Abandoned NYC

On March 21, 2020, I drove to Manhattan to pick up our son and his partner. What I saw and photographed was a city that was all but deserted

Two years ago tomorrow, on the first day of spring, I went to New York City. It’s a trip I’ve made at least 100 times over the past 13 years by car, train, and bus, so the drive up should have been old hat by then.

But it wasn’t.

I was going to Manhattan to pick up our son, Ben, and his partner, Gaby. It was a beautiful weekend morning, the one in which large crowds would typically be outside or in the parks while tourists jammed Times Square.

By this point, we all knew this was no typical weekend day.

COVID-19’s invasion of the nation’s largest city had forced New Yorkers indoors. Restaurants, bars, and nonessential businesses were closed; everyone was ordered to limit outdoor activities to getting groceries, medicine and exercising. The order took full effect that evening. In Alexandria, even though our downsized home was crowded, everyone would be in safer and more welcoming confines.

I got out of the car only four times during the 500-mile roundtrip — twice for gas, once for food, and once to load their stuff. I drove through midtown Manhattan with my camera, shooting photos of a city that was all but deserted.

It was the last time I would use my Canon for weeks.

Driving into and through Manhattan — March 21, 2020

‘Street Scenes’

I have a special place in my heart for New York, the ultimate love it or hate it town. I enjoy the fast pace, the no B.S. nature of the people you meet, the opportunities to observe and watch all aspects of life right in front of you. As someone who has lived in small towns for most of my life, I’ve long been intrigued by a city that never sleeps.

My journey as a photographer started as I walked the city’s streets and took random pictures of the things I saw. Photography became a way to hold my father’s memory close. I found I had his eye for composition, and I enjoyed shooting the things I thought would interest him. I called those first albums “Street Scenes.”

Here are some more “Street Scenes” from that day.

In some respects, my happy place creatively is walking around a city with my camera, capturing the random nature, architecture, people, and things that make up our day-to-day lives. When the pandemic hit and we were stuck in quarantine, I started walking and taking pictures of those same random types of things.

Carrying my regular camera on my daily walks, however, was out of the question, so I started shooting with an iPhone. While it’s a great tool, the phone is similar in quality to the camera I started out with in 2009. Its limitations force you to look at composition differently; at the same time, those limitations presented an artistic challenge that proved appealing during a creatively challenging time.

Back to New York

In May 2020, after two months of being home, our daughter Emma was ready to go back to New York. I drove her and brought my Canon along for the ride, hoping to capture more “Street Scenes.”

"Street Scenes" — New York City, May 2020

While it no longer had the post-apocalyptic feel that it did in March, midtown Manhattan was still gravely wounded. Marquees for shows that had been halted still were up, even though Broadway theaters would be closed for at least 18 months.

I stayed in the city for two nights at my son Ben’s apartment. The morning after we arrived, I set out on foot, walking more than 70 blocks from the Upper West Side into and through Harlem, then down the Riverside Trail and into Washington Heights. I went to Emma’s place, spoke briefly to our “adopted” son Ginno outside his apartment, and then started walking back, all the time taking photos. By day’s end, I had gone 12 miles on foot.

Driving home just after sunrise the next morning, I took another run through Midtown. The large digital billboards in Times Square still lighted up even the darkest skies, but with words of thanks to health care workers and first responders.

We weren’t back on that day, or for many more to come.

Midtown Manhattan — May 2020