But “the ballet of the streets” goes on. Times Square still shines in gaudy neon. Showtime dancers entertain tourists. Music and cheers mark a momentous election. Teenagers practice wheelies on flashy bicycles. Tourists snap selfies and costumed characters wander the streets.

The shuttered theatres wait patiently. Or are the boards taking an overdue rest from generations who “have trod, have trod, have trod?”

Human dramas, large and small, play out just steps away. No tickets are required, merely a facemask and a willingness to watch. The sun goes down early this winter. The lights of billboards set the stage. Matinees start at 5 o’clock and play until sunrise.

46th Street lies quiet at night. Normally crowds would be lining up to see musicals like “Hamilton.” Times Square, New York City. Photo by James Pothen. November 27, 2020.

A Halal cart worker prepares a meal. Times Square, New York City. Photo by James Pothen. November 19, 2020.

The Ambassador Theatre where “Chicago,” the longest-running American musical in Broadway history, had been playing. Times Square, New York City. Photo by James Pothen. November 19, 2020.

A street dancer performs a “showtime” routine. Despite smaller crowds, the performances continue night after night. Times Square, New York City. Photo by James Pothen. November 27, 2020.

A door outside the Walter Kerr Theatre advertises the musical “Hadestown.” Broadway performances were abruptly stopped on March 12, 2020, and have a tentative return date of May 2021. Times Square, New York City. Photo by James Pothen. November 27, 2020

A visitor to Times Square with an air filtration helmet. COVID-19 has led to a drop in tourism and safety measures including face masks and social distancing. Times Square, New York City. Photo by James Pothen. November 7, 2020.

The Samuel J. Friedman Theatre advertising a play starring Hollywood actress Laura Linney. Times Square, New York City. Photo by James Pothen. November 27, 2020.

A child watches the 2020 presidential election results on the ABC News ticker. Times Square, New York City. Photo by James Pothen. November 7, 2020.

The Lunt-Fontanne Theatre advertising a show about the life of Tina Turner. Times Square, New York City. Photo by James Pothen. November 19, 2020.

A cyclist performs a wheelie. Groups of young people still gather to ride bikes, scooters, and skateboards. in Times Square, New York City. Photo by James Pothen. December 3, 2020.

The Brooks Atkinson Theatre advertising the play “Six.” According to the Broadway League, shows provide nearly 100,000 jobs. Times Square, New York City. Photo by James Pothen. November 19, 2020.

The Times Square Ball reflected in a puddle. For the first time in 114 years, there will be no crowd to watch the ball drop on New Year’s Eve. Times Square, New York City. Photo by James Pothen. November 13, 2020.

The post No Actors, But the Show Goes On appeared first on Pavement Pieces.

“This is literally the worst time of year, during the worst year,” Weaver groans. She and her network of small business owners are holding on in a year where COVID-19 made tourists stay home and offices lie empty.

Weaver opened the store in the fall of 2014. After a miserable winter she decided to quit her retail job and pursue her retirement dream. She spent the summer preparing to launch the business armed with just a handful of internships, a fine arts education, and a lot of knowledge about obscure pencils.

“I was just very exhausted and really had a horrible winter,” said Weaver. “And truly just woke up one day and was like, ‘okay, none of this makes sense but I’m miserable and I have to do something about it and I’m also very young and I have nothing to lose.’” 

First there was an Instagram page to announce the brand, then a website that actually sold the pencils. And then in March 2015 she opened a brick and mortar location.

“The endgame was always to open a store,” Weaver said. “But I wasn’t so naive to think I could open a physical store without also having a web presence. Back then shopping via Instagram was not really a thing. That was in 2014 so Instagram served a very different purpose back then.”

Caroline Weaver of CW Pencil Enterprises chats with an employee. New York City. Photo by James Pothen

One of Weaver’s early customers was Brittany Bond. Bond, who had moved to the area with her husband, would stop by the store when she wasn’t working as a nanny and barista. But it was the birth of Bond’s daughter that created a deeper connection.

“I’ve just been a customer there for a long time,” said Bond. “And then, after I had [my daughter]… people become friends with you when you have kids, you stand out a little more. So we all became friends.”

