i like to tell stories

well tonight i heard an email come in, i didn’t check right away like always. then i heard my buzzer, i ignored it as thursday and friday nights on 9th ave, my buzzer rings a lot and it has nothing to do with me.

but when i read the email, ‘are you home??’ and thought of the buzzer, i picked up my phone, called, and before she even picked up the phone, my buzzer was ringing again, she was at my door. i hadn’t seen her in 2.5 years.

she had been having dinner across the street with a friend and checked to see if i still lived here, i do. so they came in and i told stories while they looked the walls. then for the first time ever, AG happily let me take her picture. she couldn’t stop laughing so i didn’t even really look through the camera or at the images as they came up, the goal became make her laugh as hard as possible, i stopped when her eyes were red and full of tears, but got a few of those too of course.

at one point as i lowered the camera, my hand hit the dial over to bulb, so for one frame, i got this one, 5 stops overexposed. somehow, tonight as i write, this is my favorite.

i make this mistake often.

it was a great 72h in Tennessee, minus the insects, heat and short trip to the ER for the insect bites back in NYC. this was the second of two different TN shoots, both full of small, wonderful adventures. more on the other once sharable.

it was a perfect shoot. too many spots to choose from for the time allotted, a great and seemingly eager subject who has probably been photographed more then anyone can count, a subject that knows the drill more then i probably do, a good groomer, a good crew on hand that all had happy vibes and one photographer all too excited to be photographing billy ray with his dirt bike and in a thicket, deep in the heart of Tennessee.

i want a shoot like this at least once a week.

at one point, he asked if he could get a passport image from me, where’s the slot to put his quarter. i think it was a joke, but he was a hard read, so i have no idea if it was just an awkward stranger moment, awkward getting my picture taken moment or if he was making fun of me.

i stepped into the room we were to shoot in 41m and 45s before my 11m 32s with our man started.

as different as our lives are now, i never envisioned a day we wouldn’t know each other anymore.

this one sorta happened on the actual shoot, a first. working for a magazine in the woods of tennessee, i got covered in what i thought was just ticks, none of which ever seemed to borrow in or needed fancy removal.

yet 24h after getting back, turns out i was covered in at least 40 of these, (yes, i counted). no idea what it was that got me, but they hurt, they itch and made things happen in my body that scared me enough at one point to seek professional advice.

i still think it was a great trip, better even because of this, somehow.

it took telling this story to someone else one day to point out the scene in little miss sunshine and ask me if my feelings where similar to the boys frustrating reaction to a suddenly unattainable dream. i had seen the movie, and didn’t even put it together on my own. i was the same age as the character in the film, wanted to be a pilot, it was all i wanted to do and while i didn’t not talk, it wasn’t a far off mark of some of my behavior back then.

so much reality of it all is lost in the city or maybe i just don’t see and feel the loss as easily as i do when i go somewhere else. the service member walking across the terminal, the service sticker on a car in traffic, a decorated luggage car half hidden by the gate. i’ve seen the images of how commercial flights transport remains. so sometimes, when flying and lost in my head, i wonder if there are any on my flight.

the pics are from the trip to BNA. i knew i would only sleep on the plane if i pulled an all night wake for an 830am flight. i don’t remember sleeping much, but the pictures from across the aisle i got snapped of me prove that i did. thanks GH.

my 25th club picture and another simple yet beautifully designed shell box.

PULL.

the little guy there with all the legs i found on my shirt back in the hotel room an hour or two later. my 60 hours in TN would become or otherwise awaken me to a entirely new level of insects love jonathan experience.

less then an hour later, the same person called, while walking their actual dog in the park, the dog had found something fumbling around in a bush a little too long. turns out the dog had found a handgun, at first, they thought it was a toy, but after not getting too close and calling 911, yup, within 3 minutes of the phone call, a policeman arrived and confirmed it, the dog had found a handgun. i appreciate this call too, i wish i had been there.

the most surprising part of both these manhattan stories to me is the dog, this dog cannot sniff out it’s own toys in a 300 square foot apartment, how did it smell or otherwise stumble upon a handgun?

i invited him over months ago for a portrait, he agreed, but said it may be awhile, it was.

last night i got an email, i had no idea who it was from, it was an address i didn’t recognize, had the simple subject line ‘foto’ and only said, “around this weekend?”

i assumed it was someone i met at some point or someone that reads this site, so i replied not knowing who it was, “yes, i am. want your foto taken?” turns out it was kit.

today, july 4th, i finally took his photo.

At my friends wedding in PA, I met KC Beachy. A week after the weekend I met her, I flew to Colorado to see her again for another weekend. I made some photographs that weekend, but the most joy was had with polaroids, we couldn’t stop making them and kept buying more and more.

The weekend after that, I went to Europe for the first time, taking a polaroid of her smiling with me. When I first called her, I told her I was looking at the Mediterranean and looking at her picture. She didn’t believe me, so I took a picture of her polaroid and the view. Before my short time in Europe was over, I made over 500 of these images.