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New Massachusetts Photos

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , on August 19, 2015| 4 Comments »

Let me tell you about these photos.

I first noticed the shoes of the gentleman riding the subway. Then the white suit, the pocket hankerchief, the bow tie, and the hat. I was concentrating so hard on taking a photo surreptitiously that it didn’t occur to me to check out what he was reading. Somerset Maugham? Proust? William Dean Howells?

You never know what photo ops you might see on the MBTA, and I hope to get adept at taking pictures unobtrusively.

Next we have a fanciful teapot in the window of the Lacoste Gallery.

Moving right along: dappled shade on Summer St., Boston, near South Station; and a row boat for rent in Fort Point Channel.

Today’s Dewey Square excitement was a labor rally for striking airport workers demanding a $15/hour minimum wage. Lots of speeches. I photographed a T-shirt and a Boston politician. The politician had such an energetic speaking style, the photo came out blurry, but I’ll add it if you want it.

The last three pictures are of a fake snake — perhaps intended to keep passersby from sitting on a resident’s stonewall — and grapes. The grapes were the most surprising thing that happened to me today. I must have walked past that fence twice a day for years and years, and I never noticed a grape vine growing there. Did someone drape it over the fence while I was at work?

Goes to show you don’t really have to go anywhere much to find surprises.

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Stop the Pigeon — Now!

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , , on November 8, 2014| 2 Comments »

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When Suzanne was two, she and John used to watch a TV show with a theme song that went like this: “Stop the pigeon, stop the pigeon, stop the pigeon — now!”

One day we took the train to New York City, and in spite of the fact that Suzanne never saw pigeons where we lived, she took one look at the city’s official bird and started singing, “Stop the pigeon!”

So unlike many people, I have some good feelings associated with pigeons, and I am getting a big kick from the pigeons I photographed near city hall yesterday.

Someone with a sense of humor has decorated the barrier around the construction site for the  new Government Center T stop with pigeon portraiture.

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When a Train Reaches the End of the Line

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on October 23, 2014| 2 Comments »

Photo: dornob.com
Train car converted to church. Lots more such churches at dornob.

The artist who tweets @FortPointer clued me in to this Boston Magazine today, which asks what should happen to the old Mass Bay subway cars that are being taken out of service.

Steve Annear reports, “The MBTA is gearing up to sign a contract with a Chinese manufacturing company to procure hundreds of Red and Orange Line train cars so they can replace the current fleet of vehicles that have been traveling down the tracks for decades. …

“According to the T, the train cars—they’re replacing 152 Orange Line vehicles and up to 138 Red Line vehicles—will go up for sale, and the highest bidder can do whatever they want with them.

“Like most transit systems, the MBTA typically sells old cars for scrap to the highest bidder. ‘But we also like to preserve a bit of MBTA history by donating a retired car or two to the Sea Shore Trolley Museum in Maine,’ said T spokesman Joe Pesaturo. …

“ ‘Someone buy four of them and open an Orange Line Deli,’ one person suggested on Facebook.

“Another tossed a different idea into the ring: ‘I’d like to put one in my back [yard] for the ultimate ‘man cave.’

“These ideas might sound far-fetched, but stranger things have happened to retired train cars.” Good examples in the photos and also here.

Photo: io9.com
A Soo Line caboose, built in 1090, turned into a vacation home in 1976 in Pennsylvania.

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Another Older-Worker Story

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , , on October 20, 2014| 3 Comments »

Here’s another story about an older worker from John. I think we’ll discover more of these, given that retirement today doesn’t have the same appeal for everyone.

“Frank Gurrera is old-school Brooklyn,” writes Pete Donohue at the NY Daily News.

“Gurrera, a World War II veteran, is nearly 90 years old. But he’s still working as a subway machinist at the MTA’s sprawling brick maintenance complex in Coney Island. Gurrera makes or modifies parts for workhorse trains that were built decades ago and need periodic roof-to-wheels overhauls in order to remain in service.

“ ‘I enjoy the work,’ he said. ‘It’s the satisfaction of making something from nothing, making something from just a piece of metal.’

“Gurrera is exactly the type of transit worker the Daily News celebrates with its annual Hometown Heroes in Transit awards, which honor bus and subway workers who demonstrate exceptional dedication, bravery, compassion, ingenuity and other admirable qualities.” More about the awards here.

Although this story is from New York, people like Gurrera are also valued in Greater Boston, which has the oldest subway system in the country. The Boston Globe has reported on local machinists who are needed to make train parts by hand.

