Month: March 2017

Ah, where to begin? Oliver Söhngen has much to say so he starts strumming a guitar. The notes literally help him find his voice: His forte is opera, and before long his robust tenor has joined the strings, filling the small room with an ocean of sound. Music has always been a part of Oliver’s life. Actually, it’s more accurate to say that music has always his life. Oliver, the founder and director of the Long Island City Academy of Music, was born in Siegen, Germany, surrounded by sound.…

Continue Reading →

Izzy Weitzman is sitting at the kitchen table putting cards into packets for pricing. Each one, he explains, entitles the bearer in the role-playing game to acquire mystical creatures and sorcerer’s spells. Some of them, he says, are worth a lot of money: He saw the Invention Edition of Lotus Petal on eBay for $250. “It’s not a card I really like,” he says. “I’m only asking $150 for it.” Izzy’s been collecting for a couple of years. He thinks he has about 700 cards. He also…

Continue Reading →

A coffee cup and pacifier in hand, Jason Greene, who has a quartet of kids, plops himself down on the living room floor, where his 18-month-old daughter, Arwen, is playing with giant LEGO tiles. Jason, lanky and laid back, waves good-bye to Cara, his wife, who is off to teach an English as a Second Language class. Two seconds later, he’s in a chair with tow-headed Arwen on his lap reading her a story. When she — and he — tire of the tiny tale of , they go off to find her bottle. …

Continue Reading →

Surrounded by magic wands, angel statues and spiritual tomes, Joan Becht Willette, aka The Enchanted Goddess, is reclining in her writing chair, notebook in hand, waiting for the right words to leap from pen to paper. Whether inspiration comes swiftly or slowly, it does not matter. The sun is shining, Merlin is meowing and Joan is sipping hot coffee from her Wonder Woman mug. It took Joan a long time – her entire life, in fact – to channel her creativity, which is why she’s helping other…

Continue Reading →