Bond’s new role as a mother created a career challenge. She was no longer able to work as a barista or nanny now that she had a child of her own.

“None of my jobs had a maternity plan built into them,” Bond said . “And none of them could cover the cost of childcare either. So I had to find something that I could do with her.”

In 2018 Bond decided to start working towards her dream of owning a bookstore. Instead of applying for a lease to open a shop, she created an Instagram page and started posting used paperbacks for sale.

“I started an Instagram about a year before I started going out on the street,” Bond said. “I would post like one or two books a week. It wasn’t a huge thing, but it was more just getting my knowledge of books out there.”

A year later Bond was ready to take advantage of New York City’s flexible vending laws. She piled her books and young child into a homemade wooden cart and started selling books on the East River Esplanade.

“About a year in, my brother flew out with a jogging stroller he found at a thrift store that he gate checked and then stripped for parts, said Bond. “[He] built the book cart in the air shaft of my building. And then I started selling on the street [in] January 2019.”

Common Books Bookcart, which specializes in paperbacks and female writers, continues to operate on Saturdays. It’s only overhead costs are a storage unit that houses the cart and inventory. Bond says sales (which mostly happen online) continue to pay that rent.

Natasha Gilmore is an Instagram customer of Common Books. She only just visited the cart in October. Bond credits Caroline Weaver, who hosts a book club that Gilmore attends, with connecting them. Gilmore herself has three jobs. But there’s only one dream job for her; owning her own bookstore.

“My core goal in life was to open my own bookstore,” Gilmore said. “Because I’ve had a lot of jobs and it’s the one job I’ve loved the most out of all of them that I’ve had.”

When Gilmore moved to New York, she reconnected with Jeff Waxman, an old friend from the book publishing world. Both of them lived in the Jackson Heights neighborhood of Queens. And both of them saw a need for an English-language bookstore (there are currently none in the neighborhood). 

“We wanted to start working on a book store,” said Gilmore. “It’s been stalled because of quarantine. But now it’s kind of safer to go outside if we mask up. And with everything that we had [we] just went out onto the street near the Farmers Market and put the books out with some hand sanitizer and gave the books to people on a pay-what-you-want model.”

The enterprise is called Open Borders Books and is run by around eight collective members, including Ms. Gilmore and Mr. Waxman. All of them have other employment, which allows the enterprise to live somewhere between for-profit and nonprofit. Proceeds cover operating costs, go towards an eventual brick-and-mortar, and are put back into the community through local nonprofit organizations. 

“We all have day jobs, and I’ve got three jobs,” noted Ms. Gilmore. “So, we only sell a few books a week, and it’s basically just what we can manage if we are making deliveries.”

Back at CW Pencils Enterprises Caroline Weaver explains (between tying bows) that she was recently featured on Adam Davidson’s podcast called, “The Passion Economy.” The podcast profiles businesses that don’t make sense to a money person like Davidson. So how does a niche business (like the only pencil store in the world) make sense financially? They foster community, like the book club that brought Gilmore and Bond together.

“This last month [Weaver] asked me to pick out the book for the book club,” Bond said. “She sends people to the bookcart to buy whatever book they’re reading often, and is very generous with that. And that’s how I met Natasha [Gilmore] too.”

For Weaver, the book club was less a strategic business decision than the realization of another lifelong dream.

“I always wanted to have my own book club,” said Weaver. “And having a physical space that is mine that is a public space is a perfect opportunity to do that. It does very much feel like a personal thing. Most of our book club members are not even people who live around here. They’re people who come down here just to come to our book club.”

Niche businesses also trade on the expertise of their owners. Weaver has authored two books on pencils and given a short TED talk on their design. Bond tracks down particular editions of books at local bookstores and, increasingly in the COVID-era, online. Gilmore has worked as a bookseller and book reviewer, and has a strong network within the publishing industry.

“To me, it is a calling,” said Gilmore. “For me, what I can contribute to the world is this. I don’t know if it’s super useful, but it’s what I can do.”

And while these businesses may have started online before expanding into the real world, local engagement has proven to be make-or-break in 2020.

