Manhattan Moments: 7 Photos of New York City That Define Me

Cristina Cianci, Daniel Ford, and Stephanie Schaefer frolicking in New York City.

By Cristina Cianci

Born on Staten Island + raised in New Jersey + my love of the shore, loud talking with hand gestures, pasta (and my ability to eat it three times a day) = I proudly wear the Italian American badge on my sleeve.

Living in Manhattan during college was a whole other ball game. From thee hidden treasures I found and made my own to the spots I frequented as a kid, these are the seven I hold close to my heart and badge.

The Brooklyn Bridge

Day or night, rain or shine.

The Bethesda Fountain in Central Park

For those times you wish you were in Europe, but have to settle for Central Park.

This View From My Friend’s Roof in Midtown Manhattan

Oh, hello.

Madison Square Garden

The best overpriced beer and hot dogs.

Little Italy

For some historic Cianci stomping ground and really good cannolis.

Caffe Roma

See previous description.

The New York Public Library

For some light reading and escaping the hustle and bustle.

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How My Older Brother Made Me A Lifelong Reader

Readers with wheels. My older brother Tom and I following the Hartford Half Marathon in 2010.

By Daniel Ford

My older brother Tom is the smartest person I know.

(Okay, his wife is probably even smarter, but I’ve known Tom the longest, so he wins).

I loved the fact that he was smart when I was growing up. It made me want to be smart. It made me want to read a book at the breakfast table like he did every morning. His example made me want to do my homework right when I got home and strive to do the best I could do in school.

I remember walking into his room as a kid—always when he was out of the house because I was too afraid to ask him to hang out—and marvel at all the cool stuff he had. His Don Mattingly and Wade Boggs baseball figurines, NFL gridiron comforter, his original Nintendo. It was a nerd nirvana!

More importantly, Tom always had a ton of books arranged beautifully on his bookshelf. I didn’t steal them back then because I was still reading illustrated versions of Robin Hood and Treasure Island, The Boxcar Children, and any "Star Wars" novel I could get my hands on. I loved knowing his weightier books were there and he had either read them or was planning on reading them. I would go back to my own room and rearrange my less impressive array of titles on my bookshelf so that each shelf started with the tallest book and ended with the shortest, just like my older brother did.

Thanks to my older brother, this is what my life looks like.

I read everything back then, but I hadn’t had the moment. You know the moment I’m talking about. It's the moment when someone puts a book in your hands and it hits your mind like a thunderbolt and completely changes the direction of your life.

Tom put several books in my hands one Christmas and I’ve haven’t been the same since. He wordlessly handed me a superbly wrapped present. The box was heavy. Since I was only reading thin paperbacks at that point, I didn’t know that meant it could only contain one thing. Books. Heavy, beautiful books.

Inside the box were three books that transformed me from a reader to a reader: To Kill a Mockingbird, 1984, and John Irving’s The World According to Garp.

I devoured the first two in short order. My young mind was blown that those two masterpieces came out of someone’s pen. People actually wrote like this? You mean there was more to literature than just pulpy fiction and sci-fi adventures?

Even if I had been a stronger reader at that point, nothing would have prepared me for the opening line to Irving’s classic novel:

“Garp’s mother, Jenny Fields, was arrested in Boston in 1942 for wounding a man in a movie theater.”

Whoa. 

Heavy stuff for a kid who was just trying to survive middle school!

When Tom went to college, I spent a lot of time raiding his bookshelf (and his music collection). He had already made the jump to American history tomes that were way over my head at the time, but which I attempted to plow through all the same. I’m pretty sure I still have his copy of Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States that I stole back in high school (and finally finished as a college sophomore). He moved out after graduating and took all his books with him, but the bookshelf stayed behind. I relentlessly set out to fill it after immediately moving into his old room.

Me holding said copy of A People's History of the United States on a trip to Yankee Stadium.

I had some help thanks to my high school English teacher Pamela Hayward, who consistently handed me books like Crazy in Alabama, Snow Falling on Cedars, and As I Lay Dying, in addition to the required reading for AP English. But the constant was my older brother. Every Christmas, there would be more books. Or gift cards with recommendations attached. Or a loan from his precious collection.

