The Cheers Leader

Veronica Devine is padding around in her bare feet. She’s a morning person, a really funny thing for a bar owner to be. She’s shucked her sky-high silver sandals, which she swears on a bottle of Smirnoff are as comfortable as house slippers. She went to a customer’s wake last night and didn’t put her pretty blond head to pillow until 11 p.m., long past her 8 p.m. bedtime. Her blue eyes look like faded jeans. It’s not yet 9 o’clock, and she’s been cleaning…

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The Sister to the World’s Women

Lordy, lordy, things could have taken quite a different turn if Maureen McGowan hadn’t hated Irish step-dancing so much. In a burst of ill-conceived patriotism, her immigrant parents made her take lessons so she could learn the culture of their homeland. What’s worse, they signed her and her three older siblings up with a group that went around performing in nursing homes and way stations for wayward children. That’s why at age 10 Maureen found herself in Peekskill, New York, dancing…

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The Well-Engineered Family

It’s a microchip, one-bedroom apartment, and they are a family of four, so there are certain compromises that must be made. They’re in the living room/office/playroom/dining room/family room. Jarda Nehybka is cutting some whole-wheat bread to go with the salad he’s made. Martina, his wife, is holding one-year-old Simonek, who is hurling magnetized alphabet letters off the filing cabinet like missiles. Maximek, who is nearly three, is racing cars on the carpet. Jarda smiles. He…

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The Kindred Spirit

It’s Thanksgiving time, and Kim Parshley is getting ready to make her famous pumpkin pie. She wishes the recipe had been handed down from her grandmother to her mother to her. It wasn’t; she was left to concoct it all by herself. It’s the brown sugar that makes it so famous. And the shortbread-crumb crust. Kim also wishes she were celebrating with the family members God gave her; instead, she’ll be getting together with the circle of friends she has chosen to stand in their…

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The Urban Rider

He doesn’t take the subway. He doesn’t take the bus. When Matthew Nicholas Mastrorocco wants to go someplace, he jumps on his bike and rides like the wind. To go to his job at Lenox Hill Hospital on Manhattan’s Upper East Side. To go to Coney Island for the day. To visit his parents in West Hempstead. To go to Montauk for an adventure. “I’ve always had a bike,” says Matthew, whose friends call him Matt. “I don’t remember how old I was when I got my…

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