Archive for the ‘Pickman’ Category
express purpose
Scenes from a short walk across a long Borough.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
There is a notion afoot, amongst the Real Estate crowd and the urban planners, that Western Queens is somehow “under utilized” and needs to become more urban. This ideation was obviously formed by those who sit in air conditioned Manhattan office buildings who have never actually visited Queens for any reason other than to go to the airport or have only driven through it on their way to the Hamptons.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
When all the transportation infrastructure was rammed through Queens in the first half of the 20th century, this was largely an agricultural area. That’s why it was so easy to site the bridges and elevated subways and tunnel out here in the first place. Large lots of land which were easily purchased from a single buyer is a developers dream. Once all the steel and cement was in place, however, Queens grew exponentially. No kid from Astoria or Woodside will tell you he or she grew up in “the country.”
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Recently, someone asked me what I thought of the current notion of turning Western Queens into some sort of Silicon Valley style digital hub and business incubator.
The idea is compelling, given the massive floor space and stout construction which the former factory buildings that distinguish the area, but I asked “what will these companies be connecting to?”. Astoria in particular is a hodge podge of wires carelessly maintained, with electrical and data cables spanning the streets. The utility poles which these wires are hung on are notoriously and precipitously overloaded, causing the them to bend and bow.
Does this look like the infrastructure that will draw a google or apple data center to the neighborhood, or does it remind you of some third world shithole in which one or two favored companies were granted a permanent franchise?
Want to see something cool? Summer 2013 Walking Tours-
13 Steps around Dutch Kills– Saturday, August 17, 2013
Newtown Creek walking tour with Mitch Waxman and Newtown Creek Alliance, tickets now on sale.
The Poison Cauldron of the Newtown Creek – Saturday, August 24, 2013
Newtown Creek walking tour with Mitch Waxman and Atlas Obscura, tickets now on sale.
gradual glow
She floats thro’ the air with the greatest of ease
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Like one of the personalized parables which populate “Thus Spake Zarathustra,” your humble narrator dares not tread the sky for he knows that failure will result due to personal inadequacy and a hidebound mind. This youngling spotted at South Street Seaport’s “Trapeze School New York,” it seems, has no such limitations placed on her “Will to Power.”
from newyork.trapezeschool.com
Trapeze School New York is dedicated to making flying trapeze available to anyone who seeks inspiration, challenge, fitness or just a couple hours of unique fun. Our mission every day is to create a safe, fun, challenging environment where our students strive to surpass limitations and more richly enjoy their lives.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The trapeze section of Pier 16 is well fortified, with nets and rigging, and is surrounded by a chain link fence to keep the curious out of harms way. The procedure, as I’ve observed it, is to allow participants an opportunity to learn the circus art under tutelage. They come up, one by one, and train in handling themselves on the wire.
If your humble narrator was to attempt something like this, it would merely provide an EMT the opportunity to learn how to resuscitate someone who died of fright.
from wikipedia
A trapeze is a short horizontal bar hung by ropes or metal straps from a support. It is an aerial apparatus commonly found in circus performances. Trapeze acts may be static, swinging or flying, and may be performed solo, double, triple or as a group act.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I’ve never had the urge to swing from a series of ropes, ride a wild or even tame horse, nor drive without a seat belt on. Vast physical cowardice is my thing, having long ago decided that disease or old age will suit me nicely, rather than accidental or violent death. These people are meshuggeneh.
from wikipedia
meshugaas, also mishegaas or mishegoss: Crazy or senseless activity or behavior; craziness (Yiddish משוגעת meshugaas, from Hebrew məšugga‘ath, a form of the above)
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Nothing wrong with the activity, however, they are all trussed up with safety lines and every participant observed ends their routine by practicing a drop into the safety net, which is actually pretty smart. Still, it takes some sort of fortitude to do this in front of hundreds of people a couple of dozen feet over the dock. This is one wild hobby to cultivate- swinging roughly through the air, on the flying trapeze, at South Street Seaport.
from wikipedia
Courage is the ability and willingness to confront fear, pain, danger, uncertainty, or intimidation. Physical courage is courage in the face of physical pain, hardship, death, or threat of death, while moral courage is the ability to act rightly in the face of popular opposition, shame, scandal, or discouragement.
In some traditions, fortitude holds approximately the same meaning as courage. In the Western tradition, notable thoughts on courage have come from philosophers such as Aristotle, Aquinas and Kierkegaard; in the Eastern tradition, some thoughts on courage were offered by the Tao Te Ching. More recently, courage has been explored by the discipline of psychology.