Now, our bookcases are essentially lending libraries between the two of us. He has books on his shelf that I’ve loaned him without having read them, and vice versa. He likes to kid and say that a book has to be on his shelf for 10 years before he reads it (except for Eric Foner’s Reconstruction, which he will never read). If I can’t find a book in my collection, odds are he has it. Some of the best moments of our bonding weekends are spent talking about all the books we have yet to read in front of one of his bookcases (I usually end up taking one or two home with me every time).

His early example also inspires me to buy books for his three kids—as well as all my other nieces and nephews—for birthdays and Christmas. Toys are fleeting and end up as yard sale fodder. Books are a gateway to creativity, curiosity, and fun! I’ll be getting them books even when they think I’m the lame uncle who gives books (including my own someday…don’t judge me) as gifts, because that’s what I learned from my older brother. It has the added bonus of allowing me to rediscover titles from my youth and keep current with today’s children’s literature.

My nephew Jack (top photo) and my niece Katie giving me hope for future readers.

Tom is now a principal at an elementary school in Connecticut, where he’s inspiring a new generation of young minds.

I follow his Twitter account and couldn’t be prouder when I see something like:

Dr. Veronesi read to both kindergarten classes this morning for Read Across America Day! @KathyVeronesi#rsd13ctpic.twitter.com/ehKB3lFLSI

— Thomas D. Ford (@TFord_LymanCT) February 28, 2014

I sleep well knowing the next generation of readers is in good hands.

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Why I Wanted To Be A Writer: Dave Pezza

This is the debut of a series featuring how all of us at Writer's Bone got our starts. Look for other tales from the crew in the near future.

I look nothing like David Foster Wallace.

By Dave Pezza

At one point in college I realized that writing was something I thoroughly enjoyed, and, quite frankly, I was good at it.

That realization mixed with the remarkable idea that writing is timeless. When you write your mind enters a timeless medium. The fact that the late David Foster Wallace can still shares his thoughts with me in an intellectual and significant way through his words absolutely amazes me.

Ultimately, I wanted to be a writer because I want to converse with others today, five years from now, 100 years from now about my thoughts and ideas. Yes, it is selfish and self-centered in many ways. But ideas shape and reshape our entire world, and how can you get them to work if no one can see them?

If I Had to Choose A Favorite Book With A Gun to My Head:

Favorite Line From Something I've Written:

The second reason was Cindy’s looks. She was not beautiful or classically pretty, rather Cindy was attractive. She had the appropriate curves and tight skin that a twenty-something girl usually has. She had light red hair with few freckles to match, but a pair of emerald eyes Arthur never failed to make note of. She played lacrosse in high school and in college, so she retained much of her former athletic body. She kept her nails short and painted dark brown, changed her hair style every couple of months, and wore clothes that accentuated her toned legs and busty chest. She wore high heels every day and hiked her skirt up just enough to give her 5’3 frame all the legs and height she could muster. All of this was enough to turn the head of every cubicle working salesman who she passed; their cheap suit pants and tight white underwear getting tighter and hotter as her sweet flowery perfume saturated the corridor halls with a carpet bomb of aphrodisiac.”

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Fred Dekker and Shane Black: The Script Writing Dynamic Duo

The Monster Squad!

By Sean Tuohy

Partnerships are not an easy thing (Dammit Dan, I said no ice in my scotch! What am I paying you for?).

It takes hard work, a shared passion, and a willingness to shrink your ego. There are plenty of partners that have never broken up, such as Tom Hanks and his wife Rita Wilson, Batman and Robin, and Häagen and Dazs (who I assume are cold, delicious people). On the other hand, sometimes partners stop being partners, for instance Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz, The Beatles, and most recently and, perhaps most heartbreakingly, the Jonas Brothers.

