The Newtown Pentacle

Friday

– photo by Mitch Waxman

This particular scuttle began on the corner of Reed and Kirkpatrick Streets, here in Pittsburgh. This intersection is found at the edge of a neighborhood called ‘The Hill.’ Kirkpatrick Street in particular has interested me when driving along its length, due to the near complete abandonment of its building lots. A rideshare was used to drop me off here, and your humble narrator soon found himself kicking dirt and scuttling downwards towards the Monongahela River.

The Hill District is somewhat analogous (yup, comparing Pittsburgh to NYC again, me) to Bedford Stuyvesant in Brooklyn, or Harlem in Manhattan, as far as its cultural significance to the local African American Community. I’m largely ignorant regarding its story.

Visitpittburgh.com offers this primer, but the story of this neighborhood is something that academic careers, and a good amount of jurisprudence, are based on upon. Politics surrounding this topic are apparently generational and quite volatile.

I’m just walking here.

– photo by Mitch Waxman

Kirkpatrick Street winds down the side of a geographic prominence, heading in a southerly direction towards the bluffs of the Monongahela River, and the Birmingham Bridge which spans it. Oakland, with its universities and hospitals, is just to the east. Downtown, with its office towers and governmental outposts, is to the west. Uptown, with its busted streets and abandoned tenements, lurks squamously at the base of the steep hill which Kirkpatrick twirls about on. Other side of the river? Glad you asked.

Yeah… everything is starting to come into focus.

– photo by Mitch Waxman

My stride was halted upon encountering this stout iron cage, affixed to a storm sewer’s open drain. This was peculiar, as its design seemed to lean more towards keeping something inside of the sewer pipe, rather than keeping things out of it. Curious.

What? You don’t notice sewer infrastructure when out and about?

– photo by Mitch Waxman

A small Baptist church was observed, tucked into an odd sized lot, and it caught my eye for some reason. Looking out into the verge from either side of the road, building foundations and the remnants of retaining walls were observed.

Your humble narrator was once again the singular pedestrian, incidentally. Plenty of vehicle traffic passed me by, but the only person walking about was encased in a filthy black raincoat.

– photo by Mitch Waxman

The weather has turned cold here in Pittsburgh, and this was the first walk of the year in which I had to wear ‘long John’s.’ That’s a layer of thermal underwear, for the colloquially or sartorially challenged. Beyond the underwear, I was encased in my normal mass of swirling black sackcloth, festooned with secure pockets. I’ve lost count of how many there are at this point… pants have something like 8 velcro sealable pockets and the sweatshirt offers 19 zippered/velcro pockets as well as channels for me to run headphone wires through the thing. Local area network guy, that’s me.

A fuligin shroud which adorns and protects the delicate skinvelope of the decaying pre-corpse which ferries my brain about, that’s what my ‘couture’ is. I consider the brain to be ‘me,’ as in that’s where the perception of consciousness resides – ‘between the ears and behind the eyes’ – whereas the jangly limbs and obtuse chemical factory in the belly and chest are perceived as being somehow external to the operation (until something goes wrong). I’m all ‘effed up.

I had the camera bag strapped across my back, of course, and the camera itself was being ‘worn’ beneath the raincoat to protect it from prying eyes, and possible precipitation. I was also wearing the flash orange ball cap which has become my regular ‘cover’ these days. ‘Cover’ is soldier talk for a hat, btw.

– photo by Mitch Waxman

Your humble narrator was deeply involved with one of his self deprecating internal monologues, literally beating himself up about something ugly which occurred several decades ago. Whether it was actually my fault or not, I’ve decided to take personal credit as having been the villain of that story. I doubt the other parties would even remember the conflict all these years later.

Regrets, I’ve got a few.

Y’know, this is why I always thought it was silly to assign readings of Dostoyevsky or Camus to students under the age of 20. Regret? What can you possibly regret at that age, as nothing has actually happened to you yet and you haven’t had the time to really screw up enough to cause lasting harm to others?

Late 50’s? Yeah…

Back next week with more – at this – your Newtown Pentacle.

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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.