Want to see something cool? Summer 2013 Walking Tours-
13 Steps around Dutch Kills– Saturday, August 17, 2013
Newtown Creek walking tour with Mitch Waxman and Newtown Creek Alliance, tickets now on sale.
Project Firebox 83
An ongoing catalog of New York’s endangered Fireboxes.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A provocatively placed municipal pimpernel is found at the angle between Sunnyside and Blissville, bathing in the corrosive miasma of automotive exhaust, blasted with coruscating radiation emanating from the burning thermonuclear eye of god itself- stands this steadfast guardian of the public good. Greenpoint Avenue is where the gradation from residential to industrial zones in this area of NYC takes place. From this point, passerby begin a descent from the high hills of Sunnyside to that troubled alluvial plain which surrounds the infamous Newtown Creek. A surprise in Western Queens, this firebox seems to be functioning.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
Want to see something cool? Summer 2013 Walking Tours-
Kill Van Kull– TODAY, Saturday, August 10, 2013
Staten Island walking tour with Mitch Waxman and Working Harbor Committee, tickets now on sale.
13 Steps around Dutch Kills– Saturday, August 17, 2013
Newtown Creek walking tour with Mitch Waxman and Newtown Creek Alliance, tickets now on sale.
subsequently professed
A week of madness, doubt, and insecurity ends.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The Roman Emperor Caligula set the standard of sanity for his culture. Luckily for the rest of you, I’m the emperor of nothing other than what exists between my ears. Unfortunately for me, there’s a couple of rebel groups here in Cortex city, and a bizarre religious cult which is steadily growing in population and making itself known out in the Oblongata Desert. At the border, in Medulla town, a team of terrorists seems to be forming up as well. One hopes that a War on Terror won’t spring up in my neck.
I’m all ‘effed up.
from wikipedia
Deviance, in a sociological context, describes actions or behaviors that violate social norms, including formally-enacted rules (e.g., crime), as well as informal violations of social norms (e.g., rejecting folkways and mores). It is the purview of sociologists, psychologists, psychiatrists, and criminologists to study how these norms are created, how they change over time and how they are enforced.
Norms are rules and expectations by which members of society are conventionally guided. Deviance is a failure to conform to these norms.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
How one wishes that satisfaction and desire had led to a more wholesome life, rather than the bizarre simulacrum- a series of dull events- which was the path I ended up on. It isn’t fair to those who, against all logic and reason, care for my well being. Would that I had chosen homogeneity, embraced the traditional desires of this culture, and was able to pretend or even feign. Unfortunately, this is my lot, to remain apart.
Barren, disappointed, abused, shunned… always must I remain an outsider…
from wikipedia
Normality (also known as normalcy) is the state of being normal. Behaviour can be normal for an individual (intrapersonal normality) when it is consistent with the most common behaviour for that person. Normal is also used to describe when someone’s behaviour conforms to the most common behaviour in society (known as conforming to the norm). Definitions of normality vary by person, time, place, and situation – it changes along with changing societal standards and norms. Normal behaviour is often only recognized in contrast to abnormality. In its simplest form, normality is seen as good while abnormality is seen as bad. Someone being seen as “normal” or “not normal” can have social ramifications, including being included, excluded or stigmatized by larger society.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
For one such as myself, the middle weeks of August are always a time of lament, recrimination, and doubt. Marching- ever marching- across the Newtown Pentacle as the burning gaze of the thermonuclear eye of god itself glares down upon me, an unending soliloquy of uncertainty and madness is held imprisoned just a few inches behind my eyes.
Whether it be Mōnandæg or Frīġedæġ, you can count on a humble narrator to find a way to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
from wikipedia
The name Friday comes from the Old English Frīġedæġ, meaning the “day of Frigg”, a result of an old convention associating the Old English goddess Frige with the Roman goddess Venus, with whom the day is associated in many different cultures. The same holds for Frīatag in Old High German, Freitag in Modern German and vrijdag in Dutch.
The expected cognate name in Old Norse would be *friggjar-dagr. However, the name of Friday in Old Norse is frjá-dagr instead, indicating a loan of the weekday names from Low German. The modern Scandinavian form is Fredag in Swedish, Norwegian and Danish, meaning Freja’s day. The distinction between Freja and Frigg in some Germanic mythologies is problematic.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
Want to see something cool? Summer 2013 Walking Tours-
Kill Van Kull– Saturday, August 10, 2013
Staten Island walking tour with Mitch Waxman and Working Harbor Committee, tickets now on sale.
