Blogging 101

Several readers have asked, "So, what is a blog, anyway?"

That's why Smartmom decided that it was time to have a teeny, tiny tutorial in blogging. So here goes. A blog is literally a WeB Log. Hence the name Blog. It is literally a daily journal on the Internet about politics, music, art, teen angst, the world according to ______ (someone's name here), or just about anything else.

Just click on that "next blog" buttom at the top right corner of the screen and check out thousands of other blogs.

The neat thing about blogs is that they are interactive. In other words, readers can respond by making comments. These comments are accessible at the bottom of every post. If there are no comments, you will see a 0. If there are comments, it might say 1, 6, or 596 depending on how many comments there are. Click the number and voila, you can read the comments. In order to comment, readers must be registered with Blogspot and give themselves a Blogspot name. Comments are warmly appreciated—and it's really not that big a deal to register with Blogspot.

Another nice thing about Blogspot: it automatically archives all posts. This means that you, dear reader, can access all of Smartmom's previous posts either by scrolling down at the side of the screen or clicking on the link that says: Previous Posts -- 10/10/04 - 10/16/04, for example. It's a great way to catch up on all the posts you've missed.

Some history. Smartmom discovered blogging when Teen Spirit sent her a link to his very own blog. Smartmom will be a good mom and NOT divulge the name of Teen Spirit's blog. She was, however, blown away by his blog and especially liked his blog motto: "What if the Hokey Pokey really IS what it's all about..."

As she read Teen Spirit's blog, she felt motherly pride for her son's fun, bloggy writing style. "Whoa, this is so cool," she said to herself. "It's like an x-ray into the mind of my 13-year-old." Not that she wanted to snoop. No, it wasn't that at all. It's just that Smartmom is, shall we say, a student of Teen Spirit's mind. And it was fun to do some studying. Yeah, that's the ticket.

Anyhoo.

Much as Smartmom LOVED Teen Spirit's blog, it didn't really occur to her to start her own. She figured it was something the teen generation was doing these days. This was reinforced by the fact that her twin 16-year-old nieces were both blogging as was their 20-year old sister, who is a student at UCLA. As it turned out, quite a few of Teen Spirit's friends were bloggin'. Suddenly, Smartmom understood why Teen Spirit was spending so much time hunched over his little white iBook in the dining room.

And then one day, out of the blue, Smartmom felt moved to start one of her own. It came to her, like so many of her best ideas, after meditating, Smartmom got up off her medititation pillow and walked over to her desk like she was in a dream. Typing her way to Teen Spirit's blog, she did some quick reverse engineering and figured out how to create her own. Why, right on the opening page of Blogspot it said, "Create an account, Name your blog, Choose a template in 3 easy steps." And it's free.

1,2,3...

In 3 easy steps, Smartmom came up with Only the Blog Knows Brooklyn (OTBKB), which she subtitled: The Adventures of Smartmom, Hepcat, Teen Spirt, and the Oh So Feisty One. Once she had those anonyms for her immediate family, Smartmom knew that she could let loose on whatever was floating through her mind. And it felt right and appropriately bloggish.

In a few week's time, OTBKB evolved into a chatty, fun, personal, sometimes funny, sometimes serious romp down Seventh Avenue and beyond. From the start, Smartmom was committed to the idea of the boldface names approach to Brooklyn restaurants, stores, schools, and other local landmarks. While she wanted the blog to have a real sense of place, she also wanted to create a personal but not too personal forum for what was going on in her life.

At first, OTBKB was very much like a daily journal. But then Smartmom decided that you, dear reader, didn't really need to know what delicious entree Hepcat was preparing for dinner, the exact time she and OSFO fell asleep after bedtime reading, or what freelance writing project she was working on. And yet, within reason, the daily travails of life on Third Street were perfect fodder for Smartmom's bloggy voice.

