Posts Tagged ‘Brooklyn’
Apotheosis Urbis
Monday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Summing up what ended up being a solid month’s worth of posts describing a four day trip, at the start of June, wherein your humble narrator returned back to ‘the old neighborhood’ in New York City – so, today’s post seeks to gather it all together in one place.
Links to the published posts of this series will be offered inline below. You may have seen some of the embedded shots in today’s post before, although I did attempt to not repeat.
Long story short: flew out from Pittsburgh on an early morning flight, hung out with my Pal Val on the harbor and then headed upstate.
Returned from upstate on Day 2, went to Long Island City and Newtown Creek and eventually Woodside and Middle Village.
Back to the creek for Day 3, and after riding the L to Canarsie, dinner at a kosher deli with my cousins and then back to Middle Village.
Day 4 was LIC again, and a walk over the Queensboro Bridge before riding the 7, and visiting ‘hole reliable’ at Sunnyside Yards and then heading over to LaGuardia Airport, and then back to Pittsburgh.
Whirlwind!
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I didn’t get a window seat on the plane to NYC, or on the one back to Pittsburgh, which was disappointing. Managed to get Newtown Creek in the bottom right of the shot above, but it’s blurry and weird looking due to the distortion of shooting through the plastic window at an angle.
Next time around, have to ensure that I’m at a window. If there is a next time, that is. I’ve never seen the Pacific Ocean, visited the Alamo, gone to Yellowstone… there’s other stuff, too, that I’d like to take a picture of.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Day one in NYC produced a lot of photos, as is always the case when I’m out on the waters of New York Harbor with the camera.
Chronicles of June 3rd’s adventures started with ‘Homeboy,’ followed by ‘Puddle People,’ ‘Working the Harbor,’ ‘Surf and Turf,’ and ‘Next stop, Willoughby.’
– photo by Mitch Waxman
June 4th saw NYC’s climate go sultry hot, and your humble narrator suffered through the heat while pushing himself forward. Plenty of time to sleep when I’m dead, I always say.
June 4th also saw me returning to the ‘zone’ from upstate NY via Metro North in ‘Omphalos,’ returning to LIC and Newtown Creek in ‘Like every other bit of wind blown trash,’ plunging toward Blissville in ‘DUPBO 2025,’ heading towards the Greenpoint Avenue Bridge in ‘DUGABO awaits,’ and visiting the Borden Avenue street end along Dutch Kills in ‘DULIE 2025.’
– photo by Mitch Waxman
June 5th, from a climatological point of view, was a difficult day to wake up in NYC. Hot, humid, swamp ass weather. Doesn’t matter, a humble narrator is fairly able to ignore and overcome environmental hazards, especially so at Newtown Creek. Lots of practice.
‘Estate Reality, Dutch Kills,’ ‘Old Friends,’ ‘DUGSBO and the plank road gooses,’ ‘The happy place,’ and ‘First DUKBO’ explore a longish walk that started at the Grand Street Bridge, then proceeded over the Kosciuszcko Bridge on my way to Newtown Creek Alliance HQ in Greenpoint.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
‘DUKBO 2 DUGABO,’ and ‘DUGABO 2 Canarsie’ finished out the cavalcade of horror and fear that I had seen and experienced on the 5th of June in NYC. My cousin drove me back to Middle Village, and the home of Hank the Elevator Guy, where I’d be staying the night.
My plan of ditching worn clothing into the trash along the way paid off mightily by this point, and after bidding my buddy Hank ‘adieu’ and offering my thanks for his hospitality, I set out on my way with just the camera bag to manage.
On the 6th, experiences and photos for ‘And on the fourth day,’ ‘Queensboro Pedestrian Path,’ and ‘Queens Plaza to Sunnyside Yards & LGA’ were gathered.
This was a heck of a trip, back to the old neighborhood.
Tomorrow – the Paris of Appalachia – 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.
DUGABO 2 Canarsie
Tuesday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A visit to Newtown Creek Alliance HQ on Kingsland Avenue found me waving the camera about in yet another overly familiar spot.
