Two suns

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Words
Two suns

She goes to bed at about seven, to not have to be awake.
.
.


It only takes one sun to make day. In her town there are two. Half of the year they go hand in hand. The other half they take turns; one appears as the other goes away.

By then she finds it difficult to go to bed at about seven, to not have to be awake. She fears summer this time of year. Bites her tongue, till it’s sore.

Prejudice

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Prejudice

I have prejudice against people. Small people, large, people who drive their car to work, those who take the bus. People who, like me, ride their bicycles. The young and beautiful, the old and less beautiful. People who are obsessed with how others look, and themselves. People who play sport, those who go for a run with their mates, the ones having a beer at the local pub. The rich, the poor, politicians, actors, truck drivers, art directors, cleaners, doctors. Photographers, people who do certain things not unlike myself, people who are not at all like me. People with plans. The ones spending their time commenting whatever caught their attention on social media, those who don’t have an opinion about anything.

I am not all those people, the ones I am not I have at some point wished I was.

Prejudice, another word for fear?

Wrote the draft for this two and a half years ago, then forgot about it. It probably had a slightly different meaning then, but only slightly. Rather fond of people, in fact.

still rolls

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Mama don't take my Fujifilm away / Words
still rolls

The Kona—the bike for those who don’t keep track of bike brands—has followed me through thick and thin for more than a decade. I don’t know which is thick and which is thin but there has been plenty of both. Late last year I was afraid that its time was up when I couldn’t screw in a new bottom bracket. Panic is a better word for it. To my surprise and delight a local bike shop was able to fix, my heart flew.

I should make better use of it as a transport unit for photography related matters, I hadn’t meant to say anything about that, no less true because, in spite of that. Oh well.

Now, two months later, and I am still being childishly happy that it still rolls. That’s all.

Oh. Kona in my language means woman, or wife. I never refer to the bike as she though. Rarely does the terribly joke about my wife slip past my lips. Just as well. Embarrassingly it has. Don’t have one, no plans, and—as much as I love it—not married to the bicycle. Now that’s all. Promise.

validate, speak thou

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From the archives / Words
validate, speak thou down

“I photograph to validate my existence, sad story”, he says, fully accepting as if it were a fact that this is what pictures do and that it is the pictures that validate and that it is within their power, implied if not stated.

Then goes on to think about the camera and its function, asking if it approves more than allows. Provides approval to be in a given place, at a given time. To take up space. Take? Space, that is someone’s? He digresses. It excuses, the camera: “Sorry about this”, it says, half-hearted, hardly audible.

Then what is it, he wonders, the wish to show to others the validation, approval, excuse. “Hello, see me, here is my right—sorry—excuse to exist, validated.” As if it were a passport.

Homes and away and summer and ages

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Homes and away and summer and ages

Homes* are now further away than images from a summer** were when they were ages away. As in more than ten versus less than eight. Years.

Just pondering some about time and the sense of it and the lack of it.


*an actual project title, a working one at least.
**also a title but more of a collection that kind of happened, not by coincidence but almost, shortened from images from a summer some years ago.
Both awaiting, something.

before you forgot what

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before you forgot what

Do you remember when you went to bed early before you forgot what you used to do at nights before you started going to bed early?

Before you forgot what used to be before you started going to bed early?

Does it work by the way, going to bed early, did it work, ever? Did I just ruin it?

lapse of

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lapse of

Many years ago I wrote that “water, in this form, falling in slow motion, is truly fascinating“. Which is odd, when in reality I find it terrifying. Perhaps it was a momentary lapse of,.. lapse of whatever. Perhaps I hadn’t connected the dots by then. Either way, can’t water just be itself?

It’s not about water, this, it just makes it easier to think about, visualize, and not panic.

Can’t fingers be just fingers? Body be just body, the room be the space within the walls and the floor and the ceiling in which you can move and expect it to feel like movement, or does all of this sometimes have to be stuck in time like water in the form of a glacier?

Slow motion should exist only as a motion picture effect.

Many years later I wrote that “pushing you down as one foot still moves in front of the other“. I don’t know how that’s connected, how it connects, only that it does. Dots.

variations were both subtle

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variations were both subtle

He doesn’t even like spruces. What’s that? He puts a lot of of effort into not liking spruces instead of concentrating on the ones that do attract him like pine, especially the crooked ones, and cedar, he really loves cedar. Pine smells so good. Red cedar. He never saw a cedar though, not properly. Not the tree, only the wood. It’s beautiful, the wood, he remembers. Remembers. The colour variations were both subtle and abrupt, beautiful colour variations. Remembers. There were others, also, their presence, their presence variations were both subtle and abrupt, beautiful vari,.. no. Yes. Perhaps they don’t grow around him, cedars. Perhaps he didn’t look closely, or didn’t know what to look for. Indifferent. Never bothered to, never risked looking.

state is insignificance

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People's words

Depression is the flaw in love. To be creatures who love, we must be creatures who can despair at what we lose, and depression is the mechanism of that despair. When it comes, it degrades one’s self and ultimately eclipses the capacity to give or receive affection. It is the aloneness within us made manifest, and it destroys not only connection to others but also the ability to be peacefully alone with oneself. Love, though it is no prophylactic against depression, is what cushions the mind and protects it from itself. Medications and psychotheraphy can renew that protection, making it easier to love and be loved, and that is why they work. In good spirits, some love themselves and some love others and some love work and some love God: any of these passions can furnish that vital sense of purpose that is the opposite of depression. Love forsakes us from time to time, and we forsake love. In depression, the meaninglessness of every enterprise and every emotion, the meaninglessness of life itself, becomes self-evident. The only feeling left in this loveless state is insignificance.

That is no way to begin a book. Why are you making me weep like that?