Over time, OTBKB evolved into what Smartmom likes to call her very own "Hers" column. For those too young to remember, the "Hers" column was a feature in the Thursday New York Times for years. Short-form memoir writing at its best, the column was authored by an ever-changing pantheon of some of the best women writers around. That column morphed into the "Lives" page, which is currently on the back page of the Magazine Section of the Sunday New York Times. While quite different from "Hers," it too is often smart, interesting, and well-written. Other bloggy, journalistic influences include, "Waiting for Dessert" in The Village Voice, Anne Roiphe and Ron Rosenbaum in The New York Observer, Sam Sifton and other great columnists in The New York Press.

Which isn't to say that OTBKB is all that well written. Smartmom just wants her readers to know that she's aiming high.

So that in a nutshell is blogging and some reasons why Smartmom decided to do it. Sadly, ever since Smartmom began blogging, Teen Spirit hasn't posted a thing. In fact, his blog has been dormant for weeks. Smartmom's best guess is that once he saw that Smartmom was indulging in the blogosphere, he decided that it wasn't very cool anymore. Which is too bad since he had so much to say. Ah well, he's probably on to the next way-cool thing, lightyears ahead of his pre-historic mom. It is also possible that he's created a brand new blog and has no intention of sharing it with his copycat mom.

Smartmom, however, is glad to report that she's inspired a small blogging fad among some of her friends. And to those who haven't tried it yet, Smartmom says, "Give it a go, dear readers. In 3 easy steps, you too can be a blogging fool."

Some Things are Certain

There is one thing Teen Spirit knows for sure. He does NOT want to attend Automotive High School. "Why would I want to spend four years learning to do the most boring thing imaginable?" he asked the other night over dinner at Thai Sky, Fifth Avenue's fabulous new Thai place. "It's not like I'm interested in becoming a car mechanic or something. I think I would have a very boring life."

Teen Spirit was responding to Smartmom's earlier question, which went something like, "How was the high school fair today, dear?"

The ever inquisitive teen had "window shopped" at Middle School 51's small high school fair held earlier in the day. The 8th graders were invited to the gymnasium to talk to the representatives who'd shown up from the various high schools. In addition to Automotive High School, all the usual suspects were there, including Murrow, Stuyvesant, Midwood, The Jacqueline Onassis High School, even the Frank Sinatra School of the Arts. But it was the vocational schools that really caught Teen Spirit's eye. Aviation, Automotive, Transit Tech. With characteristic curiosity, Teen Spirit took it all in.

We were having a quick dinner at Thai Sky before going en famille on a school tour in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. And Teen Spirit was on a rant, albeit a rather spunky, agitated rant. "And furthermore, I don't think Transit Tech High School would be right for me either," he said over bites of Chicken Sate. "I don't really want to spend the rest of my life working on the subway. Besides, I'd have to learn how to talk in this really strange, subway conductor way." At this point in the conversation, Teen Spirit imitated an F-Train Subway Conductor in true monotone: "Next Stop Seventh Avenue, watch the closing door."

The family finished their feast of Roasted Duck Pad Thai, Panang Curry and Sticky Rice and were on their way to Bay Ridge. They got terribly lost trying to find the school, which is located on Fourth Avenue in the high sixties. Smartmom had memorized the wrong street number (chalk it up to nerves and "the trying to get your kid into a good NYC high school heebie jeebies"). Hepcat got wildly agitated, as he often does when he has to drive to places he's never been. The four finally did find the high school after ASKING FOR DIRECTIONS at a nearby gas station. It was an unspeakable thing to do, and Hepcat drove into the gas station kicking and screaming, but Smartmom didn't want to miss their first high school tour completely.

Smartmom will not bore you, dear reader, with details about the school. But OSFO particularly liked the physics teacher, who reminded her of a character out of the Harry Potter books. The young, good looking teacher impressed the group with a really coooool holigram of a small pig. OSFO absolutely LOVED the pig and the way the teacher said more than once, "Physics is really AWESOME."

Teen Spirit showed off his true intellectual sophistication by insisting that we leave the tour early so that he could see the third presidential debate. Can you put -- passionately interested in the things he's passionately interested in -- on the high school application? How about blathering on about all the ways in which your child is simply amazing. But the admissions people don't want that. They want stats, ranking, grades, and standardized testing. But that's okay -- that's life on the fast-lane, even if it is only 8th grade.

