Posts Tagged ‘Astoria’
haven of light
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Do not bring up the subject of sleep to your humble narrator, for even the thought of entering into that trance state- with it’s concurrently wild hallucinations- is enough to cause both physical and mental strain upon my delicate equilibrium. Just thinking about lying helpless in the dark waiting to slip into this inevitable oblivion is enough to make me breath rapidly and experience irregular cardiac rhythms while sweating profusely. The psychological effects of such inferences manifest as a confused, trembling, and amorphous fear which betrays a dread terror and malign panic.
I’m all ‘effed up.
from wikipedia
The fear of the dark is a common fear among children and to a varying degree is observed for adults. Fear of the dark is usually not fear of the darkness itself, but fear of possible or imagined dangers concealed by the darkness. Some degree of fear of the dark is natural, especially as a phase of child development. Most observers report that fear of the dark seldom appears before the age of 2 years. When fear of the dark reaches a degree that is severe enough to be considered pathological, it is sometimes called nyctophobia (from Greek νυξ, “night” and φοβια, phobia), scotophobia, from σκότος – “darkness”, or lygophobia, from λυγή – “twilight” and achluophobia.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Severe, my psychic pathologies demand isolation from others, easy to achieve by being awake while everyone else is asleep. Terrifying possibilities of what might lurk out there in the darkness torment my imagination, and I can only feel safe when blanketed in electronic light. There are stories of untoward and unexpected occurrences observed during the Great Astoria Blackout of 2006 whose meanings are only now beginning to coalesce into some sort of sensible shape, things that can exist only in the safe fuligin which no sensibly illumined skeptical New Yorker might expect. Thresholds throughout the ancient village knew lurkers, and odd shinings were described emanating from certain ruined or lightning cursed churches which dot the rolling hillocks of Astoria.
From beneath the streets an azure glow and acrid scent escaped, and rough havoc was unleashed, I’m sure.
from wikipedia
Panphobia, from the Greek ‘pan’ and ‘phobos,’ also called Omniphobia, Pantophobia, or Panophobia, is a medical condition known as a “non-specific fear” or “the fear of everything” and is described as “a vague and persistent dread of some unknown evil”, or only seeing the extremes to everything.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
To help pass the lonely hours of nocturnal hand wringing, tooth gnashing, and guilty self recrimination I have taken to long exposure photography which allows me to feel as if something had been accomplished before weakness and fatigue forced me into surrendering to that familiar cycle of deteriorating into unconsciousness, hallucination, and dazed awakening. Stumbling out into the streets the next and every day- into and beneath the direct gaze of the burning thermonuclear eye of god itself- emanations sting at my skin and if exposed to them for not so long a time, radiation burns will begin to manifest.
from wikipedia
Erythropoietic protoporphyria (EPP) is a relatively mild form of porphyria, although very painful, which arises from a deficiency in the enzyme ferrochelatase, leading to abnormally high levels of protoporphyrin in the tissue. The severity varies significantly from individual to individual…
EPP can be triggered through exposure to sun even though the patient is behind glass. Even the UV emissions from arc welding with the use of full protective mask have been known to trigger EPP.
Prolonged exposure to the sun can lead to edema and blistering. At times the immediate damage can be so severe that the individual can lose the skin in sheets.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Doctor friends have advised me that my aversion to this hideous biological malady is unavoidable, and described timetables which offer precise time periods during which the kidneys and liver may cleanse the blood of toxins, and the function of cellular growth and repair is based around sleep as well I am told. As well, psychiatric and psychological sources describe the chronic loss or avoidance of sleep as some sort of disorder.
Well, what do lettered academics know anyway? Have they rode with the tomb legions over the frozen steppes of nephren ka, or flown with the night gaunts through low hanging branches over the Lethe, or walked a mile in my moccasins?
from wikipedia
Sleep deprivation is the condition of not having enough sleep; it can be either chronic or acute. A chronic sleep-restricted state can cause fatigue, daytime sleepiness, clumsiness and weight loss or weight gain. It adversely affects the brain and cognitive function. Few studies have compared the effects of acute total sleep deprivation and chronic partial sleep restriction. Complete absence of sleep over long periods is impossible for humans to achieve (unless they suffer from fatal familial insomnia); brief microsleeps cannot be avoided. Long-term total sleep deprivation has caused death in lab animals.
without voice
– photo by Mitch Waxman
For the fullest sensation of joy, please check out this Newtown Pentacle post: “Weirdly Afar“, from March 25 of 2011.
