The Newtown Pentacle

Tuesday

– photo by Mitch Waxman

Your humble narrator always attempts to follow a certain rhythm to his life, a staccato beat that was interrupted by the ankle injury last year.

Despite my servicing of the ultramundanities of daily existence, the rythyms of the walking schedule are increasing in frequency somehow. For much of the last six months, I’ve been hampered by physical constraints and limitations, but that’s mostly behind me. The ankle still hurts, pretty much all the time, but pain (like fear) is the mind killer. Best to just tough it out and get on with things.

Launching myself up the steep hill I dwell at the bottom of and towards the T light rail has become a bit of a ritual for me. Heart rate gets noticeably quicker by the time I reach the next corner, after climbing up that steep elevation, and after a ‘catch my breath’ moment, it’s a quick and easy push up to get to the Patomac Station on the T. I try to keep my ticker ticking at an elevated rate for the length of these endeavors, but not racing or pounding.

Along the way, this scene caught my eye for some reason.

– photo by Mitch Waxman

It was a misty and foggy day in Pittsburgh, with temperatures in the 50’s. Despite all the atmospherics, rain was not forecast, and one decided that at the end of this day’s effort a pint or two of beer and a set of locomotive photos would be on my list of things to do.

This was one of the walks where I was working on ‘speeding up’ my gait. As mentioned previously, one finds himself casually striding again, but I’m moving a lot slower than formerly, before the injury. I’m concerned at the moment with regaining ‘burst speed,’ aka the ability to ‘maximum boogie’ if needed. I’m hoping to get to being able to manifest about 100 feet worth of ‘boogie’ by the end of the winter.

Maximum boogie? Yeah, that’s when you sprint across an intersection or bust a move while trying to catch a train or a bus.

– photo by Mitch Waxman

Pictured is a T moving away from Pittsburgh towards the South Hills section. It’s a better shot than the one of the actual T which I rode into the city on, as I dig all of those catenary wires forming into the background.

On the platform, I was chatting with some dude that was a recently retired Army Drill Sergeant, while we were mutually waiting for the train, and he was a surprisingly nice guy for someone whose entire career was based around telling people they’re not good enough and calling them weaklings or sister lovers.

I should have asked him what he’d charge to follow me around, and yell at me to move faster, while questioning my ancestry and telling me how much I suck. It would be like my Jewish mother had come back to life.

It’s just over a half hour’s journey from Dormont to the end of the line on Pittsburgh’s ‘North Shore.’ That’s the part of Pittsburgh nearby the stadiums, and a mass of entertainment and night life businesses. I wasn’t going there, though.

On this occasion, I was going to be debarking the T in Allentown, at a temporary stop which the T people have established while they rebuild a transit tunnel that the service normally uses.

– photo by Mitch Waxman

Stepping off the T actually triggered the PTSD I’ve been experiencing regarding steps, but such moments of existential panic have become common. This walk was focused on exercising the calfs and the top and frontage of the thighs, so the City Steps of Pittsburgh would once again be utilized as my gymnasium.

The camera bag and camera strap were adjusted and set into a comfortable manner against the decay of my pre-corpse, and then off I scuttled. I was ‘wearing’ the camera under the filthy black raincoat, just in case it started raining. It didn’t.

– photo by Mitch Waxman

This time around, I was listening to music on the headphones, specifically a ‘mix tape’ playlist on my phone. I don’t do Spotify or any of the streaming services for music, instead I buy and download from the Apple Store. I’m told that I’m old fashioned, which cracks me up.

My problem with streaming is the same one that I have with those little air buds which everyone uses – doesn’t fit my lifestyle.

When I go out, it can be all day. I cannot run the battery down on my phone for something frivolous like streaming music. The audio files on my phone have virtually zero impact on the battery when they’re playing through wired headphones. I use the white Apple wired headphones, which pop out of my ears on their own accord all the time, and then dangle on their wires until I place them back in my ear holes.

The only piece of gear which ever gotten away from me and was lost, in all these years. was a ‘rocket blower’ which ended up splashing into Newtown Creek (nearby the Metropolitan Avenue Bridge).

Those super expensive air buds which are the current ‘de rigueur’ use Bluetooth to connect wirelessly to the phone and thereby eat a lot of battery juice. I really don’t want to have to carry a power bank and a cable around with me, too. I do so when traveling, but for day to day? Bluetooth headphones just create a problem that needs additional gear for me to solve.

Best to use the wired headphones, for me.

– photo by Mitch Waxman

I can’t help but take advantage of serendipity and crack out a shot when a vista just appears like this.

This section I was scuttling through, dubbed the ‘South Side Slopes,’ is carved onto a very steep elevation. Multiple posts over the last few months have explored several of the many, many pathways from ‘up here’ to ‘down there.’

Back tomorrow with more.

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