Photo: Pearl Gabel/NY Daily News
Frank Gurrera, who turns 90 on Oct. 29, makes subway train parts that no longer are available from the original manufacturer. The parts are used for workhorse MTA trains that were built decades ago.

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Drop a Toy on the Tracks? Call a Finder

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on October 9, 2014| 1 Comment »

When you drop your cellphone on the subway tracks, who ya gonna call?

In New York City, you call the pick-up crew.

According to Matt Flegenheimer in the NY Times, the need for these finders is increasing as travelers seem more distracted than ever.

“The requests trickle through the bowels of the New York City subway system, funneled to workers more accustomed to calls about tunnel fires or ceiling leaks. A problem is reported at Columbus Circle one recent afternoon. A passenger could be in great distress. Delays are minimal, but movement on the tracks has perhaps never been slower.

“So would a crew mind collecting its helmets and hauling its mechanical claw to rescue the turtle — fumbled by a rider — currently plotting its very methodical getaway from Midtown train traffic?

“ ‘It’s a big city,’ a transit worker, Vinny Mangia, had said a day earlier, reciting a mantra of his office. ‘Somebody’s going to drop something.’

“And somebody, if the item is sufficiently treasured, is going to try to pick it up. These are the fishermen of the subway system, cobbling together homemade instruments to pluck items from the tracks and release them to a grateful city.

“Workers have returned a bag of hospital-bound blood and corralled a collection of artificial body parts, scooped engagement rings from the rails and reunited children with stuffed animals. …

“There is the occasional aggrieved passenger, chafing at the response time if a crew is traveling from another call at a far-off station. But almost universally, riders are appreciative. A few have tried to tip the workers, though they say they have never accepted.

“ ‘A little hug, we take,’ Leonard Geraghty said. ‘I usually tell them, if it’s a man: “Take your wife out. Have a good time on us.” ‘ “

More here.

Photo: Sally Ryan, NY Times
Bob Devine uses a mechanical claw to grab a book lost at 34th Street.

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Subway ‘Zine Residency

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on July 14, 2014| Leave a Comment »

Photo: Jake Naughton/The New York Times
Ayun Halliday creating a new issue of “The East Village Inky”  as part of the MTA Zine Residency

Remember the Amtrak Artist Residency? Here’s what might be called a “stealth residency,” organized by a librarian in New York and taking place on the New York subway system.

Colin Moynihan writes at the NY Times, “Thirteen people formed a sort of mobile salon just after noon on Friday, boarding an F Train in the Gowanus area of Brooklyn with the aim of riding for hours through three boroughs while writing and illustrating zines — self-published, photocopied periodicals usually made by hand. …

“The two-day event, called the MTA Zine Residency, had been organized by a librarian and an archivist at the Barnard College library, which they said has the largest circulating collection of zines in an academic library. …

“Despite the initials in its name, the event was organized without the knowledge or collaboration of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, which runs the subway system. The peaceful takeover of the subway car reflected the do-it-yourself spirit that is a basic prerequisite to zine making, said the other organizer, the archivist Shannon O’Neill. …

“ ‘Remember the promise and betrayal of the #AmtrakResidency?’ the organizers of the subway project wrote, while announcing their own subway and ferry trips. ‘We won’t pay for your MetroCard, but we also won’t demand to own your stuff!’ …

“Transit officials had no objection to the activities. ‘As long as they abide by our rules of conduct, we certainly welcome them in the subway system to nurture creative self-expression,’ said a spokesman, Kevin Ortiz.”

More here.

I’m thinking of several artistic readers of this blog when I say you may want to get on board this train the next time it comes around.

Photo: Jake Naughton/The New York Times 
Composing zines on the F train on Friday during the MTA Zine Residency. 

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Poetry in the Subway

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on June 14, 2014| Leave a Comment »

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I was always impressed when I saw a poem in the place of an ad in the New York City subway. Now Boston has caught on.

Martine Powers wrote recently at the Boston Globe, “Finally, Bostonians will have the chance to experience the pleasures of poetry on the MBTA.

“Mass Poetry [is] bringing poems to advertisement spaces on subway cars. The initiative, dubbed PoeTry, is part of the organization’s Poetry in Public Spaces initiative, which began last year, said Mass Poetry program director Laurin Macios…

“ ‘Contemporary poetry is barely taught in schools, and often when it is, it is taught in a very scholastic sense instead of an artistic one,’ Macios said. “People often grow up without ever realizing there is poetry out there that can speak to them, or that they can speak back to. …

“Each appearance of a poem includes a tearsheet on the corner of the sign, allowing passengers to take a copy of the poem with them if the spirit strikes them.”