One of the last times that I actually cared, the NYC DEP had changed the name of that sewer plant up there to the ‘Newtown Creek Wastewater treatment and resource recovery plant.’ Can you imagine being the one who answers the phone here? Sheesh. It’s the largest sewer plant in NYC, drains Manhattan below 79th street, and parts of Brooklyn and a sliver of Queens. The stainless steel eggs are bio-digesters which process the poop.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
From the Green Roof at 520 Kingsland, looking north towards Queens, and that’s a new theatrical production mega structure which has risen from the former FreshDirect location along Borden Avenue. Again – no connection to the railroad or to the industrial canal it neighbors.
For a ‘mega massive’ panorama of the scene above, click here.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The camera was waved about, at all the familiar places. Allocco Recycling, SimsMetal, everywhere. There was a weird sense of finality for me while doing so, can’t tell you why.
Going to miss this place.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This was the last Newtown Creek shot for Day 3. I had yet another assignation to accomplish, which would require a bit of a commute.
Luckily, one of my NCA pals has driven to Kingsland Avenue, and offered me a ride to the L train, at Bedford Avenue in Williamsburg.
Brrr… stairs…
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One of the many food cravings I’ve been having in Pittsburgh has involved Kosher Deli. I mentioned this when talking to one of my cousins, and he suggested that I take the train out to his neck of the woods and we’d go out for a meal. Getting to and from the ‘old neighborhood’ has always been a pain in the butt. Terminal stops at Rockaway Parkway for the L and Brooklyn College for the 2 & 5 are pretty far away from the specific area where I grew up, and where my cousin still dwells.
Luckily, he agreed to pick me up at Rockaway Parkway, terminal stop on the L line subway.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The cars were nicely air conditioned, and I resisted the urge to debark the train at Broadway Junction to get some photos there.
We arrived in Canarsie, where I observed that in the many, many years since this was ‘home,’ that the old population of Jews and Italians seem to entirely left the ‘zone’ and the population of the area seems to have become entirely Caribbean. Cool! If I wasn’t actually heading to dinner at a Jewish Deli, my cousin would have pulled up and found me eating Jerk Chicken out of a paper bag…
Back 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.
DUKBO 2 DUGABO
Monday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
My beloved creek…
After visiting the Maspeth Plank Road and Maspeth Creek as well, my next destination involved a walk through Blissville, and then to the Kosciuszcko Bridge’s bike and pedestrian path. If you haven’t figured it out, that’s the view from ‘up there’ in the photo above.
I was heading over to Newtown Creek Alliance HQ, in Greenpoint, to touch base with a few former colleagues and extant friends. Oddly, I was actually experiencing emotions, of the sort which literature has suggested to me that the normal humans might. Odd.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Several mentions at the start of this series of NYC posts have alluded to the fact that this trip was actually a bit of an emotional journey for me.
Possibly the last chapter in the broken ankle story? Hope so.
In many ways, I needed to see what my physical capabilities actually are now, and so I returned to the place where I’ve defined that sort of thing for the last sixteen years – since the last major medical situation I found myself in, when I experienced a heart attack at 39. It was a bad moment for me personally, of course, but the recovery from that incident led to everything I’ve been doing ever since – including this, your Newtown Pentacle.
Needless to say, I was in a heightened emotional state during this four day stint. Remarkable, a couple of times I was actually displaying inner emotions to other people. Normally, my armor is up and other than brief flashes of annoyance or anger, trying to read me is difficult.
Never, ever, let anyone know what you’re actually thinking.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The struggle, during the whole recovery period from the broken ankle, was to ‘remain chipper.’ Getting depressed wouldn’t have helped, at all, and I did the usual great job of suppressing and containerizing my emotional tumult, with the intention of releasing the enclosed pressure at some future point, when expedient.
As I always say: Freak out after the crisis.
A lot of this sort of thinking, I think, is a direct reproach of how my Mom handled the world. She had one reaction to everything, a screaming and sweaty fit of anger aimed at whomsoever caused the agitation. Everything was treated with the same intensity. Russian fighter jet just fell out of the sky, and crushed the family car? Spilling a few coffee grinds on the kitchen counter? Dad has cancer? My hair is wet? Too much salt on her fries at the diner? Same reaction, everytime.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This was Day 3 of the NYC trip, and by this point the ankle was actually pretty sore. Exercise days have been spaced out, with at least a 72 hour recovery period of low activity following a walk. The joint still swells up on me, a situation which the surgeon tells me could last as long as two years after the reconstruction surgery. It was indeed swollen by Day 3, but I was still able to scuttle around pain free. It was the end of Day 4 when it started giving me some trouble, but I was already slouching roughly towards LaGuardia Airport by that point.
