I've been communicating with a friend quite a bit lately. We met while demonstrating for peace on a Sun City street corner, an activity halted by covid, not yet resumed. Even if it had been, she's living out of state and these days only comes down this way to visit one of her sons, something else halted by covid.. The other son is a covid long hauler, needs a lung replacement, and has other medical issues which deny him eligibility to receive him. Naturally his mother is devastated.
I've been trying to cheer her up a little by sending her some of my "cheeriest" photos along with some stories behind them, as well as giving her a chance to rant and blow off steam for her excruciating situation. She appreciates these, and fairly regularly suggests that I put them together with some of the stories behind them and make a book. She has encouraged me to do so often enough that I decided to share some reasons why I'm not interested in taking her up on her idea, not to be confused with a lack of appreciation for her enthusiasm. Following is my reply to her latest suggestion:
"You have way more ambitions for me than I have. Write a book? I do well in short form... sometimes. What's in my blog would constitute about three books by now, perhaps more. But I write what and when I feel like it, and work to keep on a single topic like an essay. Or a rant. Or a story. I write so much so often that I get it out of my system until the next need comes along. And for all that, I have about a dozen regular readers, not too inspiring. Of course, when I look at total history, a few of the posts get world wide attention - imagine that! And I've got something like 96,000 all time views. Nearly all of that centers on one particular post, about my disappointing experience as a Jobs Daughter when I was a teen. But a book? Not so much.
"Part of that I'm sure is my well deserved retirement. As a single mom without child support for over a decade, I worked nearly all my adult life for 6 or 7 days a week, 12 to 14 hour days. Often I had second jobs on top of the first 60-hour one, and/or did volunteer work, got involved in yet another hobby. A book seems like a job again. Had enough. These days I'm writing more to you than I even put in my blog! And yes, I appreciate the appreciation. But writing tells me when I need to do it, not vice versa. It keeps me semi-sane, dumps all kinds of frustrations or other strong feelings, and I love the mellow in between. It's of the moment, not something long and planned out. When I need a year's long project, I plant a tree. Or another bush. In between, I read, watch TV, go to the club to learn new jewelry skills in hopes of making a sale, wander in search of new pictures, and plan the next trip.
"I take pictures, again like writing, because I must. It captures - at its best - a moment,
a memory, something of beauty to me, a long gone season, even a way of recording something as basic as exactly where across the yard the gas line goes so I know not to dig there years after the paint and flags have gone. I record as in depth as I can places I can never afford to visit again, and visit other places repeatedly in hopes of getting even a single picture better than one I've taken before.
"With rare exceptions I do not shoot people. I do not record people visually. I record them emotionally. I'd be terrible in a line-up picking out the crook. I can't tell you who wears glasses unless there is something particularly striking about the frames. I finally, after knowing him for over 30 years, know that my husband Steve has hazel eyes.We had that discussion several times, and it's the discussions that registered. I have to see somebody several times before I recognize them for sure, more before I recall a name. I walked into a camera store in the Twin Cities well over a decade ago and saw this guy shopping there, thinking he was familiar. He was, but I had no idea he was closer than 250 miles from there where he lived, no reason to expect him in that store other than a shared love of photography which he does way better than I, and hadn't actually seen him for a few years. After studying him a bit, I walked up close to him and gave him the opportunity to recognize me. He did, and I wound up having dinner at a nearby restaurant with my brother that evening!"
No comments:
Post a Comment