Children in Time

Inever planned to live in an academic hub, but so it is. The school year in my neighborhood begins before Labor Day with the drumroll of basket trucks, carrying the goods of college students to their dorms a few blocks away. But for the students I see throughout the year, college is as distant in time as it is on the street grid. Education begins and unfolds much closer to my door.

First comes the preschool on our block. It occupies the ground floor of a townhouse on the opposite side of the street. Every morning, from fall through spring, there is a gathering of strollers as children arrive, some brought by parents, others by nannies. The parents are white, the nannies black and, I would judge, West Indian, which must be why so many urban WASPs and Jews grow up with fond memories of curried goat. The parking lot for strollers lies inside a black iron fence in front of the building. A genial older black man directs traffic; I know him to nod to as I walk past on my way to the gym. Years ago a friend of mine had a child there. How much you earn and spend being information more privileged than with whom and how often you copulate, I never asked what the preschool cost.

About the Author

Richard Brookhiser

Historian Richard Brookhiser is a senior editor of National Review and a senior fellow at the National Review Institute.

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Inever planned to live in an academic hub, but so it is. The school year in my neighborhood begins before Labor Day with the drumroll of basket trucks, carrying the goods of college students to their dorms a few blocks away. But for the students I see throughout the year, college is as distant in time as it is on the street grid. Education begins and unfolds much closer to my door.

First comes the preschool on our block. It occupies the ground floor of a townhouse on the opposite side of the street. Every morning, from fall through spring, there is a gathering of strollers as children arrive, some brought by parents, others by nannies. The parents are white, the nannies black and, I would judge, West Indian, which must be why so many urban WASPs and Jews grow up with fond memories of curried goat. The parking lot for strollers lies inside a black iron fence in front of the building. A genial older black man directs traffic; I know him to nod to as I walk past on my way to the gym. Years ago a friend of mine had a child there. How much you earn and spend being information more privileged than with whom and how often you copulate, I never asked what the preschool cost.