Life and Games in the West Bronx

My aunt and her friends played Mah Jongg in Van Cortlandt Park. They’d bring their card tables, folding chairs, beach chairs (the striped-awning kind), food, and ice-water, then settle in for the day. They were Russian émigrés who had found their niche in the West Bronx. My mother had two sisters, both older than she. This was their crowd. My mother, a shy person, wasn’t included. She’d sit to the side watching, with me beside her. We had an activity of our own: I’d ...