Were it that just a day or two ago I hadn’t confessed publicly my fears of descending into some megalomaniacal state and an inevitable attempt to set myself up as a comic book villain, this new throne might have been the one. Black and silver are my personal colors, after all, and this would fit the macabre decor by which Newtown Pentacle HQ is known and remarked upon by the sturdy Croats which people this section of my beloved Astoria.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Illumined by a shaft of emerald light, this throne would sit in the middle of a large room cloaked by shadow, located somewhere deep below Newtown Creek. My lackeys and henchmen, whom I would call the WaxMen, would kneel before this throne awaiting my biddings which they would then do.
(my friend Chris, by the way, claims these are supposed to be Lions- I think they look like surprised Baboons. Any thoughts, Lords and Ladies?)
– photo by Mitch Waxman
From this lair of mine, a nexus of absolute intent and malediction of wholesomeness, would my gloved hand reach out- and were the world to have just one throat…
…Sheesh…
This is why I can’t ever be allowed to have a throne.
Funny thing is that a couple of days ago, somebody emailed me asking where the store was. I think it was a fashion industry thing.
nucleonic horrors
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Whilst happily ensconced amongst the wonders of two separate boat tours of NY Harbor on Tuesday, Our Lady of the Pentacle texted me with the news of great tumult nearby Newtown Pentacle HQ in my beloved Astoria. Breathless (she is a writer and can convey great levels of subtext, even within a 180 character message), Our Lady described the presence of vast numbers of NYPD specialist squads- Hazmat, Tactical, and Aviation were emphasized- at work on 28th Avenue near 45 street.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Upon returning home, she described message board chatter spinning wild rumors, and we instituted a Newtown Pentacle style inquiry into the matter. Basically, we googled it and found this:
Here’s the scoop, at least according to WABC TV news:
ASTORIA, Queens (WABC) — A hazardous material teams investigated a possible radiation scare at a house in Queens.
A box with a radiation symbol was found inside an apartment on 45th Street in Astoria Tuesday.
feeble horns
Hell Gate and Triborough bridges from Old Astoria – photo by Mitch Waxman
Loathsome memories of recent setbacks- and also of certain rebuffs- plague your humble narrator during these gloomy and sunless days, and always only solace can offer nepenthe. Thus, during a recent stroll by the pacific maelstrom of Hell Gate, nestled between two steel structures whose unearthly vibrations and omnipresent vocalizations form the aural environment- this series of shots were captured.
curiously scattered bones on sidewalk in Astoria – photo by Mitch Waxman
Vengeance and malice, indeed all of the seven deadly transgressions, populate the infernal dream world which has plagued me since childhood. Of late, a vivid character has typified these somnambulist hallucinations, and at least once during the night I’ll awaken in cold sweat grasping at the void of a curtain draped chamber. Surely, these negative humors are manifestations of another failing displayed by your humble narrator and least of all men, the inability to not bear grudges well beyond all sensible intervals.
sinister seeming bird at Hells Gate – photo by Mitch Waxman
Having grown up in a lonely and isolated existence, in dusty rooms of sculptured green carpeting and vinyl covered couches with odd knick knacks that betrayed basic tenets of adherence to the Hebrew faith, family members carried a charge of eastern European distrust for outsiders. Don’t trust anyone, my mother used to tell me while still in the cradle. As such, your humble narrator has grown into a hostile and suspicious man, contemptuous of authority even when such authority is necessary to govern over and control chaos and anarchy.
Amtrak at Hellegat Hell Gate Bridge – photo by Mitch Waxman
Often I stand on a point of principle, in a combative and tenacious- and vastly unpopular- stand over small matters such as allowing a police officer the right to inspect my belongings on demand. Of course I realize the age we are living in is fraught with the consequences of living in a global military empire the likes of which even the Romans or Turks would gasp and genuflect at, and that to most “standard of living” trumps “individual rights” but the constables have to follow the rules too. That’s what our modern Metropolis operates on, and as the saying in Brooklyn used to go “if I gots to stands in lines, youse gotta stands in da line”.
