Far Rockaway, my little “home town” In the great big NYC Long ago, a resort for the rich But they left their big houses And beach bungalows For greener pastures I guess Making room for more humble folks Like my more middle-class family LOL We rode our bikes around Discovering little micro-neighborhoods as we did Rode them from one end of the boardwalk To the other end, 5 miles away Passing the skeeball games and hot dog stands Splashing around in the cold salt water of our corner Of the great Atlantic Ocean We learned an Israeli game called machanayim A combination of catch and dodgeball It was so much fun we wanted to play it all the time But just my sister and me, we needed more people to play So we taught the game to everyone we could And played it all day every day that summer Had Chinese food upstairs at the Far Rockaway Palace And felt so glamorous I was happy at home With my family and friends on the block But school was a different matter Just could not fit in there I thought that going to a commuter high school Would be an opportunity for a new start It didn’t really work out that way Wherever you go, there you are Took a long time to learn that lesson |