Beach Music

Grandma Sophie adjusted the volume with her big arched thumb, tuning the small black transistor radio to the elevator music station placing it next to her ear as she leaned back on her pink and yellow vinyl beach chair. She had juicy earlobes that drooped from years of wearing heavy earrings. She was oiled-up head-to-toe with Johnson's baby oil, mahogany and freckled in the sun. Her skin was smooth and she was soothing. She wore a white one-piece bathing suit with a little skirt flap. She had great shapely muscular legs. Her feet had bunions. We were on Brighton Beach opposite her apartment. I listened to ocean waves, voices, seagulls, Grandma's radio and the knish man shouting GET YOUR HOT POTATO KNISHES HERE. You want one bubbeleh, she asked. I loved potato knishes. Yes, thank you grandma! She took out a dollar bill and I jumped up to buy a huge hot flat potato knish. The ultimate beach food.