Psychiatric Hospitals at Hell Gate – photo by Mitch Waxman
Often, I fear that someday my darker impulses will take control of me, and I’ll spin off and become some comic book villain like parody of myself, the defeated antihero of a cosmic parable. Perhaps I will be remembered as a cautionary tale, your humble narrative of the man who looked under too many rocks. The Rumpelstiltskin of Newtown Creek, or perhaps just some old man in a shack who talks only to a collection of bottles?
Wards Island from Hell Gate – photo by Mitch Waxman
Preoccupations with such bizarre concerns has led me to believe in and visualize conspiracy lurking behind every corner. The attentions of certain malign elements, teenage adherents to some form of the Hip Hop cult, have been noted milling about around headquarters of late. Additionally, strange vehicles not usually parked in the neighborhood have been observed, adorned with mysterious antennae and blacked out windows- even on the windshield, which is unusual in itself due to municipal regulation.
Such bizarre notions, undoubtedly the product of lonely studies and a massive workload, were what led me to seek the solace of Astoria Park. I had hoped (futilely as turns out) to photograph passing Tugboats, but instead grew focused on certain uluations which seemed to be emerging from the impossibly distant Psychiatric hospitals at Wards Island…
The President of the United States on Marine 1 over Hell Gate – photo by Mitch Waxman
And that’s when the President of the United States flew by in Marine One on his way to the World Trade Center site to commemorate the death of his arch enemy.
In short, I’m all ‘effed up, and this post hits six points out of seven of the ICD-10 for paranoid personality type.
And the Newtown Pentacle is back in session.
with an atomic, or molecular, motion
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Another interesting event set to occur on May 21st, which has been scheduled against my Newtown Creek Cruise- I would add, seems to be the apocalypse.
On my way to a meeting at Greater Astoria Historical Society on Sunday, the purpose of which was to discuss the upcoming Forgotten-NY tour of Staten Island’s Livingston neighborhood, I came across this pamphleteer who was proselytizing passers by to prepare for the coming tribulation and offering advice for making it through the end times which are meant to begin on a specific date not far in the future.
from wikipedia
The 2011 end times prediction is a prediction made by Christian preacher Harold Camping that the Rapture (in Christian belief, the taking up into heaven of God’s elect people) will take place on May 21, 2011 and that the end of the world as we know it will take place five months later on October 21, 2011. These predictions were made by Camping, president of the Family Radio Christian network, who claims the Bible as his source. Believers claim that around 200 million people (approximately 3% of the world’s population) will be raptured.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This sort of millennialist doom saying is nothing new, remember the UFO people in California, the Branch Davidians in Texas, and the Solar Temple cult in Switzerland, just to refresh somewhat recent memories.
At the turn of the last century, one needed to have looked no further than the so called Millerites to find the originators of this sort of proclamation.
from wikipedia
The Great Disappointment was a major event in the history of the Millerite movement, a 19th century American Christian sect that formed out of the Second Great Awakening. William Miller, a Baptist preacher, proposed based on his interpretations of the prophecies in the book of Daniel (Chapters 8 and 9, especially Dan. 8:14 “Unto two thousand and three hundred days; then shall the sanctuary be cleansed”), that Jesus Christ would return to the earth during the year 1844. A more specific date, that of October 22, 1844, was preached by Samuel S. Snow. Although thousands of followers, some of whom had given away all of their possessions, waited expectantly, Jesus did not appear as expected on the appointed day and as a result October 22, 1844, became known as the Great Disappointment.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Your humble narrator would hope that if the world does indeed end on the 21st of May, that you can enjoy the view of Manhattan disintegrating from those vantage points which the scenic waters of Newtown Creek offer with me. Destruction not withstanding, there is still a heck of a lot to see.
Assuming that some multi headed dragoness isn’t raining brimstone down upon us by then, I would also remind you of a Magic Lantern Show on the subject of Newtown Creek I’ll be presenting at the aforementioned Greater Astoria Historical Society on June 6th ($5- cheep).
The Newtown Pentacle 