few
minutes, her partner, Carol Wixman, described firefighters and police
officers flooding the scene and a woman running down the street, screaming.
For anyone on West 23rd Street, the explosion Saturday night was jarring.
But for the residents of Selis Manor, a building directly behind the
Dumpster where the bomb exploded, the blast and the drama that ensued were
particularly terrifying: Like Ms. Olivares, most of the building's
residents are blind or otherwise visually impaired. 'If you don't see, and
you hear something like that, it's scary,' Ms. Olivares said. 'You don't
know which way to go. She quickly got dressed, wondering if she would have
to run, dreading that her building might collapse. (Residents were soon
ordered to stay inside.) She said she heard so many sirens, so many loud
sounds, that she began to feel sensory overload. Selis Manor, a 205-unit
apartment building at 135 W. 23rd Street, was built by Irving M. Selis, a
blind newsdealer, and opened in 1980. In the decades since, it has helped
turn a small slice of Manhattan into something of a haven for the blind and
visually impaired. The building has been under renovation since 2014 and is
partly covered in scaffolding. On Saturday night, a device placed under a
Dumpster on the eastern side of the building exploded, bursting windows and
spewing glass and shrapnel that injured 29 people. The blast, called 'an
intentional act' by Mayor Bill de Blasio, is still under investigation.
There were no reports of injuries among the building's residents, according
to its managing agent, Tony Savarese, but the force of the explosion
shattered windows as high as the third floor, broke a door frame and
obliterated a security camera perched above the entrance. It also rattled
residents of Selis Manor. Andrew Atell had just left home when the device
detonated. 'Luckily I walked under the scaffold and I
was almost at the end of the block when I heard a pretty loud boom,' he
said. 'I just see a little bit. I have some sight and walk with a cane. It
was a big boom. One loud boom. And then stuff started flying. 'I heard the
blast, and I heard little things coming down,' he said. 'I don't know if it
was glass or metal. It sounded like little pieces of glass. Mr. Atell, 63,
hurried to an F train station. 'Down in the subway, I heard someone was
trying to help somebody injured,' he said. 'I didn't stop. I got on the
train. No sense in turning back. He went to Brooklyn and returned around
midnight to find that he could not get back to his building: The block had
been closed. He waited at a McDonald's and was escorted home by law
enforcement officials around 3 a.m. If the blast interrupted what residents
described as a peaceful routine, it also activated the close-knit community
at Selis Manor. 'I went out to other people on the floor and said, 'What
happened? What happened? Jit Bhattacharyya said. Mr. Bhattacharyya, 70, is
visually impaired and has lived in the building for 25 years. He had been
waiting for an Indian program to come on TV when he 'felt it and I jumped,'
he said. 'My knee hit the table. I have never heard such a loud noise in my
life. It felt like thunder was coming through the window. He called the
lobby and went to a neighbor with a seeing home health attendant. On
Sunday, residents with seeing-eye dogs welcomed visits from dog walkers, to
whom they recounted the night's events. Kathy Mulvaney, 73, said just as
the explosion happened, her seeing-eye dog, a collie named Bella, had been
curled up on a reclining chair. The dog immediately jumped off and crawled
to her owner's side. 'She knew something was wrong,' Ms. Mulvaney said. Ms.
Mulvaney has lived in the building for 32 years, and has been blind for
several decades and has chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and asthma.
The worst part of the explosion, she said, was the uncertainty. 'There was
nobody around to tell us anything,' she said while sitting on her living
room couch in her nightgown, clutching her cane. The elevators were briefly
shut down, so it was difficult for residents to visit neighbors and discuss
what was happening. Ms. Mulvaney stayed glued to the radio, listening for
updates. On Sunday, her dog walker, Karin Magnuson, a volunteer through
PAWS NY, arrived to take Bella out. Ms. Magnuson led Bella and a black lab
named Ava, her usual charges, through the lobby, which was crowded with
people waiting for police clearance to get out, and past the scene of the
explosion, where investigators were placing numbers beside pieces of
shrapnel and other evidence. 'I took the dogs for a walk and then made my
way back through the barricades,' Ms. Magnuson said. One of the main
hangouts for Selis Manor's residents is the Malibu Diner, just down the
block. 'We have menus in Braille, but the people don't use them because
they know the menu better than me,' said Jose Collado, one of the diner's
owners. 'This is like their home. On Sunday morning, the street was closed
to traffic and swarming with law enforcement officials, and the diner was
closed. But as Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo and Mr. de Blasio took a walk around
the site, they asked Mr. Collado to open his restaurant to serve the
residents of Selis Manor, who had been told to stay put. 'The blind people
said if we didn't open, they couldn't eat,' Mr. Collado said. He went into
the kitchen and, with the help of two employees, prepared 200 orders of
eggs, bacon, ham, sausage and toast. The Red Cross helped with delivery.
Mr. Collado was not sure who would be footing the bill, but he said,
'Sometimes money is the least of your worries. He said the restaurant would
be preparing breakfast for the building's residents again on Monday..
PHOTOS: Above, a resident of Selis Manor being escorted back to the
building on West 23rd Street by a police officer on Sunday. Left,
seeing-eye dogs that live at the residence, which is home to many people
who are blind or visually impaired. An explosion on Saturday night occurred
outside. (PHOTOGRAPHS BY LOUIS LANZANO FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES; KARIN
MAGNUSON).
