Friday, January 28, 2011
A Nor'easter hits Brooklyn, New York
We had another fierce winter storm in the tri-state area. With whipping winds and an overnight snowfall, those of us who live here woke up to a winter wonderland, full of heavy tree branches and sparkling snow. With this amount of snowfall, many chose to walk down the middle of the street, as the path of least resistance. I caught a piece of happy sunshine on the fire escape, a bit of bright color in a monochromatic landscape.
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
The New Year Visits Apartment #6
It officially feels like 2011 to me now. This week, my beloved 101 year old apartment gets a sorely needed paint job, from floor-to-ceiling, top to bottom. As my landlord and I discussed the details for the new work to be done, I took a series of shots to email him, showing spots with wear-and-tear. Naturally, I started taking other pictures to enliven the chore.
As I look back on the them, they feel less like a dry recording of the "bloom off a rose". They've captured the airy essence of this space. An extraordinary amount of light pours through its' tall windows, bouncing off the high ceilings and walls. As I watch the place transform, it becomes an apt metaphor, made solid and real, for "out with the old, in the new". I can't wait to take more snaps after the work is done. This place deserves a new coat for winter. It's worked hard to give me somewhere to call "home".
As I look back on the them, they feel less like a dry recording of the "bloom off a rose". They've captured the airy essence of this space. An extraordinary amount of light pours through its' tall windows, bouncing off the high ceilings and walls. As I watch the place transform, it becomes an apt metaphor, made solid and real, for "out with the old, in the new". I can't wait to take more snaps after the work is done. This place deserves a new coat for winter. It's worked hard to give me somewhere to call "home".
Friday, January 14, 2011
Saturday, January 8, 2011
The Joys of Winter (The Comforts of Home)
As I scanned Facebook last week, perusing posts on the Nor'easter blizzard, I was struck by two things: 1) the weary resignation of New Yorkers used to the delays and hassles of a large snowfall and 2) the aghast responses of people not native to this area. Winter can elicit that kind of reaction by those unaccustomed to the viciousness of our seasons. It's even built into our sayings—"March comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb"—or the even more dramatically Shakespearean "Beware the ides of March". We take pride in this fierceness of our weather, a sign of our enduring nature in even the harshest of conditions.
But there is another side of winter, at least there always has been one for me. Large snowfalls bring on memories of school closings heard on the radio and greeted with an amount of joy that was in direct proportion to the grim set of my mother's mouth. Pancakes were made and eaten quickly, followed by a digging out of hats, mittens, snow pants, ice skates, and sleds. At the end of our expeditions there was always hot chocolate, preceded by the stripping off of wet clothes into the warmth of dry ones. These comforts were our proof we had beaten the environment to overcome the icy grip of winter.
I also remember a paper route my brother and I had. It was a ridiculous undertaking because it was in an area which was really too far away for us to service properly, but since we always had to earn our keep in some way in our household, we bravely soldiered on against the odds. I'll never forget waking up one morning to realize we had to somehow strap down a Sunday's load of papers onto our bikes and cart them almost a mile, some of it downhill. We laughed at the absurdity of this mission, slipping and sliding, our bikes tipping over every ten feet, losing papers along the way, as we came to the realization that our latest venture would have to be abandoned, as it became abundantly clear we would never make good money this way.
And yet, in the middle of this neighborhood I'd never been, tucked away on a street I must have passed by a hundred times on my walk to junior high, I relished the quiet of a peaceful Sunday morning, listening to the gentle whoosh of snow falling. It is so so subtle, the sounds of snow. Have you ever held out your tongue to capture snowflakes? That's what this morning felt like, like my brother and I were the only people on earth to witness this beauty. How gorgeous this house looked, as my brother told a story of how it was built to look like an old plantation house, and where all the servants quarters were, or at least where we imagined them to be, as each shuttered balcony housed its own private pile of snow on its railings, and the chimneys blew out a scent of woodsmoke into the air. The smell of burning fireplaces will always be the smell of winter to me, a welcome herald to the changing of the seasons, as is the clear crispness of cold air, inhaled deeply into ones' lungs. After the swampy heat of summer, physical exertion outdoors takes on a pleasurable aspect once again, as layers of clothes get removed as ones' body heat adjusts.
There is also sadness, too, as I remember the night I realized my grandmother was dying because she was too sick to come home with us, and I was maybe 7, or 8. It had started to snow after nightfall and we had been at the hospital all day. To this day, I can see myself as a child looking back at the hospital, listening to my parents speak to one another, as I tried to make out which lit window was my grandmother's. I'll never forget the way the snow looked as it fell, passing through the glow of a streetlight in that parking lot, as I turned upward to let the snow fall gently onto my face and felt its chill. It was my first encounter with death, and I associate the passing of life with winter, too.
When I wake up to snow, I think of all these things in the bright light of morning, and a feeling of safety comes over me as I drink my coffee and look through the frozen panes of glass. It is harsh, but it is also bearable, and quite beautiful. Stay warm :)
I also remember a paper route my brother and I had. It was a ridiculous undertaking because it was in an area which was really too far away for us to service properly, but since we always had to earn our keep in some way in our household, we bravely soldiered on against the odds. I'll never forget waking up one morning to realize we had to somehow strap down a Sunday's load of papers onto our bikes and cart them almost a mile, some of it downhill. We laughed at the absurdity of this mission, slipping and sliding, our bikes tipping over every ten feet, losing papers along the way, as we came to the realization that our latest venture would have to be abandoned, as it became abundantly clear we would never make good money this way.
And yet, in the middle of this neighborhood I'd never been, tucked away on a street I must have passed by a hundred times on my walk to junior high, I relished the quiet of a peaceful Sunday morning, listening to the gentle whoosh of snow falling. It is so so subtle, the sounds of snow. Have you ever held out your tongue to capture snowflakes? That's what this morning felt like, like my brother and I were the only people on earth to witness this beauty. How gorgeous this house looked, as my brother told a story of how it was built to look like an old plantation house, and where all the servants quarters were, or at least where we imagined them to be, as each shuttered balcony housed its own private pile of snow on its railings, and the chimneys blew out a scent of woodsmoke into the air. The smell of burning fireplaces will always be the smell of winter to me, a welcome herald to the changing of the seasons, as is the clear crispness of cold air, inhaled deeply into ones' lungs. After the swampy heat of summer, physical exertion outdoors takes on a pleasurable aspect once again, as layers of clothes get removed as ones' body heat adjusts.
There is also sadness, too, as I remember the night I realized my grandmother was dying because she was too sick to come home with us, and I was maybe 7, or 8. It had started to snow after nightfall and we had been at the hospital all day. To this day, I can see myself as a child looking back at the hospital, listening to my parents speak to one another, as I tried to make out which lit window was my grandmother's. I'll never forget the way the snow looked as it fell, passing through the glow of a streetlight in that parking lot, as I turned upward to let the snow fall gently onto my face and felt its chill. It was my first encounter with death, and I associate the passing of life with winter, too.
When I wake up to snow, I think of all these things in the bright light of morning, and a feeling of safety comes over me as I drink my coffee and look through the frozen panes of glass. It is harsh, but it is also bearable, and quite beautiful. Stay warm :)
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