Archive for December 2021
exotic workmanship
Friday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
It’s been a weird week for me, as I’ve been unusually “blocked” as far as writing goes. This happens periodically, and unpredictably. I’ve had a few things on my mind, but there’s never a moment when that isn’t true. My dilemma, though, has been about “voice.” I’m really, really down on, and frustrated by, NYC right now. It’s a struggle to not call out everything as being shit, or describe the distracting delusions offered by the Political state as being anything other than Matryoshka.
If you’re not familiar with the Russian term, Matryoshka is the name for those nesting dolls they offer, as well as a metaphor for hiding your true intentions within a series of false shells. The reason that the Soviets were great enemies for the West is Matryoshka, since you could never intone the truth of Soviet intent from the surface layer of their deeds. There’s always going to be another truth lurking within the surface layer.
My Ukrainian born Jewish Grandmother installed a deep prejudice in me when I was a child regarding the Russians. “Never trust a Russian. The only person a Russian loves, in their dog hearts, is the last one who fed them,” she would say. Hey – if you saw your little brother beheaded by drunken Cossacks, you’d have strong opinions about Russians too.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Thing is, the Russians are pretty smart. Never letting anyone know what you’re really thinking – aka – what the smallest and most internal of the Matryoshka stack looks like – is pretty good advice. The problem I’m having right now, writing wise, is that all of my outer shells are absent and I can’t pretend. I’d like to relentlessly pummel away at the universe in an adolescent fury of truth telling, but what does that accomplish? What can I do? What can you do? Why bother? Nothing matters.
When I’m leading a procedural meeting for the citizenry, I close it up with “well, thank you to everyone for participating in our Democracy, and working towards perfecting our Civilization. We’re not there yet, but maybe we got a bit closer tonight.” It sounds smarmy, but I’m trying to be genuine there. Or at least I used to be genuine. Nothing matters.
That aspirant optimism of mine, which is currently withering on the vine, is something my grandmother would have likely found hilarious and somewhat foolish. Granny would remind and opine that a cruel death was waiting just around the corner, and to stop wasting time on things that aren’t practical. Go clean your room, instead of worrying about the world.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Conversely, another voice in my head right now is my Dad’s. When I was a young but already humble narrator exploring sophomoric literature and ideations, the writing of Camus for example, and I began telling him about my existential concern about the meaning of life, the old man would screw up his eyebrows and look at me with concern. He’d say “that’s pretty interesting… why don’t you think about that while you’re washing the car.” My dad was a pretty simple guy, but…
I’ll be at the Newtown Creek, deep diving into the nesting dolls of truth it offers, while improving my practical skills and philosophizing, if anyone wants to explore these topics in person. I apparently require company, but I can’t promise which level of Russian Nesting Doll you’ll encounter. I’ll be the one in the filthy black raincoat.
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“In the Shadows at Newtown Creek,” an 88 page softcover 8.5×11 magazine format photo book by Mitch Waxman, is now on sale at blurb.com for $30.
tarnished silver
Thursday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A few more shots from my happy place, Industrial Maspeth, in today’s post. There’s another enormous construction project underway on the Queens side of the waterway, which will see yet another last mile shipping center built. There will be more truck traffic thereby, and despite sitting on a rail spur and adjoining maritime bulkheads, nobody in the government compelled Federal Express to explore their usage.
It just grinds my gears, hearing the politicians talk about climate change and environmental issues – specifically heavy automotive traffic – and when they have the chance to actually do something about the concerning future they speak of it’s time to feign ignorance. Look at LIC – a brand spanking new and fully planned “City” in which all of the problems of the old chaotic “City” have been artfully replicated. Go see the garbage mountains of Court Square on trash day, experience the lack of public bathrooms, or street seating, or…
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Private car ownership used to be far more common than it is today in NYC. Fleets of yellow cabs have been replaced by fleets of ride share vehicles, but there really hasn’t been an “add on” in terms of “cabs plus Ubers” as some think. What has increased? Truck traffic.
