On Columbia Street, just south of Lorraine, is this metal workshop. I've chatted with William, on the right, and photographed him more than once, but I've never learned exactly what they do. I plan to.

This photograph is from the part of the neighborhood where the buildings have forklifts coming in and out of them and where trucks are being loaded and unloaded. I don't know if these boxes are made there, of if they're used for packaging other things made there or for packaging things made somewhere else. I didn't ask. I just liked the stacks of flat boxes and the men moving them around and shooting the breeze.

(Please click on these pictures so you can see them a little bigger!) For the first time in several years NYC had a snow day where schools were closed, so I got to shoot for a couple hours in the middle of the day. The woman with the box (actually a drawer from an old dresser) was using it to shake salt out onto the sidewalk. She and I talked about how she had extra work to do on a day when lots of us got to stay home. That run down house, which I've been into for a while, is now pretty overshadowed by that great street art. And the father and son were sledding in Coffey Park, which has no hills. (Is it still called sledding if your dad just pulls you around on the sled?)

Metalworker

It was early- before 8am- and cold. These guys' workshop was wide open. They let me in to check out their work, but there wasn't nearly enough light inside to shoot. This guy, William, was happy to step out into the morning light for a portrait. The other guy wasn't interested, but I love that his faint figure is back there in the shadows.