The family listened to the candidates, products of expensive WASPy boarding schools and Yale, debate on the car radio. When they got home, Teen Spirit sat up close to the television set (which has been getting a lot of use of late for said debates). Teen Spirit, a born pundit, provided scintillating ringside observations during Bush and Kerry's tempestuous talkathon.

Haggen Daz Chocolate Ice Cream was an elixir for all after the rigors of another day on the search for Teen Spirit's dream high school.

A Date at the Coop

Smartmom has something to say that may shock you. But she's going to say it anyway. Here goes: She actually likes her work shift at the Park Slope Food Coop. Truth be told, it's practically her favorite three hours of the month.

For one thing, Hepcat and Smartmom do the shift together. And that's a treat because they rarely spend any time alone. Yes, of course, they sleep in the same bed. But there is often a squirmy 7-year-old sleeping between them. And being fast asleep does not qualify as quality togetherness time.

Like many Slope couples with kids, they also try to have a "date night" every now and again. This might be a trip to the BAM Rose Cinema for "Fahrenheit 9/11" or a tasty dinner and a glass (or many glasses) of a really earthy Cabernet Sauvigon at Belleville. But because of the hectic nature of life these days, those "dates" have become few and far between. So in a sense, the shift at the coop every fourth Wednesday at 11 a.m., functions as a "date," a nice chance to spend some time together, a way to catch up on things.

Since February 2004, Hepcat and Smartmom have been "independent office workers" at the Coop. They work in the Cedar Room, a windowless room with a locked metal door in an undisclosed location, where they sort and count coins and cash using a coin sorting machine and a rapid-fire cash counting machine. They also fill those famous brown zippered wallets with cash and coins, for the next day's cashiers,

Now don't get the wrong idea. It's not like they're whispering sweet nothings into each other's ears, or making out on the sly in the Cedar Room. No, no, no. As dedicated members of the Food Coop of the People's Republic of Park Slope, they understand that there is work to be done, to be done, to be done. And they go about their job with characteristic rigor and focus.

But sometimes, sometimes, toward the end of their shift, when all of the coins have been sorted, they have been known to share a good story, a joke, or an amusing anecdote about Teen Spirit or OSFO. They've even been known to nuzzle a bit, engage in a quick hug or exchange furtive kisses.

Hepcat and Smartmom also enjoy listening to the wacky conversations on the Coop's public address system -- the time honored way that working Coop members communicate with one another. There's the guy who gets on and says, "I need a ride to Windsor Terrace. Don't laugh. Sometimes I really do get a ride this way. I'm waiting by the front door." Or the questions between team members: "Do we still have the Greek yogurt?" "No, we don't have that Greek yogurt anymore." "That was really great Greek yogurt." "Yeah, I know..."

At the start of their shift, there are always bags and bags of coins that need to be put through the sorting machine. Ah, the coin sorting machine -- the greatest invention since whole wheat bread. Noisy, yes. Very. The Kaching, Kaching, Kachinging can get on your nerves. But what a machine it is.

It's actually a fairly tedious job putting coins through the coin sorting machine. But it does require a good deal of concentration. Every couple of minutes, one of the paper coin rolls becomes full, the machine stops, and the full paper roll must be removed from its holder. If you forget to replace the paper roll and continue sorting, all hell breaks lose and there will be coins all over the table. When this happens, Hepcat usually emits a flurry of exasperated sighs. Smartmom, from the coin sorting machine at the other side of the tiny room, sends soft words of comfort his way as he rights the mess.

Then there's the cash-counting machine. Smartmom was a tad intimidated by it when she first started to work in the Cedar Room. The high speed way that it counts bills can only be described as startling. And if you don't know what you're doing, the bills will go flying all over the place. At first, Hepcat says, Smartmom reminded him of Charlie Chaplin in "Modern Times." Y'know, the famous factory assembly-line scene. Another time, Hepcat declared that Smartmom was doing an unintentionally perfect impersonation of Lucille Ball in the chocolate factory episode of "I Love Lucy."

