Ellen Rogers

This morning for the first time, I found Ellen Rogers' photography.  Where have I been?  No clue.  It is embarrassing.  She is an artist, a fashion photographer of repute.  She is all over the internet.  She does not try to protect her jpeg images but encourages others to blog them.  She is young.  She is pretty. She has a new photo book.   She is successful.

It makes me miserable.  I am the type.  I am thrilled to find her work.  It is all analog, shot with film and manipulated in the darkroom then hand tinted.  The only digital process is to scan the final print.  She is brave, bold, creative.  It oppresses me.

For the morning, anyway.  I will write to her and tell her.  I will make a poem of my misery and admiration.  I will copy the dialog from "Death of a Salesman" between Will Loman and his brother, Ben.

"How did you do it?" Willy asks him.

"When I was seventeen, I walked into the jungle.  And by twenty-one, I walked out.  And by God, I was rich."

Willy was nuts.  The conversation is imaginary.  But that's the way it seems.  All the intermediate steps are a blur.  Talent, undaunted will. . . success.

I'll be a fool.  But I'll get over it as I do all things.  It just takes a minute.

Look at her site.  You'll probably like it, too.