Author: ruhlwrite

It doesn’t take much persuading to get Kevin David Thomas to do some goofy poses. Kevin’s an actor, singer and music director. He is, after all, an actor, so this nonsense stuff comes naturally. It’s like doing an audition. Once he gets going, he doesn’t want to stop. So it has been since his boyhood. He’s a most happy fellow. Cherub-cheeked Kevin takes his face-making seriously whether he’s bulging his eyes like golf balls and sticking out his tongue like a serpent. Invariably,…

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There are two things you notice when you walk into Antonio Meloni’s office: American Bald Eagle statues and graffiti art. This may seem an odd combination unless you know what Antonio does for a living: He runs Immigration Advocacy Services and the New York Anti-Crime Agency out of the flag-draped building on Astoria Boulevard two blocks from the 114th Police Precinct. Antonio runs two nonprofits — the New York Anti-Crime Agency and Immigration Advocacy Services. He’s been doing his nonprofit…

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Just to be clear, Ralph Charell did not ride his skateboard to Astor Bake Shop. “Are you crazy?” he asks. “I’m 86. I don’t want to kill myself.” Ralph’s had success in several fields. He rests the board on a chair and orders a cup of coffee. The story of Ralph and his skateboard doesn’t travel in a straight line, and the telling of it takes so long that his coffee will go cold before he gets to take a sip. It involves three best-selling books, a carrier pigeon, , TV movies, a…

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As Sharon Florin climbs the wide staircase to her top-floor studio, an act that she has done going on 40 years, it reminds her of how much things have changed. Sharon paints the city fantastic. The three-story red-brick building started out life as a factory in the 19th century, and by the time she and her canvases came in 1980, her floor had been divided to house artists like herself. There used to be five of them. As the last one to arrive, Sharon got the smallest space. But it has a big window,…

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Anna Conti is not wearing her wedding ring. It’s not that she doesn’t want to put it on. Anna lost her husband two years ago. She’s a widow, and the ring makes her feel closer to Ugo, the husband she shared her life with for 64 of her 82 years. The thing is, the ring’s a little large. It’s not as simple as resizing it. When her knuckle swells, as it does a lot, she needs a too-big size to fit over it. That means that the ring twirls like a top when it clears the bump and lands on her thinner…

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