Archive for the ‘Manhattan’ Category
Omphalos
Monday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The first day of my recent visit ‘back to the old neighborhood,’ as detailed in posts last week, ended with a Metro North trip up to NYS’s community of Cold Spring, right across the Hudson River from Storm King Mountain and West Point. I stayed the night with one of my oldest friends, and after quaffing a heavy breakfast in the town, your humble narrator was once again on the move.
The evening before, I grew so tired that I was becoming incoherent, it was a bit like being drunk. When I was shown the bedding upon which I’d be sleeping, an immediate loss of consciousness occurred. I’d been on the go for something like twenty straight hours at that point.
Pictured above is a Metro North unit moving away from the city.
What? I’ve always passed the time when commuting by shooting trains.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
After a few minutes, the Manhattan bound train arrived, right on schedule. It would take a little over an hour to get into town. In accordance with my advance plans, the underclothing worn the day before was thrown in the garbage (I packed a series of ‘end of life’ garments to wear which would have shortly ended up being used as cleaning rags back home). Home base would be established this evening, for the next couple of days at least, in Queens’ Middle Village. There I’d be able to dismantle my pack a bit and leave some stuff behind, but at this moment I still needed to carry everything everywhere. Bah!
I settled into a seat on the water side of the train. A camera gizmo was affixed to one of the lenses, a silicone ‘baffle’ shroud which promised to block window reflections. It actually worked as described, but was a fairly clumsy thing to handle.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
MTA has a repair and maintenance facility along the tracks up here, which our train hurtled through. I was using my usual camera formula for this sort of circumstance – setting the thing to aperture and ISO sensitivities which are normally used in low light situations, while setting the shutter speed to an insanely quick exposure speed in the realm of 1/6400th or 1/8000th of a second in order to ‘freeze’ the image.
In between shooting, I roamed around inside my camera bag, ensuring that everything has survived the trip and yesterday’s efforts. Double checking things is almost an ADD issue for me, but it insures that I don’t lose track of or damage important – or expensive – things.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
After passing by the Tappan Zee Bridge on the Hudson, the whole ‘shoot out the windows’ setup was disassembled, and a wide angle 16mm lens was affixed for the arrival at Grand Central Terminal.
The next stop after getting to Manhattan would be the 7 train, and then I was heading out to Hunters Point in LIC, to meet up with a couple of the new employees at Newtown Creek Alliance who were hired after I debarked NYC for Pittsburgh. They had a couple of new things to show me, and they also had never experienced the ‘Mitch Waxman at Newtown Creek thing.’
My beloved creek…
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I always experience a rush when entering the main chamber at Grand Central. Back in art school, during the 1980’s, I had a drawing class proctored by a guy named John Ruggiero which met here. Back then, Grand Central was a de facto homeless shelter, and the mission for the class was more or less visual journalism. Approach somebody, find out a little bit, ask if you can draw them. About half of the time, they’d say yes in exchange for a bagel and coffee. Almost 40 years later, and where am I and what am I doing most of the time – but with a camera instead of a drawing pad? Hmm.
Man, I just kept on getting reminded of my past on this trip. Everywhere I went… stories.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I decided to get to the 7 via the long way, by walking outside the building and circling towards the station via 42nd street. When people in Pittsburgh ask me what NYC is like, I usually say ‘it smells like college.’
What I mean is that the ubiquitous skunk of Marijuana is absolutely omnipresent in midtown Manhattan since legalization. Wow. Used to be that you had to walk a few blocks east to avoid the cops while partaking.
I’m all for the local and national end of prohibition, incidentally. Prohibition didn’t work out for alcohol, won’t ever work for drugs and we have the entire 20th century to look for proof of that. If there’s demand for anything, sellers will emerge to profit from it. A market arises, and you can’t beat a market. Best bet thereby is legalization, and high tax, just like alcohol and tobacco. I have spoken.
Back tomorrow with more.
“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.
Next stop, Willoughby
Friday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Finally, I had made it to Grand Central Terminal in midtown Manhattan.
Planes, automobiles, ferries, subways, and now trains. It had been a busy day for me since waking up at one in the morning back in Pittsburgh.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One entered Grand Central, which is always a rush, and proceeded to the tickets counter to purchase a fare card for a Cold Spring bound Metro North train. The wide angle 16mm lens was still affixed to the camera.