13 Steps around Dutch Kills– Saturday, August 17, 2013
Newtown Creek walking tour with Mitch Waxman and Newtown Creek Alliance, tickets now on sale.
everyday tourist
Lurking, in fear.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
It would seem that much like the hordes of rodents who tunnel and writhe below, your humble narrator is always skittish and ready to bolt for safety. Recent travels carried me through the familiar and entirely wholesome Court Square zone surrounding the megalith here in Long Island City. Certainty that I was being watched, and not just by that thing which cannot possibly exist in the sapphire cupola of the aforementioned megalith, ruled over me. Waggling my whiskers and sniffing at the air, your humble narrator suddenly felt that the presence of predators was likely and decided to make for a hasty retreat.
l’m all ‘effed up.
from wikipedia
Insanity, craziness or madness is a spectrum of behaviors characterized by certain abnormal mental or behavioral patterns. Insanity may manifest as violations of societal norms, including a person becoming a danger to themselves or others, though not all such acts are considered insanity. In modern usage insanity is most commonly encountered as an informal unscientific term denoting mental instability, or in the narrow legal context of the insanity defense. In the medical profession the term is now avoided in favor of diagnoses of specific mental disorders; the presence of delusions or hallucinations is broadly referred to as psychosis. When discussing mental illness in general terms, “psychopathology” is considered a preferred descriptor.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Perception is a deucedly odd thing, half instinct and half observation. A poor specimen, both physically and psychologically, I don’t fare well in any sort of challenge. I’ve never hit the game winning home run, acted the hero, or done much else other than cause angst and agony. It is for the best that I stay out of these bright places, and it would likely be preferable if one such as myself was exiled to a small guarded room somewhere and confined lest I corrupt or debase others.
Corrosive agonies abound in my presence.
from wikipedia
Before the American Civil War, the mentally ill were often placed in poorhouses, workhouses, or prisons when their families could no longer care for them. Patients were often forced to live with criminals and were treated likewise: locked in a cell or even chained to walls. By the 1860s, Americans wanted to provide better assistance to the less fortunate, including the mentally ill. The number of facilities devoted to the care of people with mental disorders increased significantly. These facilities, meant to be places of refuge, were referred to as insane asylums. Between 1825 and 1865, the number of asylums in the United States increased from 9 to 62.
The establishment of asylums did not mean that treatment greatly improved. Because doctors did not understand what caused the behavior of their patients, they often listed the possible causes of mental illness as religious excitement, sunstroke, or even reading novels. They believed that the patient had lost all control over their morals and that strict discipline was necessary to help the patient regain self-control. Asylums often employed straitjackets to restrain patients who could not control themselves.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This proclivity toward self recrimination is accelerated whenever I’m near mirrors, whose shocking imagery always offers horrible revelations that puncture those lies which one tells himself. Perhaps this is what set me off, while innocently traveling to and fro across the concretized realities of Long Island City, for when one observes that the absolute eidelon of senile corruption and debased sanity reflected in the mirror glass is no idle fantasy or wild illustration but is rather yourself…
How can one not realize the verisimilitude displayed, to those scurrying legions of the eternal subterranean night, and not enter into the comforting arms of madness?
from wikipedia
Paranoid personality disorder (PPD) is a mental disorder characterized by paranoia and a pervasive, long-standing suspiciousness and generalized mistrust of others. Individuals with this personality disorder may be hypersensitive, easily feel slighted, and habitually relate to the world by vigilant scanning of the environment for clues or suggestions that may validate their fears or biases. Paranoid individuals are eager observers. They think they are in danger and look for signs and threats of that danger, potentially not appreciating other evidence.
They tend to be guarded and suspicious and have quite constricted emotional lives. Their reduced capacity for meaningful emotional involvement and the general pattern of isolated withdrawal often lend a quality of schizoid isolation to their life experience. People with this particular disorder may or may not have a tendency to bear grudges, suspiciousness, tendency to interpret others’ actions as hostile, persistent tendency to self-reference, or a tenacious sense of personal right.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
Want to see something cool? Summer 2013 Walking Tours-
Kill Van Kull– Saturday, August 10, 2013
Staten Island walking tour with Mitch Waxman and Working Harbor Committee, tickets now on sale.
13 Steps around Dutch Kills– Saturday, August 17, 2013
Newtown Creek walking tour with Mitch Waxman and Newtown Creek Alliance, tickets now on sale.
The Newtown Pentacle 