Posts Tagged ‘Pickman’
DULIE 2025
Friday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Down Under the Long Island Expressway, aka the Borden Avenue Street End in Queens’ Long Island City.
This spot was the scene of an traffic accident during the Covid lockdowns which involved three fellows, who drove through this section at an outrageous speed – according to the NYPD – and their car ended up submerged in the waters of Newtown Creek’s Dutch Kills tributary. The experience was fatal for the trio, and the powers that be decided to close off this dead end section of Borden Avenue to traffic. A group of skaters then turned the street into an ad hoc skate park, and a couple of guys I know started to work on reconditioning the street end itself. I should mention that there’s people living in shipping containers which are found on the other side of that fencing under the LIE, as that’s an important fact to know, somehow.
After having walked from Hunters Point to Blissville with a couple of the new people at Newtown Creek Alliance, this was my next stop.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
They’ve been busy.
This used to be a location that you’d need to hold thorny branches back to access, and it was a favorite location for illegal dumping. It’s kind of welcoming, nowadays, and I took the opportunity to enjoy the shade offered by the LIE and chill out for a few minutes.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The tripod was deployed, as was a neutral density filter. I hadn’t gotten ‘artsy fartsy’ yet on this trip, and felt the desire to do a few long exposures of Dutch Kills. Man, I’ve spent a lot of time along this waterway. I always thought that the Brooklyn side of the Creek had lots of people keeping an eye out, whereas Queens only had me. Good to see that new people are taking ownership here. It’s about time, actually.
I hung around a little while. My next meetup wasn’t for a couple of hours, so I had some time to kill and just one more ‘have to’ for this day.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
An emotional journey is what I was on, it should be mentioned.
Memories, recollections, bitter remembrances. I thought about all of my dead friends, and a few of the living ones. I called Our Lady of the Pentacle, who is back in Pittsburgh with Moe the Dog, and caught her up with my where’s and when’s. All the while – click, whirr, click, whirr.
The smell, though. The noise. As mentioned previously, my environmental adaptations have fallen away. I was experiencing NYC, from a sensory point of view, in the manner that an outsider does. Shocking coruscations of sound and smell abounded.
I don’t think I miss New York City all that much.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
My next stop was on the other side of the Hunters Point Avenue Bridge, pictured above. Long time readers will be able to guess what I wanted to see over in that direction. My tree of heaven.
We’ll get there soon enough.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Jesus Christ, you turn a corner and BAM, there it is again. The wall of blue glass erected in the last 20 years. When I met up with the fellows from NCA, one of the first things I mentioned was the stolen sky. LIC used to be ‘big sky’ territory with nary a building over four stories tall. The vault of heaven has been privatized, however, and only the lonely can remember the old days in LIC.
Back next week with more from the fabulous Newtown Creek.
“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.
Working the harbor
Wednesday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
In a lot of ways, I spent my time on a recent NYC visit reminding myself of who I actually am – or at least who I was. My activities on this visit weren’t consciously planned that way, but given the far flung nature of my activities in NYC, it was hard not to reminisce.
That’s the Manhattan Bridge above, and I served the City of Greater New York as a Parade Marshall for its centennial. I’ve also done hundreds of ‘on microphone’ narrations about that bridge on boat tours while passing under it. –
– photo by Mitch Waxman
That’s the Mexican Navy ship which allided with the Brooklyn Bridge.
If both objects are moving it’s a ‘collision,’ whereas if one object is moving it’s an ‘allision.’ A few people asked me, after the incident, what all the sailors were doing up in the masts. Here’s some shots from 2012’s ‘Op Sail,’ where you can see other tall ship sailors performing similar ‘parade duties.’
As a note: annoyingly, Flickr has altered their code in the last few weeks, which has caused a number of images on older posts to lose their previews. Not sure what to do about that at the moment, and I really do not want to dive into recoding 16 years worth of daily posts to start fixing links.
