Yesterday was muggy. I went to the Impossible store and made big instant prints with 8x10 cameras all morning and into the afternoon. I liked the film enough to bid on an 8x10 camera on eBay. That is just the beginning, though. I have to get a lens, an old Polaroid 8x10 processor, a big, stable tripod, and holders for the film. The last item is the most difficult to find. So. . . I'm off on another chase. I think what sold me was standing for a self-portrait. I got a good image of myself, a very. . . (ahem) worldly looking fellow with all the scars and self-inflicted wounds of life in soft light and the flattering tones of the film. It is the sort of picture to use on a book jacket. Yes, I'm sure that is what sold me on it all. But I also took photos of "The Impossible Girls," the women who work in the store, and that might have helped, too. I was disappointed, though, that my portraits of them were not the best of show. Another photographer outdid me. I loved his. But had I not seen them, mine would do. You shall see the photos of them after I get home and scan and process. But I say, it is all very exciting.
I left the store at 1:30 and hadn't thought about what to do next. Since I was on the end of the island, I thought about going to Brooklyn, but I had not studied up and would have been at a loss, and having had only a croissant and coffee thus far, I headed over to the noodle shop where I ate on Thursday. Q took me there the first time a few years ago, and I have nothing like this in my own hometown. So I ate and thought of what to do. I needed to go to Chelsea to a big gallery that Jim Linderman has given me an introduction to, but Chelsea is difficult to get to from SoHo except by cab, and besides, the owner, it turns out, was in Chicago, so I'd only be going to speak with the staff. I made excuses, finished lunch, grabbed my camera, and went into the street. I'd be a photographer, goddamnit. I'd not been so much of one all week. I had a few good pictures, but I'd been timid, and most of my efforts were weak. So I began. Bam. Bam. Bam. I walked into the crowd framing from my hip, from my shoulder, from my chest, finally hitting the subjects, playing my lens like an accordion, changing focal lengths, setting distances, lining up, firing. It is dirty work, sleazy, maybe. But it is important, too, god's work, if you will. These are images for the ages. People will look back on them and recognize an era. They will only gain importance in time, I am sure of that. I was en el fuego.
The afternoon began to fade and the light angled down the cross streets and lighting up the buildings dramatically. Bam. Bam. Bam. I would look down at the results excitedly. Yes. Yes. Yes.
It will take a long time to process them, but not as long as the studio work. I will begin knocking them out when I get home. The sheer bulk of them alone, though, will be exhausting.
The decision had been made by then. There was no Chelsea. It was four-thirty. Should I go to MoMA? I had an hour. I got on the #6 at Spring. It was crowded. I was tired. I would go back to the hotel and put down my load. I would pour a whiskey and relax. I was pretty spent. I set the ISO up on my camera. Click. Click. Click.
It felt good to drop the backpack and the camera. The Cannon 5D is heavy. I was envying a lighter camera, a Leica M9, perhaps, or the new Leica M. I hooked the camera to the computer and watched the pictures unload. Twelve hundred of them. One scotch. Two. It took forty minutes, and then it was five-thirty. I would walk up to 5th Ave. and look around. Grab the camera. The light fading early in the city, the crowds heading home. I walked slowly, slower, tired, whiskey tired, too. Click. . . click. . . click. . . .
Walking back, I stopped at the sushi place I'd eaten my first night in town. Down the stairs. The small restaurant was crowded. Sixteen people, I counted. I was the only Yankee. Something was going on. Speeches were made. People laughed and cheered. Me, too. I watched others and saw that I had been right to drink from the glass that first night. The cold sake was so much better than the cheap warm sake I get all the time. Really good. I'd have another.
Back in my room, I downloaded the new images and had another whiskey to kill the worms. Then I wrote some correspondences that needed to be handled before I got home. Then I thought I should go out even though I was exhausted. I put on my clothes and headed out the door. Downstairs and out the lobby the rain came down in sheets. I stood under the canopy and watched those caught out dashing from doorway to doorway. It would do little good. They would be soaked in seconds. People grimaced and laughed and shrugged their shoulders in resignation. Two Eastern European girls made up for the night walked out from the lobby. They looked and stood and watched. We smiled at one another. One said something, I said something back, and we all laughed. She pulled out her cell phone and made a call. They would get there eventually, wherever they were going. Rain would not stop them tonight. I, on the other hand. . . .
Now it is Sunday and my last day in town. Not quite a day. I must leave for the airport at one-thirty. I have enough time for something, a stroll through the park, perhaps, or, maybe, a trip to MoMA. One thing, and then I'm away.
All I can think, though, is that someone ought to sponsor me to come make street photos. Really. It is what I am good for.
I agree!
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