One poem in the series, says Powers, “What Travels,” by Joseph O. Legaspi, takes place on a subway car. “What travels beneath their secret faces? What is train but transport to other lives?” More at the Globe.

See also http://masspoetry.org.

Photo: Suzanne’s Mom
Poem: “Bulls vs. Suns, 1993,” by José Olivarez

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Taking Photos in New York

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on April 5, 2014| 6 Comments »

Washington-Sq-is-where-I-came-inWashington Square, New York City

Random photos from my travels.

My husband going into the Public Theater to see classmate Ted Shen’s musical, A Second Chance. The Playbill for the show. A delightful chandelier at the Public, with paddles that illuminate changing phrases.

Subway buskers playing a grandson’s favorite song, “When the Saints Go Marchin’ In.” Grand Central Station. The charming Iroquois Hotel. A flower-themed mosaic in the Lexington Ave. subway.

Gertrude Stein looking like herself in Bryant Park. And the Metropolitan Museum, where we saw a great photography show with my sister and brother-in-law. More on that later.

(Be watching for the relaunch of the Luna & Stella website, where one of the family pictures is of my sister at age 3, pictured with Suzanne’s maternal grandfather. … Did I mention this is a blog for Suzanne’s birthstone-jewelry company Luna & Stella?)

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The Stockholm Subway

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , on January 8, 2014| 5 Comments »

I can’t remember at the moment how I came across this tidbit, but I knew as soon as I saw it that I wouldn’t be able to resist something cool about  Stockholm.

I took the Stockholm subway a few times in the 1990s, but I don’t remember anything like this. Relatives living in Stockholm will have to let me know if the subway today is really the magical mystery tour that Dangerous Minds suggests.

Go to the Dangerous Minds website for a wonderful array of pictures. It sure doesn’t look like the Red Line. If the Red Line looked like this, I would expect to encounter Ming the Merciless around every corner.

Might make the commute more interesting.

Click here.

Photo: Dangerous Minds
A human emerges from a wall in the Stockholm subway’s “wild underground fantasia.”

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The Bunny Didn’t Eat the Celery

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on December 15, 2013| 2 Comments »

Last night as we pulled into our snowy driveway, a rabbit ran in front of the headlights. I thought he must be hungry and cold. But this morning, I saw that he hadn’t found the celery I put out, and the apple was buried.

Here is the celery and a few other recent photos: a church’s advent wreath, a frosty leaf, a suitable wreath for a coffee shop, my dogwood in snow, winter footwear on the MBTA subway, and Rudolph cookies.

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Library in Shanghai Subway

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on August 29, 2013| 6 Comments »

Libraries are busting out all over. We’ve blogged about the Little Free Library in Cambridge as well as Sam and Leslie Davol’s uni, which got invited to Kazakhstan — not to mention a library housed in an unused pay phone shelter.

Now it seems that a subway system in China is getting into the act.

Writes Zhang Kun at China Daily, “Shanghai’s Metro Line 2 is turning a new page with a library taking literally an online approach. Passengers will be able to select a book at one station, and return it to any of the other stations with customized bookshelves.

“Readers do not have to pay a deposit or any rent for the books and magazines they take. Instead, they are encouraged to donate 1 yuan (16 US cents) to charity at the bookshelf.

” ‘Now you can read a real book, rather than staring at the cellphone through the metro ride,’ said Zou Shuxian, a spokeswoman for the Aizhi bookstore, which initiated the project jointly with Hujiang.com” and the Metro Line.

“The Chinese Academy of Press and Publication released a survey recently that said the general public between the ages of 18 to 70 read 4.39 books in 2012, much fewer than in Western countries.”

The library “has been a resounding success with office workers. Waiting lines have developed during rush hour. … All the books have green tape on the cover to inform people about the program [and] to remind people it is borrowed and should be returned.”

I myself find it essential to have a book with me whenever I take the subway, but that’s largely because I ride the oldest system in America and it’s always breaking down.

My husband, who lived in Shanghai for about a year, says subways there are fast and efficient. I don’t think book lovers will have time to finish their books before their last stop. A lot of green tapes will be going home with commuters. You can’t keep a book lover down.

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Super Subway Musicians

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on April 14, 2013| 4 Comments »

I saw these fiddlers a couple times while waiting for the evening train to Porter Square. For weeks there were tweets: “Who are those guys?”

Steve Annear at Boston magazine got the scoop. “Two former Berklee College of Music students have made a full-time job out of playing contemporary music on their violins for the swarms of passengers that crowd the platforms of the MBTA each day.