Hopefully, they’ll resolve this on the server end, but that’s why a bunch of previews are ‘404ing’ at the moment on older posts. Sigh… the future kind of sucks, doesn’t it?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The NYC ferry docked at Pier 11, and my Pal Val and I began heading towards the big orange boat. It had been about 12 hours at this point, relative to waking up at 1 in the morning back in Pittsburgh. Fatigue was definitely setting in, as was the desire for luncheon.
It was nice to smell salt in the air again, although I was frankly overwhelmed by the sewerage smell several times. My environmental adaptations have faded in my absence from ‘Home Sweet Hell.’
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The big orange boat left its dock at Whitehall and started the thirty minutes long journey to St. George on… Staten Island…
Along the way, I was busy with the camera, spotting tugs and getting shots of the maritime show on hand. I’ve always been amazed at how seldom most New Yorkers take advantage of the ferries – if nothing else – just for a change of scenery and to get out on the water for cheap.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Nearing Staten Island, and the Kill Van Kull (aka tugboat alley) was busily spitting shipping out into the main sections of the lower harbor, from Port Elizabeth Newark at Newark Bay.
Funny thing is that I haven’t thought about this sort of thing much, or at all, in the last 2.5 years. It was when I was sitting in that damned wheelchair after breaking my ankle that I began longing to see this again.
I alluded to this the other day, but this visit ‘home’ was a surprisingly emotional experience for me. Normally, I suppress and ignore my ‘feelings,’ as being over emotional in daily life is how you make stupid mistakes and often costly errors, while offending others. I realize that this is exactly the opposite of what mental health professionals advise, but it works for me.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I’m like a mafioso in terms of ‘never let anyone know what you’re going to do or say next,’ and one of my little mottos is ‘do what you say, say what you do.’ What that means is that people who know me in real life are often puzzled by my seemingly random decision making process and pivots, and they are often treated to long polemics about my personal rules, and subjected to apologetic confessionals about when I break one of those rules – usually due to expedience.
The tyranny of ‘the now’ rules over most days.
Back tomorrow with more from NYC.
“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.
Homeboy
Monday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
It all started at one in the morning on a Tuesday.
I had a 6 a.m. flight, leaving Pittsburgh International AirPort and bound for LaGuardia. Had to bathe, eat breakfast, and double check my packed bags. An Uber picked me up at 3:30 a.m. and I was at the airport by 4:05.
Got through security, which is a bit of a ‘thing’ when you’ve got a camera bag with you, and was soon cooling my heels at the gate drinking an expensive cup of coffee, purchased at the terminal. The plane landed on time, and my Pal Val picked me up in her car. The plan was to park her auto nearby the ferry stop in Astoria, and then board a boat for a NY Harbor Photo Safari.
I needed to smell salt water again, Y’see.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I will admit to getting a bit emotional at times during the four days I was back home. It had more to do with the broken ankle situation, and reclaiming the walking physicality I’ve been working so assiduously to regain, than any sort of homesickness. Really felt like the end of the ankle story had finally arrived. Seeing my friends and colleagues again was just icing on the cake.
Physically speaking, I was running on adrenaline and caffeine. Back in Pittsburgh, I’m sleeping a solid eight hours a night. Get up early, go to bed early. It’s not like NYC back in Pittsburgh, as they roll up the sidewalks by nine or ten even on a weekend in the Paris of Appalachia.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
An interesting wrinkle discovered during this visit was that my environmental adaptations have faded away. As the folk wisdom states ‘if you live by the sea, you don’t smell the salt or hear the waves,’ meaning that your brain ‘tunes out’ environmental background stimuli which it deems unimportant.
What that means is that I could smell it, all of it. I could hear it, I could feel it. Everything stunk, the entire city with its standing wave of 15-20 decibels noise, and the mixed aroma of garbage, deep fat fryers, and human shit.
The East River smelled like an unflushed toilet to me, although it wasn’t ‘in a state’ or anything. Nothing’s changed on the waterway, my perceptions of it have.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The cops appeared, as they always do in NYC, while the ferry navigated first to Roosevelt Island and then to Long Island City.