One partnership I never truly understood was between screenwriters Fred Dekker and Shane Black. Two friends who shared a passion for movies broke into filmmaking together and even penned some movies as a screenwriting duo. However, their careers went in two very different directions. Black and Dekker (haha, get it?) met at film school and even lived together for a while. They wrote "The Monster Squad" together and then penned the still unproduced "Shadow Company" before they kind of broke up. How do two men who share the same love and same career goals go two different ways in life?

Let's take a look quick at the work that these two did together:

“The Monster Squad”

This movie bleeds 1980s. Just look at the hairstyles, the Walkmans, and the music cues. The movie is “The Goonies” except with monsters such as wolf man, vampires, and the living dead. Also, the kids shoot guns and swear unlike the PG-rated “The Goonies.” Black co-wrote the movie while Dekker directed. The movie sank like a stone. Why? Well, it was a hard movie to sell. It's too complex for a child to understand and too simple for an adult, so it got stuck in this weird middle ground. It would take years for the movie to find the right crowd.

“Shadow Company”

After this the pair wrote “Shadow Company” (Black reused the name for the evil group of drug smuggling commandos in “Lethal Weapon”), which was another 1980s-tastic monster flick. The movie told the tale of Vietnam vets that could not be killed. It was “Night of The Living Dead” meets “The Dirty Dozen.” Although the script was never made into a movie, it is still a ton of fun, and worth reading.

However, after that the two never worked together again. Why? I have no idea. I am going to take a guess and say that by the 1990s Shane Black was heating up in Hollywood while Dekker’s was cooling off. I don’t know. Maybe they stayed friends, but professionally parted ways.

Either way, it’s worth looking at both their separate careers:

Shane Black

Shane Black hit the scene hard before he was 22 years old. His spec script “Lethal Weapon” was turned in to a surprise blockbuster that spawned three sequels. After this his script for "The Last Boy Scout" was bought for an unheard of $1.5 million dollars—a record that was soon broken by his sale of “The Long Kiss Goodnight” for $4 million dollars in 1994. Black went into a sort of “retirement” during which he worked behind the scenes doing uncredited rewrite work. Then, after a nearly 10-year absence, Black sprang back into action with “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang,” the movie that helped bring Robert Downey Jr.'s career back to life and got him the part of “Iron Man.” The movie was not a smash hit, but it did win the hearts of critics and has a great indie fan base. Black wasn’t done. After helping write the “Iron Man” films, he was asked to direct “Iron Man 3,” which turned out to be the highest grossing movie of 2013. All in all, not bad.

Fred Dekker

Fred Dekker came on to the scene with less of splash. He wrote the script for cult horror hit “House.” With this under his belt, Dekker was able to produce "Night of the Creeps," a much-loved horror film that failed at the box office. After the failure of “The Monster Squad” (his collaboration with Black) and two crashes under his belt, he was given the chance to direct the third installment of the “Robocop” series. Sounds great, right? Not so much. Peter Weller, who played Robocop, was not going to be in the film and the studio gave Dekker a shoe string budget. The movie crashed and burned and essentially killed Dekker's career. Dekker did some writing work here and there, but for the most part was shunned from Hollywood. Looking back, he did a lot with little and had some of the most original ideas in Hollywood. “Robocop 3” is a bad movie, but you can see that they did the best they could with what they had. In the end, Hollywood chewed Fred Dekker and then spat him out.

* * *

I always wonder how these two former partners and friends look at one another. You have Shane Black, Hollywood mega star, on one hand and then you have Fred Dekker, cult movie maker and redheaded stepchild of Hollywood on the other. Do they still talk? I mean, can you maintain a friendship with someone when their success so outweighs your own? Does Dekker look at Black with envy? Does Black look at Dekker with pity? I wish I knew how these two interacted now. Do they still talk like they did in the old days or are they no longer buddies? I may need to write a movie about them to figure it all out.

Maybe they will have a “reunion script” in the future. That would be awesome to see these two friends come together for one final “Hoorah!” Will it happen? Who knows, but I know this it better happen before the Jonas Brothers get back together.

