I’ve taken two art classes with the Rockaway Art Room, and I’d like to share my experience because I’ve become a big fan!
The first was a watercolor and weaving class with artist Bekka Palmer. Something kind of magical happens when you weave two different images together. An unexpected third subconscious creation starts to appear. Beeka is a fine artist with a focus on textile design and basket weaving. Her work is inspiring! Take a look: bekkapalmer.com
The second was a found objects workshop, building a relief mandala with instructor Camila A. Morales (@camilamorales). She began with a wonderful presentation on art, ecology, and sustainability in our community. Camila, a professor and artist herself, aims to bring art education to the peninsula with FIELD NOTES, a free public arts and science program coming to Far Rockaway this spring. For the art-making, she set the tables with buttons, moss, and all these little treasures. This one pushed me out of my comfort zone, and that’s a good thing.
Both classes were so engaging. And it was just people showing up, making something with their hands, talking to each other, having tea, and being creative.
These workshops took place at the new and delightful Jupiter Club—a members-only surf storage and co-working space in Arverne (69-62 Almeda Ave, Arverne, NY 11692). Owners Gina Jurlando and Tim Reckel envisioned it as a community events hub too, and it’s already become home to some Rockaway Art Room’s classes.
(L-R) Jamie Soltis, Rockaway Art Room Founder; Teaching Artist, Bekka Palmer; Gina Jurlando, Owner, Jupiter Club.
Waves of watercolor.
The Rockaway Art Room was conceived by Jamie Soltis. Jamie and her husband, Ednmand Ducey, found their way to Rockaway by way of waves. They’re surfers. Jamie works in the nonprofit world; she is an actress performing off and on the peninsula, and she is a mother to an exuberant two-year-old. Jamie and her crew felt they wanted more creative calmness and wellness in their circle. She took the leap and began the hard work to build the polite program for the Rockaway Art Room.
I say thank you.
We are lacking many things on the peninsula, and an organized, creative outlet for so many of us who are creative people is one of them. The long-term goal is to open a brick-and-mortar art school. Teaching artists get paid, and students, art-curious folks, and all ages are welcome to attend art classes for free. This concept for the Rockaway Art Room is something Jamie feels strongly about. She shares on the GoFundMe page two goals:
- Free art classes for everyone in our neighborhood
- Create jobs by making sure the artists who teach are paid fairly for their time and expertise.
Jamie, like many of us, feels the race of life—work, family, chores, obligations. The Rockaway Art Room is a way to ease all that, a place where relaxation and art meet, and where you can connect with like-minded people. It’s an outlet to discover something new, take a pause from the regular routine, use your brain in a different way, get off our screens, smile, and have some fun!
The aim for the next phase of Rockaway Art Room is a five-week oil painting series that would start sometime in the early summer. Also on deck, open drawing meetups around town, drawing our urban natural landscape, and the people that inhabit it.
Here’s the GoFundMe – Donations go toward paying teaching artists, buying supplies, outreach, and taxes. The ask is low; I feel the dollar amount should be at least tripled. Let’s do this, Rockaway! Please consider supporting this fantastic program by making a contribution or sharing this article and donation link.
Follow the Rockaway Art Room on Instagram for updates on summer programming: @rockawayartroom
by Paula D.
on April 22, 2026 7:29 am in Art / Memories
You smell the incense before you see it. It’s sweet, piney, copal warmth. It’s moving at the perfect pace with the breeze. And to catch that scent, out in open air means it’s burning heavily, rolling through the streets like the volcanoes that frame the sky of Antigua, Guatemala.
The cobblestone streets are lined with families. Makeshift push carts of nuts and cotton candy move past you. Fresh slices of papaya are offered by traditionally dressed women, seated along the curbs. They are slicing at their ground-level kitchens. It almost feels like a carnival yet softer, slowed, and swaddled in a spiritual aura.
Then, from a distance, you see the clouds of holy incense and through that the procession, followed by the sound of dramatic music, louder with each swaying step.
Every Sunday during Semana Santa (Lent), Antigua honors the season with elaborate processions that last through the night. Community, priests, and church folks carry statues of Jesus bearing the cross, followed by the Blessed Mother, followed by a full-on marching band. There’s an order to it—men carry the float with Jesus, women follow and carry Mother Mary. And it is an honor and a devotional display to do so.
The men wear hooded purple cloaks, the mood is solemn, and the pace is steady. The women, dressed in black with lace, like widows, shoulder the weight of their massive float with grace. Seeing these women, shoulder carrying, reminded me of the heavy weight of the cross Jesus bore and the weight of my sins.
It struck me to see so many young people (teens through their 30s) wanting to be there; it wasn’t a church obligation. Catholicism is part of who these people are. It made me think about my relationship to the church and what it can look like.
The Lent processions in Antigua, Guatemala, trace back to Spanish colonial rule in the 16th century, when Catholic traditions were introduced by missionaries. These processions were designed to visually teach the story of Christ’s passion to Indigenous populations, many of whom did not speak Spanish. Over time, what began as an imposed ritual became more layered, adapted, and reinterpreted through local culture.
Mayan Indigenous influence is most visible in the creation of alfombras—intricate carpets made from colored sawdust, flowers, fruits, and other natural materials. Originally, they honored sacred Mayan spaces and were created for royalty or deities. The offerings drawn from the earth, rooted in a deep connection to land, color, and symbolism that long predate colonial religion.
