Sigh

Some mornings are better than others. Some mornings, I wake up and think that I'll kick some kind of ass today. Other mornings, I wake up and immediately find an article about an 18-year-old commercial photographer who is flying around the world on a monthly basis. And it's just depressing.

Sigh.

Anyway.

This is over in Irondale -- just testing the camera before an assignment. The shutter release on the battery extension only works erratically as of late.

Hey, it was there

It's outside the Irondale City Hall and I was there, waiting for somebody. Wheeeee.

The King

No, not Elvis. King cotton. From a couple weeks ago.

Warning: Nostalgia to follow

The last time I saw her, we spent an afternoon at the park. She was joining up with the Navy and her recruiter told her two things: chew gum, and start running. So we ran and walked, and chewed gum, and talked. We went to high school together, hung out, but I can't remember if she's two years younger than me, or three, or what. Don't ask why or how it came to it, but I threatened to throw her shoes over the baseball fence, to which she responded, "go ahead, I'm Mexican; we're good at climbing fences." A couple minutes later, as we walked around the park, she giggled, ran over to a drainage ditch and jumped it. I looked at her sideways and raised an eyebrow. "We're good at crossing rivers, too."

Whenever the word 'Mexican' comes up in a conversation (or on the radio, or television, or in print), some little part of my mind snaps straight to her. Some sizeable part of my heart goes there, too. I try to not regret the things I've done and try to not do things that I might regret, but I can't help it with her. I regret losing touch with her. I regret not being closer to her. I regret a lot of things when it comes to her.

We brought in a Colombian woman for portraits this morning for an upcoming article, and there was just something about her that threw me. I can't help thinking about her right now, and thinking about her means feeling that slow ache of regret. I wish I had a picture of her somewhere, and I might, but it'll be on film, which means it's somewhere at my parents' place. Mrs Pomare, I believe, is what she'll look like in ten years or so.

Janet, I miss you.

Just splitting the goodies

None of these will run, but I thought I might post 'em here just so I can say I'm keeping up with my blogs. From the St. Aloysius School's All Saints Day celebration this morning."Yo, how's my halo look? Straight? Cool.""And I was all, 'yo, that Saint Nicholas guy ain't nothing but--' ... crap, he's right behind me, isn't he?"
Can't even go to church these days without somebody sticking a wide angle lense in your face.
Saint Nick's plottin' to nick the priest's communion goblet. Or planning world domination. Either way, kiddo, count me in.

Ahh, good times with the Catholics. Almost as good as that time I put Alka-seltzer under my fingernails and dipped 'em in the holy water. Those guys had no sense of humor.

"Pretend like I'm not here"

That's what I say to kids when I have an assignment around them: "pretend like I'm not here, okay?" Because I don't really want them to look at me, or give me a big smile, or throw up some kind of gang sign ... yeah, that's happened before, damn near killed myself laughing so hard ... And then there are the people who aren't really looking at you, which might run ...

Just a little tidbit

I'll be posting (hopefully) an embedded Soundslides later with more photos later. Unfortunately, I don't have any audio to go with it -- my recorder was dead, and the three closest convenience stores to the gin didn't have any AAA batteries.