Did I mention how hot it was? That’s the end of my Monday morning moaning and self introspection.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Back in Pittsburgh, I laugh and laugh when people describe traffic as being heavy. Even in a slow down ‘rush hour’ scenario, traffic in Pittsburgh is still moving at 10-20 mph. The Brooklyn Queens Expressway at the Meeker Avenue exit, however, was moving at the average speed of vehicle traffic in NYC, which – last time I checked – is estimated to be about 3.2 mph. It was lovely, the way that the sunlight filtered through the shimmering engine exhaust.
The Kosciuszcko Bridge was left behind, and your humble narrator reentered the street grid in Brooklyn’s Greenpoint section. It would be about a 3/4 of a mile scuttle to get to DUGABO (Down Under the Greenpoint Avenue Bridge Onramp) where NCA HQ is found at 520 Kingsland Avenue.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Boy, they just don’t have sewer plants in Pennsylvania like this one, I tell’s ya. We got’s a mammoth series of scary factories out here though, like Brooklyn used to.
After arriving at NCA HQ, I began drinking copious amounts of water, rehydrating after a sweaty few hours on Newtown Creek’s ‘mean streets.’ Several friends actually made a special trip to coincide with my visit, and we had a bit of an NCA reunion going on for a bit. I was faklempt.
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.
Archives #038
Wednesday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Here are the keys to the mausoleum, and all the liquor is inside.
That’s what my pal at Atlas Obscura said before disappearing for an hour to gather the crowd of paying guests at an event, leaving me all alone at the Whitney Mausoleum in Brooklyn’s Greenwood Cemetery. I did the only logical thing, which was to call Kevin Walsh from Forgotten-NY and tell him where I was, trying to make him jealous. You don’t get to make that guy jealous often, savor it when you can.
On November 27th in 2013, ‘fastened ajar’ arrived in subscriber’s inboxes, describing a nocturnal visit to Greenwood Cemetery in Brooklyn.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The train thing isn’t really a new subject for me, it’s just that I used to be extremely limited in terms of what was on offer. Long Island Railroad often popped into focus here at Newtown Pentacle, as did several of their freight contractors.
In 2015, it was the LIRR which caught my attention in ‘continuous system.’
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The 7 Line is the most photogenic of NYC’s subways, which is a hill I’ll die on. Yes, Smith/9th street is quite comely, but for pure urban goodness, the 7 is the best.
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.
In 2017, a ride on the 7 line was discussed in ‘cryptic formulae.’
“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 #035
Friday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Directly after this photo was taken in 2010, then NYS AG Andrew Cuomo transmogrified into a crab monster and chewed the heads off of eleven journalists, a television sound person, and three videographers. Luckily, your humble narrator was using a telephoto lens, and was thereby far enough away to avoid this carnage. A limo arrived, and every step Cuomo took toward it saw him reeling in the extra limbs and eye stalks, and a seemingly human creature in a tattered suit entered the vehicle, which drove away. Building superintendents appeared, who hosed down the charnel gutter. The viscera flowed into and out of the open sewers, and the Newtown Creek ran red with the third estate that day.
You don’t mess with Andy Cuomo.
In 2010, all the fancy people came to Brooklyn and gathered along the Newtown Creek to commemorate the end of legal hostilities between Attorney General Andrew Cuomo and the transnational energy giant regarding the Greenpoint Oil Spill.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Jesus! There’s something about mass production meeting the sacred, and it leads to an all too obvious and somewhat French influenced commentary about… it’s wank though. Nothing matters anymore. Still, commodifying the belief system of others for personal profit is a pretty delicate thing.
Whereas, at the time of this archive post’s publication – there was not – but now – there is – a fully articulated and posable Jesus action figure out there. Someone’s going to hell over this one, right? I mean… $55 for a doll?
In 2013’s ‘not inefficient,’ your humble narrator became transfixed by a series of plastic religious statues on sale in one of Astoria’s multitudinous 99 cent stores.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
That bright orange business on the right hand side of the shot above is the Queensboro Bridge, with Manhattan at top of the shot and Queens Plaza in the fore. I got this one when a friend allowed me access to the roof deck of the condo building he was occupying for a spell.
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.
In 2018, ‘momentous talk’ showed off a few photos from high over Long Island City, at night! Why don’t any of the new people have curtains?
Back next week.
“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 