For this and other reasons, Smartmom loves to partner with Hepcat in the Cedar Room. Truly, he is one of those people who is exceptionally comfortable with the physical world. Unlike Smartmom, machines don't scare him one bit. In fact, they seem to bring out the best in him -- the guy grew up on a farm in California and thinks nothing of taking apart cars, tractors, milking machines, and watches. He sometimes even puts them back together...

Smartmom finds it quite titillating to watch Hepcat confidently feed the coin sorting machine and interact with the frantic cash counter. She loves to watch him flick the tabs of the coin rolls with two thumbs, and neatly line up the color-coded coin rolls in the boxes where they belong.

When the job is done, there's a great feeling of accomplishment. Smartmom is charged with filling out the daily coin box form, which means she has to use a calculator to do some semi-complex addition and multiplication. Then, the two put the boxes away in the metal cabinet, turn off the sorting machine and the cash counter, and neaten up the tables, leaving the Cedar Room just as they found it.

Sometimes after the shift, Hepcat and Smartmom grab a bite of lunch or a do a quick shop at the Coop. Having spent three hours alone in each other's company, the feeling of reconnection is palpable. Who knew socialism could be so romantic?

New York City Nightmare #2004

Smartmom is bummin', so stressed out is she about getting Teen Spirit into a good high school. Last night she and Hepcat sat in the auditorium of Middle School 51 and listened to a roomful of parents reduce their children to a bunch of statistics. "If my kid is in the top 2% does that mean..."

For those of you who are unfamiliar with the New York City high school shuffle, there are no zoned high schools in this town. This means that eighth graders have to apply to high school much like applying to college. Admission is based on their performance on a standardized test they took in 7th grade and their grades. Some schools have special admissions tests Others rely on auditions, interviews, recommendations, and portfolios. And that's not all—every kid has to select 12 schools that they'd consider attending -- because you never know. It's a highly competitive jungle out there and you just might have to attend choice number 12...

Get the picture? As one of Smartmom's fellow Writers and Drinkers wrote in an e-mail: "I wish I could go into suspended animation and wake up with everything done." Suspended animation sounds like a good idea right about now.

As you can see, getting your kid into a good New York City high school is just another New York City nightmare. One more penetrating reason to consider pulling up stakes and high tailing it out of this burg. But where can you go? Sag Harbor, Long Island? Northern California? Iceland?

Don't think Smartmom hasn't considered renting a house somewhere, anywhere, and sending her genuis child to a local school in a town where the kids JUST GO TO HIGH SCHOOL. Y'know, wake up on the first day of ninth grade with a school down the street that will happily take him in.

At last night's meeting, the school's guidance counselors did their best to answer two hours of hysterical questions. Understandably, a lot of parents were in a state of extreme agitation. And the Board of Education isn't helping matters screwing up the way they have: the high school information books are weeks late; the rules are changing; and nobody seems to know what's going on. The guidance counselors did what they could to allay everyone's fears. But you could see that they were as confused as everyone else. And there was plenty of heavy sighing in the room, agitated grimaces, and indiscreet rolling of the eyes. Who can blame the crowd -- victims all of a dehumanizing system.

Just so you know, Smartmom went to small private schools in Manhattan. She was educated at a time when progressive education was not a dirty word. Hey, it was the late sixties and the seventies, get my drift? She had, what might be called, a child-centered education that valued human potential. Her high school was named for Henry David Thoreau's Walden Pond, for chrissake. And Groovy Aunt went to Bank Street when it was on Bank Street!! Now how's that for cool cred. It was another time, another place, a world away from the hyper-competitive rat race that is education in 21st century New York city.

Which isn't to say that Smartmom isn't pleased as punch with the public education that Teen Spirit and OSFO have received thus far. Park Slope's PS 321 is an unbelievably great public school with great teachers and staff. Heck, Smartmom and Hepcat moved from the wrong side of Fifth Street to Third Street just to send their kids to that vaulted academy. While Teen Spirit's experience at Middle School 51 has been mixed, he seems to be sailing through the so-called "difficult middle school years" with a healthy amount of confidence and smarts. So things have been basically okay. Until now.

