“Mais, yall come see my new tricycle, cher!”

I must have been 17 years old before I ever uttered the phrase “come here.” And I did so only to make myself understood to what I thought was a somewhat dense Northerner, a Long Islander who couldn’t understand basic English.

In my part of the world, in South Louisiana, for some reason or other, we never said, “come here.” Instead, we said, “come see.” Always and forever, with no confusions or misunderstanding.

Yet the very first time I said “come see” in Southampton, New York, in the fall of 1991, the response was — well, I don’t have to tell anyone who wasn’t raised in Louisiana what the response was.

Me: “Come see.”
Friend: “See what?”
Me: “What?”
Friend: “Come see what?”
Me: Pause. Thinking. “Uh. Come here?”

And thus I switched from “come see” to “come here.”

NPR reported last week that a Burger King in Miami was going to sell beer with its burgers and fries, beginning in mid-February. Many believe that this is the first Burger King in the country to serve beer, but in fact, the Governors Island Burger King sold beer here during the Coast Guard era on the Island. (It was also likely the only Burger King that was  attached to a bowling alley!) 

 The Burger King is located on the southern portion of Governors Island, adjacent to the ball fields. It is often remembered fondly by those who lived and worked here as a center of Island recreation and fun. The Burger King even made an appearance in issue 615 of Spiderman. 

 Unlike many places around New York City, you could get a 32 ounce beer on Governors Island for just over $2. 

And although we may no longer have the Burger King, we do have a variety of…