Archive for the ‘newtown creek’ Category
nigh unendurable
Monday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
So yeah, I get a bit depressed occasionally. Part of being mentally healthy – most of the time – is realizing when you’ve got a psychic cold and acknowledging the fact. Americans don’t talk about this, we should. Regardless of all that, a humble narrator is back on duty and raring to go – the Newtown Pentacle, thereby, is back in session.
On the 4th of July, one scuttled over to Blissville in pursuance of climbing up the Kosciuszcko Bridge and shooting the fireworks with my beloved Newtown Creek in frame. Denied this happy juncture, one instead set up the camera alongside the fencelines of First Calvary cemetery and prepared to photograph the fireworks show from that location instead. Hence, the shot above was captured.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The pedestrian and bike path on the Kosciuszcko was closed, and guarded by a caper of those irrepressible scamps, whom you meet occasionally, that dress for work in NYPD uniforms. I didn’t even recognize the unit these particular assassins of joy were assigned to Blissville from (IUB or something) so talking my way onto the bridge wasn’t possible as they didn’t know me from a hole in the wall. If they were 108 pct., there’s a pretty good chance I could have charmed my way up there, but there you are. Everybody has a job to do, and this bunch of Cops were assigned the “deny Mitch his picture” duty.
There were – literally – about a thousand people along the fences of Review Avenue. This is the highest density of lookie loos I’ve ever seen arrayed along the Blissville/Long Island City border, about 2.1 miles back from the East River, btw.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
It’s been a pretty crappy couple of weeks for me, actually. Climate has not been on my side, what with the extreme heat and all the rain. If you think the stuff I was publishing here was scary, be glad that you didn’t encounter me at the neighborhood bar I was drinking my troubles away at. A couple of “hard cases” here in Astoria had never encountered the unfiltered version of the “Mitch Waxman Experience.” Apparently, when I decide to drop the act and just be myself, it’s rather terrifying. Also, my back hurts, and that left foot of mine is still causing a lot of trouble. Couple that with being in a mood, and Oy… it’s so humid… it’s like a sauna out there.
As mentioned though, the psychic glacier has calved, and one has resumed pretending not to be murderously angry all the time. Everything is fantastic, all the time, again. I’m a mother flowering ray of sunshine, yo, in love with a great city on the edge of a dark and cruel ocean. Hey… did you know that concrete is radioactive?
“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.
coterminous with
Friday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Some of you have inquired as to where my recent dark point of view is coming from. Headlines, mainly. Every one of my little parables this week relates to late 19th and early 20th century existentialist writing. Camus, Kafka, Nietzsche. I always say, when you’re in a mood, wallow in it.
As you may have guessed, a humble narrator is in a bit of mood this week. One requires a short break, so single images of various scenes will be greeting you, along with rather depressing anecdotes. Happy Summer.
Back to normal next week, I think, at this – your Newtown Pentacle.
“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.
clutching pits
Thursday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One strives to abandon the primitivism of a dualist philosophy and not be bound by the liberal fantasies of the enlightenment. There is no such thing as good, nor is there bad, both are constructs. Nothing matters unless you say it does, and justice is a fairy tale told to the existentially terrified or the weak. From the second you pierce the birth caul to the one in which you are wrapped in a shroud, there is only pain and pleasure. There is no regret, the experience of which is like chewing on a stone, with the same predictable result. History does not celebrate the good, instead we remember the monsters. Do you want to be remembered?
As you may have guessed, a humble narrator is in a bit of mood this week. One requires a short break, so single images of various scenes will be greeting you, along with rather depressing anecdotes. Happy Summer.
“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.
other embodiments
Monday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Y’know, I’d normally make a reference to the mood I’m in by describing myself as standing on a beach with a gun in my hand while looking down at the dead Arab boy lying in the sand, but references to existentialist literature would probably be misread. Matter of fact, somebody just stopped listening when I said “Arab.” Somebody else didn’t like “gun.” There’s also likely somebody offended by “beach.”
I’m alive, and I feel absolutely nothing – except dirty – dear stranger.
