March 7, 1996

The freezing rain makes even the razor wire look soft.   Newark

My ride to work passes along University Avenue, behind St. Michael’s Medical Center.   I transverse almost all of Newark in the process of getting to work.   It is difficult to describe the slow evolution of Newark as a city, as a landscape.   Newark seems to be recovering from its economic heyday.   At the turn of the last century Newark had a small population of very wealthy citizens and a growing population of the working poor.   As the industries shut down, the working poor just became poor.   Islands of segregation appeared, slums and tenements bloomed.   Now, one hundred years later, old brownstone buildings fall to become parking lots.   A gentle freezing rain lays a layer of ice upon every surface.   The roads are slippery.   My eyes catch the morning sunlight through a crystal layer of ice on some razor wire as it protects an empty lot.

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