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Why the 'How I Met Your Mother' Finale Wasn't the 'Best Burger in New York City'

The "How I Met Your Mother" finale was the opposite of this moment.

By Stephanie Schaefer

I remember watching the series premiere of “How I Met Your Mother” when I was sophomore in high school. It was the perfect sitcom to fill the void left by the end of my favorite show “Friends,” provide distraction from my math homework, and entertain a 15-year-old girl stuck in the suburbs without a driver’s license. The truth is, at that point, I didn’t have a great deal in common with the show’s characters. I had never been in love and the thought of settling down seemed like a continent away, but I enjoyed the premise nonetheless. After all, isn’t that what sitcoms are for? To allow us to escape, dream, and laugh?

As I watched the crew gathering at MacLaren’s Pub each week, I envisioned what it would be like to be a 20-something gallivanting in New York City, dating eligible bachelors, and chasing an exciting journalism career like Robin. Back in 2005, I wanted the happily ever after between Robin and Ted. After all, I was young, naïve, and didn’t know anything about love.

A lot has changed in the past nine years since the pilot episode. In fact, after graduating college I did end up moving to Manhattan where I got my first taste of a journalism career. I soon related to the main characters more than ever. There were moments I shamelessly cried on a crowded subway like Robin, wondered if I’d ever find lasting love like Ted, and debated if I should stick to my career dreams or find a more financially stable job like Marshall.

Many of the creative and well-written early episodes resonated with me. Whenever the city got me down, I would retreat to my closet-sized room and watch reruns. I remember one episode that hit the nail on the head. Marshall and the gang go on the hunt for the “best burger in New York City.” Like most of the show’s iconic symbolisms, the burger meant more than just a meal. Marshall recalls the time when he first moved to the city eight years prior and tasted a bite of heaven in a tiny burger joint. Eating that delectable burger once again would make Marshall feel okay about putting his dreams of becoming an environmental lawyer on hold—especially when he disappointedly realizes that the location of the eatery had turned into Goliath National Bank (the corporation that recently offered him a job). However, in true “How I Met Your Mother” fashion, the five best friends finally taste that perfect burger after a long search in one of the most memorable moments of season four.

The gang in more hilarious times.

Similar to the HIMYM crew, in the midst of the confusion, heartbreak, and soul searching in New York, I did experience the moments that made me feel alive and as on top of the world as someone tasting the best burger they’ve ever had. Like Lilly, Marshall, Ted, Robin, and Barney, I met my friends at Irish bars after work, enjoyed amazing food, and even fell genuinely in love.

So kids, you may be wondering how I felt about the finale. I could dive into every flaw and tear the sitcom’s ending apart like many critics. Honestly, that was my original plan for this piece. However, after giving myself a few days to process the much-talked-about ending, I decided to take a slightly different route.

Like most HIMYM fans my age, I’ve grown up a lot in the past nine years. But while most of us gained maturity and insight over the near-decade, it seems as if the once beloved sitcom and its characters seemed to become less mature and more one-dimensional—which can be blamed on sloppy writing, poor character development, or failed attempts at humor.

The finale and episodes leading up to this big moment only increased my frustrations with the characters and their total lack of growth. Essentially, they were right back where they started, but we, as viewers, were not. Robin and Barney divorce because the two weren’t mature enough to handle Robin’s work schedule. Barney immaturely recreates his chauvinistic playbook and impregnates a one-night stand. And perhaps in the most frat-boy move of the show, instead of revealing her name, Bays and Thomas call the mother of Barney’s daughter “31” — as in the 31st woman he’d slept with that month. Hmmm, I wonder what will happen with Barney sits down to tell his daughter the story of how he met her mother…

What did change toward the end of the series, however, was the magic of the first few seasons. Anyone who’s watched the sitcom religiously knows how special the beginning of the series was. If you would have told 15-year-old me that future Ted Mosby shows up with a blue French horn at Robin’s doorstep to win her back once again, I would have thought it was romantic. But now I know that if you love someone – I mean truly, deeply, and unconditionally love someone – then you don’t make any excuses not to be with them, which is the main problem I have with the Ted/Robin courtship. When you know that you want to, or at least hope to, be with someone forever you do things that may seem illogical—like give up a judgeship so your wife can live her dream in Italy (à la Marshall), or, in Ted’s case with Tracy McConnell, cancel your plans to move to Chicago at the last minute.

