6 November 13

In the shadow of--

For a lot of years I lived in New Jersey and commuted to NYC each day.  My commute was a two hour ordeal each way starting at around five AM and ending somewhere around nine PM.  Some would say crazy, but then again I have been accused of being that smart on a number of fronts over the last seven decades.  I lived in central Jersey for one reason.  Kids!  I wanted them to grow up in a semi rural environment and to go to school and church there instead of some of the near ghettos around the big city.  It worked, they both turned out to be fantastic kids and now adults.  So the sacrifice was worth it all.    

Years later when I grew up and started my lighthouse odyssey, I had a chance to revisit the big apple in a whole different role.  I needed to photograph the Jeffery's Hook light.  Or as some called it the "Little Red Lighthouse".  Little because it stands directly under the George Washington Bridge on the New York side and is dwarfed by the bridge itself.  You really have no appreciation for just how large some of those bridges are until you stand under one.

You also have no appreciation for just how downright dangerous it was back in the late nineties to get to a bridge abutment in Spanish Harlem on foot.  This becomes especially tricky when you have a pretty wife and about seven thousand dollars of camera equipment on your back.  One cannot park a vehicle near the bridge.  It just isn't available.  So there is about a 25 block walk through a couple of parks and a couple or three slum streets all the while looking like Mr. Clean in the midst of the Congo.

To say I was nervous is an understatement, but we did make it back out alive.  Somehow!  I did have to talk my way out of a few skirmishes.  I mean, those people had no idea what National Geographic was!  Not that I was working for them, but I felt the story would help to wrap us in as cocoon of authority.  Or at least semi safety.  Fat chance!  Back then that was a pretty tough neighborhood.

Then when we go there, the light was wrapped in a shroud to protect the environment from falling paint chips while it was being painted.  So, this is the only image of the Little Red Lighthouse that I have.  And I ain't going back!

Tomorrow is Camel day!