Focusing And Refocusing: Views From An Evolving Life

Focus: Harlem Green, A Community Garden Tour

Four days after the Jazzmobile concert in my new neighborhood came Harlem Green, a tour of Harlem community gardens.

This was a remarkable event, kicked off by a fabulous breakfast cooked up by Cindy Worley, who along with her husband, Haja, is one of the founders of Project Harmony and its many community endeavors, including the storied and magical Joseph Daniel Wilson Memorial Garden at 219 W. 122nd St.

We heard story after story of vacant land (well, vacant except for car dumps, garbage dumps, drug dealing and prostitution that went on there) reclaimed by community members and planted with fruit trees, vegetables, ornamental trees and shrubs _ just about anything that's green. One is named in honor of a father who started it, another for a 90-year-old man who took action to revive his block, another for a now-deceased pastor of a neighboring church. Some involved fights with those who wanted to take the land back for high-rises and other development.

They're labors of love for the core individuals behind each garden, as well as for a corps of volunteers from the neighborhood, New York Cares and elsewhere. And they're supported in part by Green Thumb, part of the NYC parks department and the largest community gardening program in the country with more than 600 member gardens in the city.

Rain kept the attendance down, which was a shame because this was such a magnificent thing to see and experience.

I'm so much looking forward to getting involved with one -- probably more! -- of these gardens myself. They're so wonderful in so many ways.

More photos are here (the short version) and here (the long version) ... click the slideshow icon on the Flickr page for best viewing.

 

Focus: Harlem Jazzmobile Street Concerts

 

I'm loving the new neighborhood, and here's part of the reason: free jazz concerts on the street and the spirit that comes with them.

These are sponsored by Jazzmobile , celebrating its 45th anniversary this year with a mission of presenting, promoting and preserving jazz. They offer a number of programs, including a series of street concerts. This one featured the Jazzmobile All-Stars and was hosted by Community Pride, part of the Harlem Children's Zone project. 

More photos are here (click the slideshow icon on the Flickr page for best viewing).

At Home in Harlem: My Blog, Version 3.0

Welcome to (another) reincarnation of my blog _ complete with a new domain name, a new name, and a whole new neighborhood.

The most recent previous incarnation _ "Of Bronx, Bikes, Commutes and Cameras" under the domain name www.nycbikecommute.com _ clearly no longer makes sense. As of three weeks ago I now live in Harlem, for one thing. For another, I haven't been bike-commuting lately. And for a few months I'd put the whole blog thing on hiatus anyway, because I was so busy trying to do the actual photo- and video-learning work that I didn't have time to spend blogging about it.

Now, revitalized by the move to this fantastic new neighborhood, I'm inspired to start up again.

The "Focusing and Refocusing" idea comes literally from those aspects of shooting photos and video, as well as from framing story ideas in any medium. It also comes more esoterically from whole new perspectives and appreciations that come from moving back to Manhattan in general and Harlem in particular. And from my efforts to expand my interests and my professional horizons with the photo and video efforts. And, notably, it also touches on the goal of a continuing need in life to engage in both focusing and refocusing, and never stop doing either.