On the way to last night's meeting, Smartmom and Hepcat had a rapid fire shouting match -- many unpleasant words were bandied about. Needless to say, they were both stressin'. Smartmom chalks it up to a bad case of "the trying to get your kid into high school heebie jeebies." Hepcat, if you're reading this: SORRY.

Imagine how difficult this process is to maneuver if you don't have a flexible work schedule, don't speak English, or didn't go to high school (or college) yourself?

Rest assured, Smartmom and Hepcat will be taking great pains not to take out the inevitable stresses of this odious process on eachother or their children. As another friend wrote in a heartfelt e-mail, "We should be drinking our way through this, however life is requiring a high degree of self control and responsibility these days." And right she is. We parents are all victims of a system that forces us to treat our children like race horses and not the fascinating, deeply unique human beings that they are.

The Song of Summer Ending

Tonight at bedtime, Smartmom read a few chapters of E.B. White's "Charlotte's Web" to OSFO and Teen Spirit (he for the umpteenth time), and was struck once again by this poetic and poignant passage at the beginning of Chapter 15. "The crickets sang in the grasses. They sang the song of summer's ending, a sad monotonous song. 'Summer is over and gone,' they sang. 'Over and gone, over and gone. Summer is dying, dying.'"

Unfortunately, we can't hear the song of the crickets in Park Slope. It's possible that there are some crickets in Prospect Park or The Brooklyn Botanic Garden. But we can't hear them above the hum of the neighbor's air conditioners and the noisy traffic racing up Third Street.

Fact is, we really don't need crickets to tell us that summer has come to an end. There are already too many reminders that its leisurely days have been replaced by our action-packed, high-speed lives.

Ever since Smartmom and family got back from their idyllic California farm vacation in late August, summer has been, as E.B. White wrote, "over and gone, over and gone. Summer is dying, dying."

First there was the Republican National Convention, which rocked the city with an outpouring of anti-Bush, anti-war protests. Then came the aniversary of September 11th, which has now become the official end of summer for most New Yorkers in the way that it signifies the loss of innocence that came with the terrorists, the rubble, and the mournful white ash.

Then there was the start of school. Groan. The children never look forward to getting back into the swing of things. But it's the parents who really dread the return to tension-filled mornings, homework, and the other stresses of school life.

Still, autumn is probably the most beautiful season in Park Slope. Slopesters are blessed to have Frederick Law Olmstead's magnificent park when summer is changing into fall. And on the Slope's tree-lined streets, the multi-colored leaves mesh pontilistically with the brownstone, red brick, limestone and stained glass of this 19th century neighborhood.

In other ways too, the Slope welcomes the change of seasons. The stores on Seventh Avenue are festooned with Halloween costumes, ghoulish make-up and party decorations. And at the facing Korean markets on Garfield Place, there are dueling pumpkins, gourds, and autumnal flower arrangements.

But fall also brings with it the realization that the children of Park Slope are growing up. Last year's baby's are this year's toddlers. Yesterday's pre-schoolers are lining up at PS 321. Elementary begets middle school And perhaps most shocking of all, an inordinate number of the kids of Park Slope have become bona-fide TEENAGERS.

Has anyone else noticed the huge crowds of just-hatched teens around The Mojo and PS 321. As the mother of a 13-year-old, perhaps Smartmom is particularly attuned to this age group. Consequently, she spends a prolific amount of time spying on them fascinated as she is by their outfits (grunge meets punk meets goth meets psychedelic); their habits (some are smoking and it ain't just tobacco); and their big-time ATTITUDE.

And many of these Slope teens are, well, huge. Over the summer, the girls became women and the boys became men. And it's just so freaky. They look like stretched-out versions of themselves as children. But, truly, they are not children anymore. How quickly the years sped by. Just yesterday they were being pushed around in McClaren strollers on Seventh Avenue sipping from sippy cups and eating string cheese. How did this happen?