Over time, that tradition merged with the rituals of Holy Week. Now, local families, businesses, and church groups spend hours, days, and sometimes all night creating the sawdust carpets. They are offerings. Gifts to God, laid carefully on the ground.
I was in awe of these artworks. Before the procession begins, there’s an eerie window of time when you can walk the carless streets (on Lent Sundays) and take in the intricate street carpets as they’re being made. You witness the care and intention, knowing they will be slowly, deliberately walked over by the procession. When I watched the details dissolve underfoot, it was a heart-opening, wow moment for me.
This is a ritual of impermanence. It’s a blessing to have the procession pass over the carpet your family, business, or church created. For me, I thought of Ash Wednesday and one of my favorite bible quotes: “Remember you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” (Genesis 3:19).
That first week of Lent, I texted my family group chain from Guatemala and typed out, “I’ve been in touch with the spirit.”
Happy Easter to you and yours.
For more photos and videos of the Guatemalan Lent processions and alfombras, visit my Instagram: @theglorifiedtomato.
Source: growingupbilingual.com, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sawdust_carpet
My grandmother used to take us kids to Friendly’s on Hillside Avenue out on the Island. It was always a treat to go to lunch with Grandma Pauline. And we could order whatever we wanted!
For some reason, I often went for the triple decker sandwich. Which is a classic club: three slices of toasted bread, crispy bacon, turkey, iceberg lettuce, tomato, cheddar cheese, and mayo, stacked sky-high and cut into fours, each corner pinned with a toothpick holding the whole overstuffed situation together. Something about those little toothpicks with the colored tops takes me right back to 1989. I know those are a microplastic nightmare now, but let me reminisce.
I was tiny but had a big appetite, and I’m sure my grandmother knew that the triple decker was way too much for my little body to handle—but she’d just smile and let me order it anyway. That’s what grandmas do. They love you like that.
The club sandwich was stacked so tall, toothpicks didn’t do the trick, so we halved skewers! Function over form on this one.
We were a big triple decker family too. My dad made them at home. They are fun! We never called them club sandwiches—always triple deckers.
On my recent trip to El Salvador, with limited groceries and way too many eggs and slices of bread at the AirBnb, I rediscovered my beloved triple decker sandwich. Back home a few weeks later, I made another, in line with the classic yet a vegetarian version with fake bacon (close enough) and all the other stuff. There’s just something about a stacked sandwich that feels like summer, and I’m channeling that now.
As an investigator of food history, I looked up the origins of this iconic sandwich. Turns out, the club sandwich was invented in a club. Go figure. A men-only, private club in New York City. The Union Club is still in existence today and is known as the oldest private social club in New York City, founded in 1836.
Wikipedia tells me the club sandwich was first mentioned on November 18, 1889, in an article in The Evening World newspaper and it outlined an early version of the recipe.
Another version of the story says it was invented in Saratoga Springs, bought by this rich businessman, art collector, and legal, horse-racing gambling guy named Richard Albert Canfield.
But I’m sticking with the NYC origin story. You can’t fully trust gamblers. I think he borrowed the idea.
I’m imagining white linen tables with seated, gluttonous, rolly-polly, cigar-smoking men at the Union Club. They’re all very hungry and have no patience. A brilliant chef in the kitchen decided to build a mega sandwich that echoed these gentlemen’s egos and wealth, and hopefully sped up the line. But I can’t find anything on who that person actually was. Legend.
The triple decker club sandwich became a staple of American dining, appearing on restaurant menus as early as 1899. Variations using chicken and ham evolved, and today you can find this iconic sandwich in almost every diner in America.
For more food theory banter follow mei n the kitchen, cooking and creating on Instagram @theglorifiedtomato
I attended the Shakespeare On The Rocks Fundraiser Gala last week, and it was a theatrical party to remember! There were many familiar faces — our Rockaway celebs, fancy Brooklyn folks, artists, and community supporters.
Cast members from last year’s performance of Romeo and Juliet were in attendance, along with gala hosts, founders, and co-producers/directors Elwin Cuevas and Robert Bryn, who held court all night.
The evening featured lively short performances—including a memorable one by Actor Catherine Yeager McQuaid —as well as romantic poetry by Owen Loof, a sneak peek into his new book. And thank you, Owen for a copy of, The Best Dressed Man in Rockaway!” There was a buffet, an open bar, and plenty of dancing with DJs keeping the energy high.
“When you do dance, I wish you a wave o’ the sea, that you might ever do nothing but that.”
Photos by Jena Cumbo
“For the apparel oft proclaims the man.”
Co-producers/directors Elwin Cuevas (L) and Robert Bryn (R) deeming dapper!
The gala was held in the lively event space at Bungalow Bar, complete with a photo booth and professional photographer, Jena Cumbo, capturing the not-so-often-seen glamorous side of Rockaway. No crocs in sight! And wow, we cleaned up well. The attire was formal, with tuxes, ties, cummerbunds, silk, gowns, high heels, and rhinestones making everyone look radiant.
Word on the dance floor is that Shakespeare On The Rocks Theater Company is set for another wildly performative production, Much Ado About Nothing, this July in Rockaway!
If you couldn’t make it to the gala, you can still support this special group of artists and their upcoming production by making a contribution. Donate here. To get a feel of what to expect this summer, here’s my article on last year’s performance of Romeo and Juliet:
