b"As a retiree, you are involved in activities for the union. Do you do other things as well?I used to go to another senior center, but I'm at Penn South [cooperative community at], 28th Street and 8th Avenuenow. They have a very good senior center. I take two classes there. One, we do movies and the other one is music. That's Monday and Friday. Tuesday, I go to the acupuncturist. It's right near Stein Center, so I go there for lunch, then I walk over tothe acupuncturist and I walk home. Wednesday I'm here to call people about their pension counseling appointment. Thurs-day is the National Council of Jewish Women where they have people come and talk; then they serve us refreshments. Fridayis my music course; Saturday I'm going to Macy's. Sunday I go to class at JASA. So that's the week, the general week.What is the music class about?The leader is a former school teacher and he plays the piano. He'll play classical music and he'll discuss it. He's notthe greatest. It's entertaining, so I go. It gets me out of the house. I'm also a member of the Library of Performing Arts,where I take a silent movies class. And then there's the synagogue on 87th Street, where they do documentaries. I'mgoing there in April. I like movies. They have activities here to. They just had an Irish celebration. They have an Irish danceand someone to play the music. They served Irish soda bread. They used to have corned beef and cabbage, which I liked.In June, they have the annual event at the Hilton Hotel, where they serve us lunch. They have entertainment and speak-ers. There's a hiatus over the summer and then it begins all over again. Then we have classes here. There's a class here onpolitics with Mr. Ed Sullivannot THE Ed Sullivan. He was in the state assembly over 20 years. He loves to talk and tell usall the stories and we discuss politics. There's a theater class here. I don't go to the theater with them. I get my own ticketsthrough TDF. They go on trips too. A long time ago, they went through the Panama Canal. They also used to go to AtlanticCity. We went to Mohonk [Mountain] House, we went to Villa Romaoh, the food was good there.You are very engaged with activities here. I come about once a week and it depends upon what they have to offer here. I think they're going to have somethingabout insurance here, but it's always the same thing. The guy always tells the same joke a 65-year-old man is married toa 25-year-old girl he always tells the same joke [laughs]. But everyone always laughs.We would like to get a sense of the kind of benefits people had. If you wouldn't mind, would you tell me whatyour starting salary was when you began working for the city and your salary at retirement?I know that I ended at $41,000. I started in '64all I can remember was when I started making $10,000 after awhile. I thought I was rich.I think my rent was $85 a month at that time.The first time you worked for the City was with the Department of Welfare. What was that job like?I wasn't a manager or anything. I just don't remember. Maybe just a clerk. I worked Welfare maybe about 10 years,took my money out of the pension and then when I came back in, I bought back my pension. I did home visits to find outwhy they needed welfare. I dealt with a lot of people. I wasnt the social worker. I went to interview them about why theyneeded the money and to weed out phonies. Then you had to come back to the office. They had a dictaphone and youtranslated into that and then they gave you back what you said. Then you talked to the supervisor. I had good friends fromthat job. There were three of us that stuck together and even years later, we all stuck together.57 "