Taken away in the worst way possible...

Throughout the past nine seasons this “I can’t live without you” mentality was never the case for Ted and Robin, particularly on Robin’s part, but they’re both to blame. The timing between them was always off. Either Robin didn’t want a commitment or was “too busy” at work or Ted was chasing other women or Robin was preoccupied falling in love with shallow and sexist Barney, etc. Bottom line, they never fought for each other. They only ended up together in the very end when it was convenient for writers who had grown too lazy and too reluctant to change their original plan.

But, you know what Bays and Thomas? Love doesn’t always mean convenience. Love, although at times messy, means sacrifice, commitment and compromise. It’s finding a way to greet your spouse at the airport even when it’s snowing, like Marshall did for Lilly. And, most importantly, it’s staying by someone’s bedside when they're sick like Ted did for Tracy. Ultimately, love means more than stealing a somewhat superficial (yes, I said it) blue French horn.

Like many “How I Met Your Mother” fans I was disappointed by the lukewarm ending—a conclusion that didn’t allow me to escape, dream, and laugh quite like I did while watching the show as a teenager. All and all, I hoped the finale would make a return to the sitcom's initial magic and leave me satisfied like eating the best burger in New York.

However, all I found was a Goliath National Bank.

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Song Writing 101: Coffee and Lyrics

By Anton Laplume

Song writing.

Song writing for me is the equivalent of writing in your diary or journal. It’s a way to document a certain frame of mind of when a song is written. Expressing your feelings towards any given situation. Whether it’s love lost, love gained, being broke or having an excess amount of money, the separation of those you grew up with designated by life’s process, or the new bonds you form in your progression through this crazy world, there’s plenty of inspiration to grab from.

Sometimes it comes in the form of just music without lyrics because sometimes just the music is enough to get the point across. Other times the music is simply two or three chords but the lyrics have a much deeper meaning. That’s the great thing about music and art in general, there are options, and so many different ways to explore them; and beyond the art, there’s a discipline gained from working within certain creative boundaries to express concepts that are seemingly untethered by logic.

However, everyone has their process.

For me, it usually starts off with a large cup of coffee and some kind of turbulence in my life. When something happens, either good or bad, that kind of rearranges my thought process and has me questioning the way I’ve been doing things, I’ll hide out in the organized chaos of my work space and just start to play. As the playing continues, a vocal concept will kind of just come to fruition and before I know it, there’s a concept for a verse or chorus.

Now we come to the lyrics (entering large cup of coffee), which can be a frustrating process. As I would imagine it for most writers, I am very particular about the words I use. From the amount of syllables a word may have, to the way it flows with the surrounding words. What kind of rhyming scheme do I want (If any at all)?. What part of the beat am I placing a word on? And how do I want to finish a phrase? Both rhythmically and harmonically speaking. That’s where those creative boundaries come into play.

The following is usually the final part of the skeleton and the bane of my existence… the bridge. The bridge of any song generally comes in a little more than half way through and offers a bit of relief or change from the songs main idea (verses and choruses). When I write a bridge, I’ll try to change the key center of the song, maybe change up the rhythmic pattern a bit, which can be difficult at times. The reason being, is that sometimes you’re just not hearing a change or a new section to add. Maybe you’re having a hard time coming up with a smooth transition (once again, those creative boundaries). And it’s okay to not have a bridge sometimes, but it is important as a musician to challenge yourself to come up with an idea, even if you’re not particularly hearing one.

That’s where the discipline comes into play. Because to just abandoned the bridge because of the lack of ideas is not only preventing the possibility of a great concept, but also denying yourself a process of learning which can only benefit you. Either way, a lot of the time this ends up being the downfall to a lot of my material. Halting the process of writing to the point where the song is just another unfinished idea in the musical wasteland of my brain.