That’s another thing which is quite different in Pennsylvania – far fewer cops. One of my neighbors suggested we start up a bonfire in his back yard. I said no, claiming that NYPD would show up and hand out tickets and the. conduct warrant checks. My neighbor reminded me that we were in Pittsburgh. I laughed and said ‘you’ve never met the NYPD, have you?’
The ferry continued down the East River.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One of the last things I’d do before heading back to Pittsburgh would involve the Queensboro Bridge’s newly opened pedestrian walkway, as a note, but you’re not going to see those photos for a while. During the four days I was in NYC, I walked close to thirty miles and shot close to 2,200 exposures – with much of that distance was expressed around a certain waterway which provides the currently undefended border of Brooklyn and Queens, as you’d imagine.
One of the goals for this trip was to test out my newly reconstructed ankle, and determine exactly how screwed I am moving forward. I brought the joint back to my testing environment, for a shake down cruise, basically.
I’m all ‘effed up.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
There was a not insignificant amount of swelling going on after returning back to Pittsburgh 96 hours later, but it’s also the first time that I’ve asked the assembly and meat and metal which my ankle has become to ‘push’ for multiple consecutive days in a row without any sort of rest period.
The past couple of months have seen ‘exercise days’ and ‘photo walks’ separated from each other by at least 72 hours of recovery time, post facto. All in all, the joint held up to my abuse and I didn’t find myself walking like the Batman villain Penguin again.
Back tomorrow with more from NYC.
“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.
Get’s and go’s
Thursday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
That’s a T light rail entering Potomac Station in Pittsburgh’s Dormont, where Newtown Pentacle HQ currently is found. I really have to get back to doing night shots, I’ve decided. Miss it.
Problem is that Pittsburgh is a very, very daytime focused place – or at least my style of life here has been. I get up early these days, about six in the morning, and am usually back in bed by about eleven at night. A huge change for me, this is, given how thoroughly nocturnal I used to be back in NYC. It’s darker here, I should mention, as there’s far less scattered light pollution bouncing off of concrete and buildings.
It’s funny, I feel like I’ve been slacking lately, although in reality I’ve been pushing the physical envelope as much as I can, post broken ankle wise. Every one of the longish walks I’ve been showing y’all has resulted in a day or two of painful soreness, but echoing in my head is ‘everything’s ok now, push harder.’ In reality, everything is definitively ‘not ok,’ but I’m trying. Everything will be better if I just work harder.
Really do miss the night stuff, though.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Next door to Dormont is Mount Oliver, and amongst other things, that’s where Moe the Dog goes for his dog training. He’s good at being a dog – to be clear – what with all the barking and the pooping so he doesn’t need any help on that front, but Moe has a lot of rough edges and bad habits we’re trying to coax him out of.
After dog training, it was time for me to figure out a route for my next walk. As mentioned, ad nauseum, one the goals at the moment is to pick routes which will provide certain otherwise hard to impact muscle groups in my legs which atrophied during my hermitage a decent workout. I also want to ‘see some stuff’ along the way.
On this walk, I had the whole kit with me – tripod, prime lenses, zoom lens. For this sort of carry, I prefer a knapsack, and the one currently on my back is from the Patagonia brand. Water resistant, lots of internal pockets, multiple compartments. The bag itself weighs practically nothing. This particular bag can – and has – held more than I had packed into it on this outing, but this was a day trip and not an overnighter. Additionally, I have to be concerned with how much the bag weighs which I’m slinging it onto my back because… you guessed it… the ankle.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
St. Patrick’s street, in the South Side Slopes/Allentown zone of Pittsburgh, that’s where I had a Lyft driver drop me off. I’ve been up here a few times in the past, but have never walked this particular route before. It’s almost like I’m systematically working my way through the street grid of an intriguing neighborhood, isn’t it?
I’ll show y’all what I saw along the way, on what ended up being a four and change miles scuttle, much of which was walked downhill at quite a steep grade. Interesting neighborhood, this.
Back tomorrow with more, at 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.
The Newtown Pentacle 