As you may have guessed, a humble narrator is in a bit of mood this week. One requires a short break, so single images of various scenes will be greeting you, along with rather depressing anecdotes. Happy Summer.
“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.
effigies sculptured
Friday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A recent visit to the Empire State Building observation deck cost me $41, plus subway fares. That’s the price you pay to see things. We all have a price, and problems we can’t solve. Luckily, there’s often someone willing to sell you what you want. I’ve been wanting perspective, and to “get high.”
Superman has super problems, I’ve always thought. The big guy has to spend a lot of time restraining himself. He can burn somebody by looking at them too hard, and probably cause cancer if he stares at you with those X-Ray eyes of his. When Superman is stopping a bank robbery, it must be excruciating to exercise the care involved in not killing everything he touches while moving at super speed. Superman punching someone in the nose, and not having that someone’s head explode into a cloud of red mist, represents a significant amount of martial restraint.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
As the burning thermonuclear eye of god itself slid down behind New Jersey (I’m told there’s a cavern in Pennsylvania it slots into), a humble narrator got busy with the camera and the clicking and the whirring. What stirred me into dropping the cash on this visit was the recent revelation that all of the “master shots” of Newtown Creek from this perspective in my image library depicted the old Kosciuszcko Bridge.
Superman can famously walk about on the plasma shell of the sun, burrow through Earth’s mantle and visit the molten core of the planet, divert the course of mighty rivers, and withstand all sorts of hellacious situations. I’ve often wondered if he’s just numb. If you’re Superman, how far do you need to go to just feel something? Imagine if he’s disguised himself as one of us and attends a concert, gets overwhelmed by an emotional response to the performance and absentmindedly begins to loudly applaud. Superman clapping his hands loudly would likely result in a mass casualty event.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This is one of the classic Empire State Building shots, depicting the Flatiron – or Fuller Brush – Building at the intersection of 23rd street and Fifth Avenue/Broadway. The other nearby landmark is Madison Square Park, which used to be a Potters Field cemetery for the poor.
Something which I’ve never been able to reconcile regarding the Man of Steel is the amount of time he spends pretending to be human. You have to figure that every minute of every day, he should be out there saving lives. This guy could handle large scale desert irrigation projects, literally moving mountains, and he’s spending his days 9-5 working at a newspaper? Sure, the pen is mightier than the sword, but… Superman.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A very similar shot, compositionally, was in yesterday’s post – depicting the angle of view towards the Queensboro Bridge with Astoria in the distance. That’s the Chrysler Building in the foreground.
If you were actually able to leap over tall buildings in a single bound, you’d likely be leaving craters in the sidewalk when jumping. The physics of Superman are daunting. As mentioned above, he’d have to take exquisite care not to atomize people while crime fighting. Presuming Superman is about 200 pounds of pure muscle, that means his foot would need to exert enough force on the ground to propel 200 pounds a thousand or more feet in the air. Superman is never portrayed as having freakishly large feet, so let’s presume it’s a normal size 11 or 12 shoe that he would wear. That means he’s focusing multiple tons worth of force into a 4-5 inch patch of sidewalk, and that the cement paving would essentially turn into a powder of particles. These particles dispersing into the atmosphere would appear to us, to be an explosion.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Looking westwards towards the hideous Hudson Yards complex, with the burning thermonuclear eye of god itself nearly occluded behind New Jersey.
“Faster than a speeding bullet” also points out another angle which this Kryptonian Weapon of Mass Destruction would have to be extremely careful about. The fastest of our modern bullets moves at about 2,600 feet a second, which is just about Mach 2. Comic writers have established that our boy can move far faster than that, and within the atmosphere at that. Imagine the firestorm of friction heated air Superman has to be pulling behind him when he’s in a hurry. He’d be leaving horizontal fire tornados all over the sky everytime there was an emergency in China.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One last shot just as proper night was setting in, looking southwards towards the Freedom Tower over Lower Manhattan, from the Empire State Building Observation Deck.
Up, up, and away.
“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 