Over break I visited my grandmother and my sister for a day. On thanksgiving i missed the PERFECT picture of my grandma sitting in her favorite chair with my dog laying at her feet. She was holding a mirror in her hand and she was brushing her hair. She was completely unaware of me standing in the next room and she was completely in her own world. She had to make sure she was well put together for the family dinner.
I found myself without a camera the other day, a midnight trip to the Marin Headlands. I didn’t think about bringing a visual apparatus, I just thought of going.
The sky was dark, and the ocean loud. Even though the only light that lit the beach was the moon, I could see everything. If I brought my camera, I would of missed the first hand experience of being there and taking it all in.
I’m happy I didn’t bring camera, I didn’t need it.
Sometimes it’s best to leave it at home.
Sometimes you want to bring it and not leave it home, but that night was not the time to do so.
It was last saturday and I was on my way up to work in Santa Rosa when I decided to pull off on highway 12 exit to grab a bite to eat and a coffee, but when I was leaving the 7-11 up there I glanced across the street and the santa rosa flea market was going on so bagel and coffee in hand I crossed Brookwood Ave to check it out. I was immediatley disapointed in myself for not having my camera in the car with me, there were countless booths with merchandise strewn all over the place but one in particular stood out, there was a 10×10 eazy-up with the back end of a minivan parked underneath it and a middle aged latino man passed out in a chair right next to the van. The table under the eazy-up was covered in used tools and left over roofing material, the part that made the photo however was the fact that the mans 9-11 year old son was the one manning the table and he was covered up to his elbows in roofing tar. This would have been an amazing photo.
So over Thanksgiving break I decided to make a “fancy” dinner for myself and I’m not one to take pics of my food but I wished I did this time. I was astonished how good my mini pot pie turned out! I swear it looked like it came out of a storybook! When I dug into it I loved how the smoke was escaping the dish. If only I had the control to take a photo before I ate the rest of it. Oh well.
This past Thanksgiving I had the opportunity to spend it with my amazing roommate and her family. It was such a wonderful experience to see how they celebrate this “cookie-cutter”American holiday. In my eyes it was all pretty typical, except a few of their family traditions that I was introduced to. I think my favorite moment of the whole day was when my roommates grandpa was dancing with his daughters and granddaughters. The music made everyone clap and start dancing as if they had never done it before. I would have loved to capture the joy and timelessness in this moment that they were all in. The smallest little niece had such a sparkle in her eye, looking up at her family as her biggest heroes.
My grandparents used to live in Laguna Beach, California. They had a cottage styled house with a huge garden in in the front yard. The house was surrounded with a white fence that was covered with flowers. As Laguna Beach has many hills, their house was about a mile high, facing the ocean. I used to sit outside and watch the day pass. At the golden hour, there were incredible sun rays and reflections on the house and the garden. I wish I would have photographed the house, while emphasizing the lighting.
When I drive alone, that’s when images come to mind. It’s just me, and the world, and several lenses. The windshield, rearview mirror, side windows and side mirrors frame my surroundings.
So often, this produces interesting and often beautiful potential photographs. Especially when I am on the highway in a sparsely-populated, flat area; this dynamic multi-directional camera I am inside of creates miraculous compositions. Capturing them is difficult, since I am operating this contraption as a driver.
If I brought a friend, relative or some other person along with me, so that they could drive while I shot, it wouldn’t work. The moving nature of of the vehicle makes image capture challenging, but that’s not the biggest problem. It’s that I would no longer be alone, and it is seemingly the solitude more than the nature of the car that creates the overflow of would-be phenomenal images running through my mind. That, and the inherent beauty of the desolate landscape.
The sun sets below Paestum in Southern Italy. March 2015.
In case of emergency, exit through roof. An American student gazes through a bus window at Mount Vesuvius near Ercolano, Italy in the spring of 2015.
There was a picture in my family’s photo album that had recorded the presence of snow in Healdsburg around the 70s (a pile of snow accumulated on the ground and on the plants of the lawn) and ever since I can remember my childhood had lacked the presence of snow, save for the snow that would blanket the mountains nearby under certain weather conditions. However, back in winter of 2011, I had witnessed the falling of light flakes of snow right outside our family home, believing for a while that it was hail. The white specks dancing in the air before falling to the ground, not leaving a lasting impression of its existence. It definitely wasn’t hail as the specks lacked any noise when coming in contact with concrete and they weren’t heavy at all. It didn’t last long, only about 20 minutes or so, but it had been mesmerizing to see it and experience it. Since it hasn’t snowed since then in Healdsburg in the lower elevations, I feel like it had been a rare opportunity to document it, however I hadn’t thought of taking a picture, so all the evidence I have of it happening is the accounts of other witnesses such as my parents and brother. Maybe the next time it happens, I’ll be ready with camera in hand.
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