At left, the view from the kitchen window in the loft where I stayed.
At first, the image seems to be a typical street scene on the lower East Side of Manhattan. But look closely at the frond of greenery sticking out from between the two buildings at the fifth floor. It's a tree, but where is it rooted? Has it sprouted from a pot inside a fourth-floor apartment with a window that opens on to the wall of the next building? Could it be growing up from the dirt between the two buildings at the ground level? Examination from the sidewalk is useless, the two building faces meld together at street level, with not even a crack to peer through.