📍 The Block That Raised Me
Welcome to the Jane’s Journey blog — a space where I share my path from flowers to frozen food, and all the unexpected pivots in between.
This isn’t just about food.
It’s about resilience.
Creativity.
Family.
And the block that taught me all of it.
🌇 From Castle Hill to the Core of Who I Am
How do you go back?
Back to the Bronx.
Back to those never-ending summer days when we stayed out until the streetlights blinked on and our mothers yelled our names out of apartment windows.
We were wild and free — but also deeply connected.
Bound by the buildings, the row houses, the church, and the families all grinding through the same reality.
Our dads went to work.
Our moms stayed home or picked-up side jobs — waitressing, cleaning houses — trying to stretch every dollar.
And those dollars didn’t always come home.
Still, my mother let him back in.
What else could she do?
I remember walking up to Joe & Joe’s on Friday nights while my mom was working a shift. I'd wait there, asking my dad when he was coming home with the meatball heroes he promised. Minutes turned into hours. And still, we waited on the stoop until we were too tired to eat.
There was something about Joe & Joe’s — the clinking glasses, the smell of whiskey and steam from the kitchen, the buzz of live music. My father had a voice like Sinatra, and when he sang, the whole place would hush. I used to think he could’ve done something incredible with his life.
But he couldn’t get out of his own way.
He died at 52.
And to this day, I believe he died of sadness — a darkness that never let go. His mother died of a heart attack at the kitchen table when he was just five years old. His father — my grandfather — escaped into the bottom of a glass and eventually remarried Florence whom he met and partied with at the Unicorn Pub.
So I ask myself:
Was it alcoholism?
Was it untreated depression?
Was it generational grief passed down like genetics?
Did my father ever really have a chance?
🛠️ A Family of Steamfitters (and Survivors)
My father was a steamfitter. His father, too. And my great-grandfather before them.
Castle Hill Avenue was home — and legacy.
Everyone on the block knew your last name, your lunchbox, and your story.
Me, my sister, and my two brothers lived for those sidewalks — playing Johnny-on-the-Pony, double-dutch, stickball, football, and tag until our knees were scraped and our lungs were full of laughter.
The rule was simple: Come in when the lights come on.
🏫 School, Stoops & Staying Power
I went to the same grammar school as my mother, my father, and my grandfather.
Same walls. Same nuns. Same chalkboards. Same prayers.
Our identity wasn’t something we wore — it was something we were born into.
The stories we heard.
The songs we sang.
The smells of Sunday dinners floating from kitchen windows.
All of it became part of me.
🔥 The Summer of ’77
If you were there, you remember.
The Summer of Sam.
The blackout.
Billy Martin and Reggie Jackson fighting in the dugout (on their way to World Series).
The nine-day heatwave that made the city feel electric — dangerous, alive.
We had Saturday Night Fever on cassette. We sang the Bee Gees into Richie Myers’ cassette player and danced on the stoop like it was Studio 54…we were 12 years old!
As Son of Sam gripped the neighborhood at night, we listened to the radio, wondering when the next murder would hit.
And even with all the fear, all the tension, all the chaos...
I was home.
After two years in Florida, we had returned — and I was right where I belonged.
💬 Why This Story Matters
Before Jane Foodie ever existed...
Before I held a bouquet, a chef's knife, or sealed my first frozen entrée...
There was this block.
Castle Hill.
And it raised me.