As Joni Mitchell wrote, "And the seasons, they go round and round..."

Fortunately OSFO and Teen Spirit still enjoy lying in the big bed listening to Smartmom read "Charlotte's Web," a book that depicts a magical childhood on a farm, a world away from 21st century Park Slope. They love to hear the story of Fern, a girl who understands the language of a pig, a spider and the other animals in the barn.

Smartmom knows that OSFO and Teen Spirit won't always want to read "Charlotte's Web" and that one day they too might be hanging out in front of The Mojo (Teen Spirit is already growing out of the nest in some ways). But Smartmom is so grateful for these bedtime readings, these loving cuddles before sleep. She knows that Teen Spirit and OSFO will change and grow. That's the way it goes. Just not yet, please. Not yet.

Movers and Shakers

Life on Third Street hasn't been the same since The Deserter's moved to Nyack. Mrs. Deserter's window boxes are still on their old window sills on the second floor across the street. The plants are growing wild, snaking downward, practically touching the top of the first floor windows. Smartmom hasn't seen the new owners water them once, which is a sad state of affairs, since Mrs. Deserter was obsessive in the loving attention she lavished on those boxes. Smartmom misses the sight of Mrs. Deserter leaning out her window with her gardening shears and watering can. For years, the two would wave and share news in true Brooklyn fashion: Smartmom yelling from across the street to Mrs. Deserter at her window sill.

The Deserters were the first people Smartmom and Hepcat knew in Park Slope. Old friends from Smartmom's college days, they were mavericks in a way, Park Slope pioneers. Living on Ninth Street in a huge railroad floor-thru, they didn't have kids then and their apartment was a bohemian's paradise crammed full of books, the artwork of friends, a grand piano and Mr. Deserter's ancient video equipment.

They moved to Third Street after their first child was born and that's really when the two families became intertwined. They lived in the same kind of apartment in the same kind of limestone building on two sides of the same street. Mr. Deserter, however, was convinced that Smartmom's apartment was much wider.

It's not that they ever did that much together. But they would often cross the great divide of Third Street and laugh about the fact that people on one side of Third Street rarely socialized with those on the other. The friends proudly broke with Third Street convention and would sit in one another's front yards watching their kids play. They'd invite one another to building bar-be-cues and block parties and share birthdays and other events. But really what they did was talk, endlessly talk about gardening (back when Smartmom was interested in sidewalk gardening), pre-school, PS 321, life as mamas, life as papas, The COOP, careers, art, movies, books, politics, computer programming, dot.com boom, dot.com bust, kids, kids, and more kids. There seemed to be no end to the way their lives ran parallel and it was always interesting to share eachother's news and blues.

The families were known to get together for impromputu "what's in your refrigerator?" dinners. Out on Third Street, Hepcat and Mrs. Deserter would discuss their latest purchases from the PARK SLOPE FOOD COOP and come up with imaginative menus to Smartmom and Mr. Deserter's delight. "I've got a pork loin, an eggplant," Mrs. Deserter would say. "And I've got mescalin salad, and some nice asparagus," Hepcat might add. The Deserters were like family in a way and there was an ease, a familiarity, which made these dinners such fun. With so much shared history, they'd regale eachother with stories about old friends, professors, and their younger selves at a younger time. They'd finish up these wine soaked evenings with good gossip about their neighbors, of which there was never a shortage.

For years, The Deserters talked about buying a house in the Slope. And when their second son came along, it became imperative that they find a bigger place to live. Sometime last year their attention turned, shockingly, to suburbia. Smartmom never imagined they'd cross that line. But Mrs. Deserter longed for a backyard as her gardening ambitions had grown beyond her beloved window boxes -- she needed a larger canvas, so to speak. And soon, the Deserters discovered Nyack and became convinced that they'd found a town, similar in some ways to Park Slope, that they could call home.