“I realized throughout the pandemic the hard truth that I think a lot of New York City retail shop owners are realizing, which is that we depend on tourism much more than I think most of us realized,” said Weaver. “…if tourists want to come visit us, cool, that’s awesome, I would like to have them but I started to realize I love my community. That it’s the community that keeps me going.”

With that in mind, Weaver is changing CW Pencil Enterprises. The subscription boxes she is wrapping are the beginning of the end. The last box will ship in March 2021. And over the next few months, Weaver will expand her offerings to become a full-service office supply store focused on the needs of her community.

“I feel like this pandemic has given me this humongous, scary but also very exciting opportunity to reimagine my business for whatever this new retail climate is that we’ll be re-entering one day,” she says. “I don’t really have a choice because it’s either close or evolve.”

The post The small, resilient businesses built by women appeared first on Pavement Pieces.

A few tourists and costumed characters did mill about, but most were wearing masks because of the COVID-19 pandemic. In a twist, it seemed that there were more members of the media than protesters despite the stakes of the election. NYPD officers were present all day, setting up barriers for a crowd that never materialized.

As the polls closed and results came in, people gathered around the ABC News ticker to watch states slowly turn red or blue. There were no loud cheers or wild celebrations. Even political arguments among people in the square never went beyond yelling. The storm would come, soon enough. Just not that day.

A cyclist passes the Armed Forces Recruitment Center in Times Square, New York City November 3, 2020. Photo by James Pothen

A cameraman setting up a shot in Times Square, New York City. The square remained relatively quiet and uncrowded through the day. Photo by James Pothen

Three NYPD Officers in Times Square, New York City. There was a visibile police presence but no unrest or large-scale protests. Photo by James Pothen

An NYPD van parked in Times Square, New York City. Photo by James Pothen

A person watches the election results come in over the ABC news ticker in Times Square, New York City. Photo by James Pothen

A group of NYPD officers make their way to the north side of Times Square, New York City. Photo by James Pothen

A protester dressed up as President Donald Trump in Times Square, New York City. Photo by James Pothen

This is a project of  Lori Grinker’s graduate photojournalism class.

The post Masked, Boarded Up, and Subdued: Election Day in Times Square appeared first on Pavement Pieces.

“I want to get rid of this constant undercurrent of ‘everything’s different right now,’’” said Gilbert, a longtime New York City resident living in Prospect Heights, Booklyn. “We have to be aware of so many things right now. I mean it gets exhausting, just kind of tiring mentally.”

As the federal government and pharmaceutical companies race towards a vaccine for COVID-19, Americans have mixed emotions about it. A large part of that comes from conflicting information from different sources.

“I just simply don’t know what to think about a vaccine at all,” said Domanik, a pastor at Falls Church in Menomonee Falls, Wis. “Because I’m just hearing a lot of different things from a lot of different news outlets.” 

Trish Gilbert, a longtime New York resident plans to see what side effects a COVID-19 vaccine could have on seniors. Photo Courtesy of Trish Gilbert

For Gilbert, a recent pledge by nine drug companies to ‘stand by science’ gave her comfort that once the vaccine is released to the public, that it would be safe. Yet she was hesitant to be first in line, citing potential side effects for older people as a cause for concern.

“I would probably wait until a friend of mine who is a senior person at a big pharmaceutical company tells his parents to go ahead and get the vaccine,” Gilbert said. “And then I would think, ‘all right, I can trust it.’ Because it’s so hard to know what the facts are when you’re just reading the newspaper and so many people are manipulating science for political ends on the right and on the left.”

Domanik was more concerned about how the vaccine would be distributed. He wanted to be sure that vaccination would be done right the first time.

“I just want to know what the actual plan is in terms of its release,” Domanik noted. Adding, “I want it to be administered and distributed right. I want it to be safe. I want it to be ethical. I want it to be quick, expedient, and I want it to be easy for the public to get.”

For Tay, a Singaporean living in New York for the last three years, his Christian faith gave him a sense of calm while he waits for the vaccine to come.

“There is peace and that peace is the one that is usurping the anxiety and therefore gives me hope, which is a great

Tony Domanik, a pastor in Wisconsin, wants a vaccine to be distributed fairly. Photo Courtesy of Tony Domanik

thing, said Tay. “Otherwise I may have euthanized myself a few weeks ago.”