Luckily, I didn’t have long to wait as far as boarding the train, and clicked out a few photos while crossing the great lobby.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
My energy was really starting to lag. The lifestyle I’m living in Pittsburgh these days is built around ‘early to rise and early to bed’ logic. Most nights I’m snoring by 11 p.m., and am awake again by 6 a.m. My night owl ways, as lived back in NYC, don’t fit in with the rhythm of life in Pittsburgh.
Luckily, the train was beginning boarding, so I just needed to find a seat and then relax for a little over an hour until reaching my destination.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I made it, and settled into a seat. I was trying out a $15 camera gizmo on the way up north, a large silicone lens baffle which promised to cancel out window reflections when used properly.
The thing worked, sort of, but it wasn’t any sort of major improvement over my home made baffles made from the kind of foam you stuff in around a window based air conditioner. It was only $15, though.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The ride north was uneventful, except for when that wagyu burger from the Staten Island Ferry Terminal produced a massively sulfurous fart, which emerged unbidden into the train car. Sorry, everyone.
I texted my buddy, letting him know I was heading towards him.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The LIC/North Brooklyn real estate frenzy is happening in the South Bronx too. I know… as a child you said to your parents ‘mommy, I want to live in the South Bronx, please.’ Sigh…
Back next week from a visit to the greatest city in the history of mankind.
“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.
Surf and turf
Thursday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
My Pal Val and I met up, after I flew in from Pittsburgh. She picked me up at LaGuardia airport, and we rode on the NYC Ferry from Astoria to Manhattan’s Pier 11. We then marched over to the Staten Island Ferry and were soon on… Staten Island… now you’re caught up.
I was absolutely famished, with the last caloric installation having occurred some 400 miles west of NYC, in Pittsburgh at about two in the morning. There’s only so far that a homemade egg sandwich is going to carry you, so we decided to grab some eats while in St. George.
That’s the predicate of how I ended up ordering a $20 Wagyu Beef burger at the Staten Island Ferry Terminal. It was a good burger, but no burger is worth $20 except to a weary traveler in need of a hot shot of fat and protein to fill his empty fuel tank.
Good news about this spot were the views, which were spectacular.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
It was nice seeing the familiar ‘color way’ heraldries of NYC’s tug fleets again. Val and I finished our luncheon, and headed back into the terminal to catch a big orange boat back to Manhattan. Along the way, we spotted multiple tugs waiting their turn at dock.
My day was at roughly at the median point, and after landing in Manhattan, Val and I would be splitting up. She needed to catch a ferry back to Astoria to fetch her car, and I would be plunging right up the middle of Manhattan Island on the subway towards Midtown.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A couple of last shots of the maritime world were gathered, and I adjusted the intricate web of straps arranged about the torso. I was carrying a week’s worth of clothes in addition to my camera bag, and the camera itself was in my hand. My usual formula for this sort of ‘heavy carry’ looks like an old timey soldier’s setup – the camera and the clothes bag straps arranged in an X shape across my chest, with the knapsack/camera bag shoulder straps locking the two other straps into place while I was moving about.
We arrived back on Manhattan Island, and Val and I bid each other adieu.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I didn’t necessarily miss the subway all these months, and my only thoughts about the subject while sitting in that wheelchair were ‘glad I don’t have to deal with the subway right now.’
One decided to get off the Subway at Herald Square, and walk from 34th to 42nd in order to get to Grand Central Terminal. At least it used to be a terminal, before the LIRR opened up down below.
Does that reclassify the place as a station/terminal now? The terms are specific. For most of its existence, the last stop on Metro North (a public passenger service, nationalized from private rail companies by the noted Liberal and Socialist President Richard Nixon) was here, hence terminal.
Saying that, 7 train subway service has been passing through here for quite a long stretch, but that didn’t make it a ‘station.’ It’s all very confusing.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Leaving ‘the system,’ I stepped back into the sunlight after riding the R to the 34th street hellmont, which is just a slight bit better experience than the one at 42nd street. I had swapped lenses while on the subway, and reentered the street level milieu with a 16mm wide angle prime on the camera. I wanted to ‘take it all in.’
