1995 | Rochester
I had first seen her on the porch across the street from where I was photographing. She had been staring at me, watching me walk down the street making photographs. I made sure to not ever point the camera her way, I didn’t want her to think I had taken her photograph. I kinda forgot about her after a few yards, crossed back over the street and kept walking. A few moments later, I heard soft footsteps behind me, only in unison with mine however, if I stopped, so did the footsteps… If I kept walking, there were the soft steps again. When I turned around to look, there she was. She leaned towards me while still keeping her distance and very softly with glee in her voice, she pointed to the Leica and said, “Take my picture.” I raised the camera to my eye, pressed the shutter and smiled at her. She giggled, spun around and happily shuffled back to her porch.
I used to walk around Rochester often and it never failed, even in this photography city, I always got hassled, she was one of the only instances where it actually was the opposite. Usually it was residents but one time I had the police approach me. The officer actually found the entire thing humorous but maybe it was just my behavior upon his approach. He rolled up behind me as I was standing in the middle of a street with my camera pointed at the sky, he was right on my heels and I decided the best idea was to ignore him even though the cruiser was only about twelve inches away. I heard the window go down right next to me and kept trying to pretend he was not there. He actually even said, “Excuse me.” I turned and looked at him while keeping my camera trained on the sky, he then said, “[insert name of photo school].” I looked back up at the sky and said, “Yes.” He smiled and drove away.