The Newtown Pentacle

Thursday

– photo by Mitch Waxman

Continuing with 2022’s “best of’s” in todays post:

May started off with a visit to Philadelphia’s Schuykill River and downtown area. Back home in Queens, Dutch Kills and its collapsing bulkhead received one of what would end up being weekly inspections by me in “ugly trifles.” One did his fair share of riding the NYC Ferry, as in “ivied antique.” Long Island City’s Newtown Creek coastlines became a particular point of focus, as in “torture of.” I made it a point of collecting sunset shots around Newtown Creek all year, as in “nimbus over.”

A growing sense of outrage at the despicable management of our commonly held municipal assets, given the high price which the citizenry pays for these basic services to support the political intrigues of City Hall and Albany, began to manifest in a less than subtle way right around the time which “weary journey” appeared in your inbox.

– photo by Mitch Waxman

June of 2022 started off with a tugboat encounter on Newtown Creek in “peradventure may,” continued on with another visit to Hells Gate in “whisper leeringly,” checked in on that collapsing bulkhead along Newtown Creek’s Dutch Kills tributary in Long Island City in “crystal coldness,” visited industrial Maspeth in “rest without,” gave the Pulaski Bridge a portrait session in “ever been,” kept on working the sunset angle in “seemed older,” and rode the Rockaway Ferry in “emotional need.” I tried to photograph a lunar eclipse in “hidden pneumatics,” and Sunnyside Yards was visited in “fiendish subjects.”

All year, I kept on trying to push myself to not just get a good photo, but to try and get a category defining photo. This meant moving around with all of my gear on my back. This was a real pain, but unlike “normal” conditions, I couldn’t just come back in the future. There would be no ‘next time.’

– photo by Mitch Waxman

July of 2022, things got started with an LIC post that visited Dutch Kills and then took a ride on the 7 line in “cacodaemonical ghastliness.” An artist friend of mine turned me on to a spot along Jackson Avenue in LIC’s Court Square in “frequent fumbling,” I went to a carnival in Astoria Park at Hells Gate in “fumbling in,” visited Staten Island’s Fresh Kills in “torn to,” and in “retinue of” I went hunting for a 7 train/Queensboro Bridge sunset shot.

In “stifling age,” it was revealed that I had visited Pittsburgh again, and that this particular journey also included a visit to Wheeling, West Virginia in “assented without.” I applied a bit of discipline on myself, and did a researched Pittsburgh history post in “boldly away.”

– photo by Mitch Waxman

August rolled into town, and that’s when I decided to show you what the July 4th fireworks shows – the Macy’s one in “thing therein,” and the Astoria Park one in “wrinkles formed,” looked like. A rental car allowed me to range pretty freely for a few days, first in “nervous overstrain” at Newtown Creek, then to College Point in “breathing sleep,” and even out to Nassau County in “desolate pitch.”

My last dragon to slay, as I’ve been calling the collapsing bulkhead at 29th street along Dutch Kills, received a bit of political focus in “scintillant semicircle.” I got caught out in a violent thunderstorm along Dutch Kills in “palsied denials,” justified trespass in “so inquisitive,” and got a few nice Tugboat shots for “breathing things.”

– photo by Mitch Waxman

September found me trying to do and experience everything all at once one last time. For most of 2022, I was able to maintain a decent “lead time” on these posts, and some of them were scheduled as far ahead as a month in advance of publication. This is the way I like it, incidentally, and was a personal achievement. A particularly photogenic evening was encountered at Sunnyside Yards in “significance of,” a colorful sunset captured at Dutch Kills in “harrow up,” “ten beings” found me at an abandoned power plant in Yonkers, I visited the World Trade Center observation deck in “equally silent,” Hudson Yards in “nightmare spawning,” and I was back in Pittsburgh with “churchyard teachings” and several other posts at the end of the month.

October saw the Pittsburgh posts continue, as with “politely holding,” but we were soon back at Newtown Creek with “subdued sort.” I attended a performance at the Maspeth Avenue Plank Road in “falling on,” wandered around Queens in “insistent pleas,” walked over the Kosciuszcko Bridge in “times amidst,” and my pal Carter Craft gave me a boat ride down Newtown Creek starting in “devilish anxiety.”

– photo by Mitch Waxman

November and December are a bit of a blur for me. Posts like “unearthly immanence” or “brood capriciously” don’t say too much, but I’m fond of the photos. I spent a lot of time by myself, when I had some time, in posts like “unguessed companion” or “amorphous blight.” In “noxious heap” and “disreputably nourished,” there’s a certain melancholy reeling in around the edges.

Then my new car arrived and the entire moving away project kicked into overdrive. I quit Community Board 1, Access Queens, and Newtown CAG. I started tooling about – Flushing, College Point, all over. Newtown Creek Alliance gave me the “reveal award” at the annual gala. My pals on the John J Harvey Fireboat conducted a public facing tour on Newtown Creek for me, as described in “humming music,” and then I was back in Pittsburgh with Our Lady of the Pentacle in “crystal stream” and other posts. Every time might be is the last time became the mantra, and posts like “severed aspiration,” “tradewinds sweep,” and “treasure house” were expressions of that.

Whew!

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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.