“After meeting in 2009 outside of the school, violinists Rhett Price and Josh Knowles got together and decided to form a two-piece ensemble and perform songs while standing on the Boston Common. But when winter got too cold and their fingers ‘started to get stiff,’ Price says the pair turned to the T for a busker’s permit so they could share their songs with riders traveling on the underground transit system.

“ ‘It’s been amazing. I was really nervous at first—we were nervous about playing on the T in general, and we didn’t think any one would give us any money. But there are people who come up and [request songs],’ says Price. ‘This is what we do right now to pay bills.’ …

“Price says he and Knowles play at three stops throughout the week, including North and South Stations, and at the Harvard Square stop. In a few weeks, they’re kicking the public transportation appearance up a notch, and will travel to New York City to play for riders there.”

Um. Forget about New York. Spend more time at South Station, please.

More.

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Solstice Flash Mobs

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on December 27, 2012| Leave a Comment »

The New York Times recently printed a lovely collection of pop-up music sightings by various reporters. Each unexpected free performance affected New Yorkers like a flash mob.

At the High Line, surprised “participants were given small sets of speakers that could be attached to their coats or backpacks, or held by hand. As you began the walk at the southern end of the High Line, near Gansevoort Street, your every footstep or hand twist kicked the app into action, and you heard various sounds — clinking, chimes, splashing water, car horns, chords on electric guitar and, in a novel touch, occasional rounds of applause.”

Another report notes, “The High Line elevated park does not normally allow group walks or amplified sounds, but it made an exception for ‘The Gaits,’ one of a dozen participatory performances that constituted Make Music Winter.

“The event was an offshoot of Make Music New York, a festival of hundreds of concerts that occurs in June on the first day of summer, in public spaces around the city. Modeled after Fête de la Musique, an annual affair in Paris started in 1982, the New York version is in its sixth year.

“The founder of Make Music New York is Aaron Friedman, a composer and political activist who decided it was time to add a winter solstice edition.”

Several delightful Winter Solstice music events are described here.

Photograph: Todd Heisler/The New York Times
Meredith Krinke, 6, holds Bach sheet music for her father, Brian, December 21 on the G train in New York.

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Inflatable Flood Barrier

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , on November 26, 2012| Leave a Comment »

Hurricane Sandy was terrible for many communities in its path, and the devastation has given urgency to climate concerns and innovative solutions.

Henry Fountain writes about one such solution in the NY Times, “With a few dull thuds, the one-ton bag of high-strength fabric tumbled from the wall of the mock subway tunnel and onto the floor. Then it began to grow. As air flowed into it through a hose, the bundle inflated until it was crammed tight inside the 16-foot-diameter tunnel, looking like the filling in a giant concrete-and-steel cannoli.

“The three-minute procedure, conducted on a chilly morning this month in an airport hangar not far from West Virginia University, was the latest test of a device that may someday help guard real tunnels during disasters — whether a terrorist strike or a storm like Hurricane Sandy, whose wind-driven surge of water overwhelmed New York City’s subway system, shutting it down for days.

“ ‘The goal is to provide flooding protection for transportation tunnels,’ said John Fortune, who is managing the project for the federal Department of Homeland Security’s Science and Technology Directorate.

“The idea is a simple one: rather than retrofitting tunnels with metal floodgates or other expensive structures, the project aims to use a relatively cheap inflatable plug to hold back floodwaters.

“In theory, it would be like blowing up a balloon inside a tube. But in practice, developing a plug that is strong, durable, quick to install and foolproof to deploy is a difficult engineering task, one made even more challenging because of the pliable, relatively lightweight materials required.”

More.

Photograph: NY Times

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Subway Portrait Artist

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , on May 19, 2012| 3 Comments »

Some outstanding musicians have performed in the Cambridge and Boston subways over the years. I never know quite what to expect.

New Yorkers also get some nice surprises in the subway. Alex Vadukul of the NY Times writes about a paper-cutting portraitist who works fast:

“In the congested world of subway performers, where dance troupes, conga circles and violin players blur, Ming Liang Lu, 57, is an alluring presence. A self-described ‘master paper portrait cutter,’ he has the ability to trim facial portraits out of frail paper within minutes, compelling some riders to willingly miss their trains.

“Mr. Lu practices several ancient Chinese art forms, and says he hails from a noted Shanghai teaching lineage. On weekends, he teaches calligraphy, painting and cutting at the New York Chinese Cultural Center. He said that in Shanghai, his birth city, he was renowned for stone sculpture and stamp seal carving. He credits the facial portraits to his formative training in a three-dimensional form.” 3-D before 3-D. Read all about it.

Photograph: Joshua Bright for the NY Times

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