The plan from this point involved getting to Grand Central and catching a Metro North train up to my buddy’s house in Cold Spring, upstate. That’s where I’d be spending the night, and given that I’d been awake for something like fourteen hours at this point, I was growing pretty fatigued.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
My toes were pointed in the correct direction, and thereby I followed them. Grand Central was a 15-20 minute walk away (I’m moving a LOT slower than I used to, although the ankle was not at all getting in my way, my legs are still somewhat atrophied from the long recovery period) and I was intent on getting upstate and out of the City as quickly as possible.
More tomorrow.
“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.
Archives #047
Tuesday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
My pals at Newtown Creek Alliance and I used to find ourselves reporting oil slicks and other petroleum related situations to the NYS DEC quite often. The head spill investigator for the agency, who was based in LIC, used to bring us in for an informal lecture and describing how to identify the type of conditions we were observing, and how to report it to the agency to get the quickest investigatory response. This relationship bore much fruit over the years, and still does.
Me? I’ve got at least three ‘reported observations’ which ended up becoming formal ‘remediation efforts’ by NYS officialdom. ‘Eyes on the Creek,’ that was one of the operative rules for us.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Often has a humble narrator opined that the NYC Subway system provides circumstances favorable to the practice of a very technical form of photography. Low light, reflective surfaces, fast moving subject matter… add in a prohibition against tripods, lights, and flash… if you’re struggling to master hand held and low illumination photography skills, go ride the subways and get good at it. You’re commuting somewhere anyway, why not make creative use of otherwise lost time?
2015’s ‘copper eyed’ is all about subways, and photographing them as they enter the station. As a note: This is one of the very few times that I included the shot’s exposure triangle information, incidentally, which was me trying to pull back the curtain a bit to show how I do my thing.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I always figured that since half of my time outside the house in NYC was inevitably going to revolve around transit so I might as well make some usage of my wait times on the subway platform. Eventually this catalog of transit included every single public conveyance I could get a camera next to – taxis, buses, citibike… everything public.
These archive posts are reaching into Newtown Pentacle’s backups, and are pulling posts that went public on this date, in their respective years, going back to 2009. This practice will continue until I’m back on both feet full time, and new photos and stories can be gathered. For anyone who hasn’t heard the news, I broke my left ankle at the end of September.
“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.
Archives #041
Monday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Happy Monday, lords and ladies. Progress, recovery from the injury wise, continues here at HQ. Hoping that sometime towards the end of this week or the start of the next… I might just be able to wield the camera again. Cross your fingers, mine are.
I think I’ve mentioned it previously, but since I started receiving physical therapy treatments for the ankle recovery my healing factor has gone into overdrive. This week’s posts are being written on Thanksgiving, I’d mention, so you’re a few days into my future while reading this.
These archive posts are reaching into Newtown Pentacle’s backups, and are pulling posts that went public on this date, in their respective years, going back to 2009. This practice will continue until I’m back on both feet full time, and new photos and stories can be gathered. For anyone who hasn’t heard the news, I broke my left ankle at the end of September.
2013’s ‘monstrous guilt’ appeared today, addressing a few of the many accusations leveled at your humble narrator in the early days of this publication by various malcontents and madmen back in Queens, in a post illustrated with photos of walking around in Manhattan. Paranoid, much? Sheesh. Don’t miss a certain subsection of y’all at all.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I’m still under Doctor’s orders to wear the walking boot when I’m out and about, but around HQ I’ve just been instructed to wear just a pair of my normal shoes again. I’ve also been growing capable enough to handle the bare minimums of adulthood again, cooking light meals and such.
Just watch, though… the day I say ‘I’m going out to go get some shots’ is the same day a blizzard appears and buries Pittsburgh in thirty stories of snow.
2014’s ‘faint draft’ saw me attending the christening and launch of the NYC DEP’s newest (at the time) sludge boat on Ward’s Island in the East River.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
It grinds that I’ve lost three months out of my life to this experience, but hey – I’m still kicking. I’m constantly reminded, however, that time grows short and the shadows are stretching out long. I’ve got a lot of dead friends, Y’see.
Time is precious, don’t piss any of it away if there’s a choice about it.
2015’s ‘marine things’ is a lament about another friend of mine dropping dead, this time it was Staten Island’s own John Skelson.
“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 