A Knish Tale

By Jim Gillen
The Providence Center

Do you know what a knish is? Well it sort of a potato pie, but with an attitude!! Just how I like them!

There is a little place on the Lower East Side of Manhattan called Yonah Schimel and it’s a knishery… They speak and live and breathe Knishes. I’ve been going there since my youth when my Dad, who drove a taxi back then, would bring me and its been a life long love affair.

I went to High School in Brooklyn and more often then not, we would cut class and jump the turnstiles on the subway for a joy ride into NYC. Usually downtown, the Village, the Lower East Side, Times Square when it was …lets say, lively!!

We would generally act out like dummies, drink, get high and more often than not wind up at Yonah or Katz’s Deli for a Knish.Yes, we thought we had the world on a string.

Occasionally, we would head over to Tomkins Square Park to watch all of the Hippies and the Krishnas and the fun goings on. It wasn’t until the early 80’s when Tomkins Square became synonymous in the media with drug use and homelessness. It had become a pretty wild place. I can tell you this from personal experience, having had numerous misadventures there, several times waking up, not knowing where I was. As the years went on, Tomkins Square became the “home” to many people who had, perhaps, no where else to go.

One day, with much fanfare, the City came in, kicked everyone out and bulldozed everything in site, part of the “ending” or “hiding” the homeless in NYC… Question being, where does everyone go? What becomes of the people who resided there?

Well, just wondering… Oh yeah, the knish? After all, this is a knish story. I was down there this weekend and got to stop at Yonahs and enjoyed a knish (or two).

And old Yonah? Well we always assumed he was Yonah! He is still there and he still calls me kid.  Some things change and some things stay the same, think about it.

Don’t forget to join us at “Healthy, Body, Mind and Spirit” event at McAuley House on Friday June 25th from 10am -2pm with all sorts of cool stuff, including music from The World Famous Recovery All Stars… and the food? Oyyyy!!!