They moved in August while Smartmom and family were still in California. When Smartmom returned, their windows were dark. A few weeks later, she saw a moving truck and figured that the new owners had moved in. Smartmom hasn't set eyes on them yet, but when she does she wants to tell them to take care of those window boxes, it's not polite to neglect good memories that way.

She Stoops to Conquer

It's Autumn in Park Slope and the streets are positively brimming with stoop sales. They are as ubiquitous as pumpkins this time of year and the lamp posts on Seventh Avenue are taped thick with clever signs. And on the sidewalks, there are the quaint, hand drawn chalk arrows and large letters that say, "This way, lrg multi fam stp sale..."

How one feels about stoop sales on a given Saturday depends largely on one's mood. If you're up for it, they can be great fun -- a tempting way to waste time on a weekend morning. But if you're not in the mood, it can feel like one more Slope cliche. And if your apartment is already unbearably cluttered, each room a veritable monument to unwanted detritus, the sight of a stoop sale may induce nausea, or bring on an unpleasant sneer.

An then there's the matter of quality. Most stoop sales lack it, which reduces the whole endeavor to a form of garbage picking. In other words, Slopesters could be a tad more selective about what they set out for sale. Ever hear of the Salvation Army or the New York Department of Sanitation?

It can actually be embarrassing to see what people offer for sale. Granted, Smartmom is only seeing the stuff that her fellow Slopesters are trying to get rid of. But the fact that they bought it in the first place is the crazy thing. The lamps, the furniture, the clothing, the books that get hauled out of basements and plopped on the street. Do people really want to broadcast the fact that "Chicken Soup for the Soul" was in their library to begin with? Like snooping in someone's medicine cabinet, it can be downright unflattering what you learn about people at stoop sales.

In a sense, a stoop sale is a a micro-history of people's lives—the good, the bad, and the ugly. It can be touchingly revealing of a person's outdated dreams and aspirations, their misguided interests, tastes and styles. You wore that? You read that? That ugly lamp graced your living room? The fact is, you can truly learn too much about a person at a stoop sale. And sometimes less really is more.

Which isn't to say that Smartmom can resist the call of a stoop sale. Like many Slopsters, the sight of one can set her heart a- thumping. And she's been known to cross the street two, even three times on a single block to check out sidewalk tables, ever optimistic that the next one will be THE ONE, the one that will make her dreams come true.

And what exactly might a great stoop sale be? Well, a great stoop sale, and there is such a thing, might have an item that Smartmom really needs, like an unused classic yellow rain slicker for Teen Spirit. Or a pair of never-worn roller blades in OSFO's size.

It might feature the original Clue Game (remember Col. Mustard and Miss Plum?) with all the pieces neatly put away. Or an out-of-print children's book Smartmom adored as a child such as the original hardcover edition of "The Lonely Doll," or the now-classic "Pretty Pretty Peggy Moffit."

A great stoop sale might have a top notch selection of small press poetry books that meet with Smartmom's discriminating tastes or kitschy tablecloths from the 1940's. A really great stoop sale, and this would be pretty unusual, might even have a vintage globe, preferably a black, light-up one, that would fit perfectly into Smartmom's priceless collection of 100 or more.

But a great stoop sale is pretty darn rare. And Smartmom is too discreet to list the stoop sale blunders she's made -- those items that within minutes of the purchase she had to stuff in the trash (or sell at a future stoop sale). Alas, even Smartmom has gotten pulled into the frenzy, the gelatinous quick sand that a stoop sale can be.

And yes, Smartmom and family have, in a fit of de-cluttering, had their own stoop extravaganzas. They've endured the heartwrenching ordeal of watching friends and strangers reject their treasured garbage. It can be downright dispiriting to beg someone to take a beloved, but too small, Agnes B shirt for a quarter, or Teen Spirit's toddler corderoy pants from Garnet Hill for a dime.

For the stoop seller, a sale can also be regular nostalgia fest, so imbued are one's pocessions with memories of people, places, and things. It's positively Proustean. But afterwards, there is the post-stoop high, the feeling that one has made space for the new, which comes of having cleared one's apartment of all those remembrances of mistakes past.