Gilbert noted that far from being the “great equalizer” as Madonna predicted back in March, COVID-19 has disproportionately affected minorities and people of lower income.

“If anything, it has accentuated, it’s made more apparent what the cruel inequity is in our country rather than equalizing,” Gilbert said. “You go to the Upper East Side, and it’s practically empty because people just decamped to their summer homes and weekend homes just to keep themselves safe. Whereas if you’re living in a dense neighborhood, densely populated and you have more people than maybe would be ideal in any living space, you can’t social distance.”

Tay has found the lockdown to be a time of personal renewal, and has gained an increased awareness of the needs of others, and a desire to be kinder.

“I think there’s a lot of good things that have come out of COVID,” Tay said. “People being kinder and me as a Christian also acknowledging that there are people of different faiths, backgrounds, different walks of life. And with the racial debate and predicament that we find ourselves in just makes me as an individual want to embrace and be kinder to people more than before.”

The post Some Americans Say “Not So Fast” on Operation Warp Speed appeared first on Pavement Pieces.

“I’ve been very nervously monitoring Trump’s popularity and chance of winning the election,” said Chris Ahn, a Korean-American man living in Brooklyn. “ I think right now we’re at 75-25 split going towards Biden.”

Hope for many Asian Americans is connected to a Biden victory in November. Many of them had experienced anti-Asian remarks or microaggressions.

Eunice Paik, a Korean-American leasing agent experienced anti-Asian sentiment. Photo Courtesy of Eunice Paik

“I remember I opened the door for a family, two older ladies and their two children and they just gave me the dirtiest look,” said Eunice Paik, a Korean American woman and 13-year New York resident. I was giving a kind gesture, and they sneered at me.”

When the murder of George Floyd inspired nationwide protests over the summer Asian Americans felt a call to action that overrode cultural norms that discourage complaining and speaking out. 

“I definitely was concerned about African-Americans being treated badly and many of my AfricanAmerican friends telling me they were afraid of the police,” said Dr. Alex Pothen, an Indian-American man living in West Lafayette, Indiana. “This cannot go on. This is indicative of a much deeper systemic racial problem in our country that we need to address.”

But addressing the problem proved to be challenging. For some, it was a struggle to know where their own identity fit in a conflict defined by blackness and whiteness.

“There’s kind of this tendency to say, ‘Well, Asians are really kind of white, aren’t they’,” said Chang Kim, a Korean-American man living in Brooklyn. “Kind of carving out Asians as a special kind of person of color, as in like. ‘Well you’re like, kind of a person of color, but you’re also kinda…so I wasn’t sure where I fit in.”

Others wanted to attend protests, but stayed home out of health concerns. Some have found more behind-the-scenes methods to promote racial justice. For families with means, that meant keeping their kids at home this fall so that parents who needed to work would be able to send their kids to school.

Bonita Price, a Canadian citizen of Filipino ancestry struggles to explain racism to her children. Photo Courtesy of Bonita Price

“As a family, we’ve had to make a choice,” said Bonita Price, a mother of four children who has Filipino heritage and Canadian citizenship living in Brooklyn. “…we’re going to try to online school as much as possible and enjoy it so that other kids can actually go to school in your place.”

For some there is a sense that the shine had come off the American dream. The hope of a prosperous life based on equal opportunity had been removed. Underneath was an ugly truth of racism and oppression.

“I think we’re in an apocalyptic moment,” said Kim. “As we all know from Sunday School apocalypse means an unveiling. I think that this unveiling has really made clear to me that there’s something really broken about America.”

The prospect of a Trump victory in November creates anxiety. For Price, it was grounds for moving her family to Canada. Even though her experience was that Canadians were more racist than New Yorkers, she noted that the Canadian government treated people of Asian descent better.

“They were sending televised messages: ‘do not discriminate against Asians because of the virus,’” Price said. “But it’s the opposite in the U.S. We might feel safe in New York, but if your government is sending messages of hate [and] discrimination it’s hostile.”

The post Asian Americans struggle to find their place in a Black and white world appeared first on Pavement Pieces.