Every consumer good, scrap of food, and dog collar in Nassau and Suffolk Counties arrives on Long Island, from Port Elizabeth Newark, after being driven by truck through NYC. We need to break that particular chain, and establish water transport of bulk shipping between the Port of NY/NJ and Long Island. Why are there no docks for intermodal cargo shipping at or nearby JFK? JFK is a major shipping port for NYC, but it’s all truck and airplane based. It’s surrounded by water, and connects in several places to the LIRR network of rail tracks, but we unload cargo from jets and use trucks to move the stuff around instead. That’s where your magnification of traffic has magically appeared from in the last 10-15 years.
Don’t worry, the bosses have decided to add another half mile to the Second Avenue Subway to negate having Upper East Siders needing to walk the two blocks to the 4/5 on Lexington. It is uphill, after all, and what upper Manhattan needs is more Subway capacity, right? It’s not like all of the leading economic indicators and the actual non Wall Street economy are centered around Brooklyn and Queens where north/south transit is accomplished using a four car long G line train.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The sham of it all.
What NYC needs is a holistic master plan, one which governs in broad and not terribly specific strokes. You want to build an apartment building? Great. How are you going to engineer storm water neutrality into the structure? Check the requirements for that in the master plan and Mazel Tov on your new endeavor. Amazon or Fed Ex or UPS wants to expand their operation? Fantastic – NYC needs blue and brown collar jobs more than ever, but here are the electric vehicle/mass cargo intermodal shipping predicates which they’ll need to oblige.
Bike lanes will fix all problems instead. They are a panacea, a silver key which open up vistas of experience and reality that can only stagger the imagination. They’re like Coca Cola – the real thing.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
Buy a book!
“In the Shadows at Newtown Creek,” an 88 page softcover 8.5×11 magazine format photo book by Mitch Waxman, is now on sale at blurb.com for $30.
something tangible
Wednesday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Recent endeavor found a humble narrator in my happy place – Industrial Maspeth – before the burning thermonuclear eye of god itself emerged from behind Nassau County in the east. I was at the Maspeth Avenue Plank Road, with the tripod and full bag of gear.
Daylight savings time, coupled with the paucity of daylight hours and the atrocious angle of the winter sun relative to NYC’s street grid, negates a lot of photographic opportunities. Sunsets and sunrises are really your only chance for “magic moments” this time of year. One has been making an effort to commit to one or the other time interval at least once a week.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The Maspeth Avenue Plank Road is the stubby remain of a bridge which last crossed Newtown Creek during the Presidency of Ulysses S. Grant, and it’s found just shy of three miles from the East River. It adjoins a section of Newtown Creek called “the Turning Basin.” This area is conventionally referred to as being the most environmentally compromised section of the waterway, as a point of interest. Industrial usage of this zone of Newtown Creek included an enormous and quite dirty Manufactured Gas Plant on the Brooklyn side, and a chemical/acid factory and high volume copper refinery on the Queens shoreline. There were a lot of other businesses with lovely occupations housed on both sides – fertilizer and rendering mills, night soil processors, secondary manufacturers and packagers for petroleum refining byproducts like paraffin waxes and naphtha – for instance.
It’s nice. At sunrise, fleets of birds take to the air.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The big LNG fuel tank at the right side of the shot is one of two such apparatuses found in Greenpoint at the National Grid property. Grid’s footprint used to be Keyspan, and before that it was Brooklyn Union Gas’s. BUG was the manufacturer of the “natural” gas mentioned above. When Grid bought up all of the BUG assets, via their purchase of the Keyspan outfit who had previously acquired the property, they also assumed Superfund liability and responsibility for cleaning up all of BUG’s “yuck” here in Newtown Creek’s turning basin.
That’s the happy place for ya.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
Buy a book!
“In the Shadows at Newtown Creek,” an 88 page softcover 8.5×11 magazine format photo book by Mitch Waxman, is now on sale at blurb.com for $30.
The Newtown Pentacle 