But in the event that I do successfully finish the songs structure, I will then introduce it to whoever I am playing with, and we add on the final touches to make the song complete. For me, once a song is finished, nothing gives me a greater sense of accomplishment or feeling of relief. At least for a short period of time, then I have to start the whole process over again.

The beauty of whole thing is that every time it’s a little different, and every time, the end result is just as satisfying.

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Sylvester Stallone: The Forgotten American Writer

Sylvester Stallone

By Sean Tuohy

Before his name was instantly recognizes all over the world, before he was a pop culture icon, before all the fame and glory, Sylvester Stallone was hunched over a pad of paper with a pen in hand trying to create a story.

Like many struggling artists, he had the talent and the drive and was just trying to make a buck. We all forget that Sylvester Stallone is a writer and an incredibly underrated one at that. He has 27 accredited scripts to his name and several of those are considered American classics. Screenwriters never get fame or glory. At best, they get a "good job" and then are left alone to create another story. If you look past the action movie star image you will find that Stallone is no different than any other writer. He’s stuck in a room trying to create something from nothing.

So let’s take a moment then to appreciate Stallone the writer.

“Rocky”

Rocky is considered by many to be one of the best made sports movies ever made. Stallone wrote this movie when he was nearly broke and struggling to make it as an actor. He knew that he had a great idea for a story within his own life. He wanted to write about a talented actor trying to make it, with one shot at the big time. The storyteller within Stallone told him no one would empathize with a movie about an actor trying to make it, so he switched it to the story of a boxer.

Bingo!

If you look at the script for Rocky, you find a well-crafted story that shows the rise of a troubled character trying to overcome the odds. Each character in the movie has flaws and internal conflicts, and overall are all well-developed characters. The monologue in “Rocky” where Rocky tells Adrian his fears and doubts before the big fight is a wonderfully honest portrait of a young artist on the brink of success (the above clip with his trainer Mickey ain’t bad neither). People tend to forget that Rocky does not win the match in the movie. After a close fight, he barely loses to Apollo Creed. Only a true writer would look at a story about boxer and say “He needs to lose the match for the sake of the character and the story.” Rocky's story is relatable, timeless, and always heartwarming.

The John Rambo Series

Stallone was not the creator of John Rambo—that was in fact the talented David Morrell—but he did bring him to life on the big screen. He co-wrote the first three movies (“First Blood,” “Rambo: First Blood Part II,” and “Rambo III”) and he was the sole writer of the fourth and final in the series, “Rambo.” Although I love the entire Rambo series, the fourth installment of the series has always stuck out to me the most. Although the plot seems very basic—Rambo saves hostages from a hostile country—it solely exists to move the action. When you look at the story developing within Rambo, there is so much more to find. Rambo is a man who hates who he is, and has never really came to peace with what he was made to do. By the end of the story, Rambo has been able to confront who he is enough to begin to recover and allow himself the peace to like himself again.

“Poe”

Sadly, I don't think this movie will ever be made. I have a feeling people would scoff at the idea of an “action star” making a bio pic. However, if it is ever made in to a movie I will be the first in line to see it. If I have to I will elbow an old man out of the way to get that ticket. I was lucky enough to find the script for Poe, which Stallone had penned years ago and had planned to make himself, but sadly, like so many movies, it fell apart and the story was shelved.

The movie was about famed American writer Edgar Allan Poe. Stallone was able to approach Poe as a tragic and tortured soul that had an amazing talent for writing but let his inner demons get in the way. Instead of your typical biopic, which tends to make their subjects two dimensional, Stallone actually was able to bring Poe to life in his screenplay.

It is hard to see Stallone as a “normal person” because he is, after all, Sylvester Stallone. However, at his core, he is a writer and actor who is just trying to share his stories. I like to believe that even someone like him, who has experienced such success, at one time or another felt the same self-doubt, fear, and frustration that all writers feel as they try to sort out the mess of ideas swimming around their head into a coherent story.

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