Central Park

The Daily Plant : Monday, April 29, 2002

GO AHEAD, MAKE YOUR DAY

How would you like a holiday when everything in the whole world is free for the day? If you would, then you’d better hope "Free Day" becomes a reality—and not just a dream spun by one child at a Parks recreation center. Kids attending the enhanced after-school classes at recreation centers around the city were asked to invent their own holiday, and while many of these days sound great, don’t count on them being written into law anytime soon.

"On Free Day you get to go wherever you want, without a curfew," writes 13-year-old Jonathan Quezada. "On the same holiday there will be money falling out of the sky." Of course, if being caught in a money shower doesn’t interest you, perhaps you’d prefer "Cherry Day." Conceived by Keianya Dickson, age 9, this holiday involves doing "nothing but eat foods that have cherries in it or on top." Sound a little too sugar-coated for your tastes? Maybe you will want to celebrate "Girls Day," which 9-year-old Yolanda Lock envisions as a day on which the "tradition is for boys to do everything girls want them to." And there were a host of other holidays, whose names give more than a hint of what they’re about, including "Hot Dog Day," "Beach Day," and "Kids Day."

Still, some children were less concerned with food and days off. They instead tackled more serious issues. 13-year-old Elyana Salas, for example, envisions "September 11^th Remembrance Day" as a way to help "those who have lost love ones." She writes, "It will show the families that there is support for [them]." Salas, unlike some of her peers, may actually see her dream come to pass.

The design-your-own-holiday assignment offers a glimpse into the varied and colorful world of after-school programming offered at each of Parks’ 36 recreation centers throughout the city. All of the different recreational programs help children develop skills, both creative and physical. Throughout the year, kids learn about subjects ranging from marimba-playing to karate. Fortunately, even if Free Day doesn’t make it onto the official calendar, all of Parks’ after-school programs are already free for New York City’s children to enjoy.

Manhattan Parks’ semi-annual blood drive is being held on Tuesday, May 7 and Wednesday, May 8 from 8:30 a.m. to 1:45 p.m. in the Arsenal Gallery. Parks is the only City agency to be given the Gold Award from New York Blood Services. To help uphold this record and to donate blood please contact:

Donate blood, get 3 hours comp time, and save a life.

(Monday, May 6, 1989)

Four hundred men and women, wearing Project Return and Samaritan Foundation T-shirts marched shoulder to shoulder into the North Woods of Central Park yesterday, leading one of the largest volunteer clean-up efforts the park has seen—and forming the longest human chain in this neck of the woods.

The volunteers, who participate in the Project Return and Samaritan Foundation programs, who were furnished with Parks gloves, hats and trash bags, pitched in alongside Parks maintenance workers to tidy about 40 acres of the North Woods. The massive cleanup began at 104^th Street and the Closed Road at 10 a.m. and ended at noon at the Great Hill, where there was a festive picnic and music by Collective Efforts, the Project Return band.

"Youth is given. One must put it away
like a doll in a closet,
take it out and play with it only
on holidays."

(1919-1989)

Know Before You Go

Harlem Meer Center (formerly Lasker Rink)

Harlem Meer Center