Some cathedral we came across, roaming around Paris.
NaBloPoMo Day 28: Action
Today’s NaBloPoMo Prompt: If you could pass along only one photo of yourself to future generations in your family, which would it be and why?
I picture of me as a baby, I think, because why bother with all the nonsense and silliness that constructed me, all the random ephemera, the scars and bruises that came to be my identity? Why not go with my potential? An old scratchy photo from 1971, yellowed from the passage of time, a pre-digital artifact the speaks of an era that, thankfully forgotten, nevertheless created damned fools like myself who created more damned fools.
There’s me on a velvet mat, chubby as all hell. My grin so wide it inflates my head by a factor of two. Not much hair. Cloudy blue background. What’s this little ball of fat going to do with his life? Sports? Business? Creative arts? Anarchy? Terror, doom and gloom, atrocities? So many doors to open, explore, back out of slowly, horrified, close and lock and nail boards too, weeping.
Best part of this photo is I had no idea what was going on. Didn’t know I was being photographed. Didn’t even know I existed! In every other photo you see of me, I know there’s a camera pointing at me, and I’m distorting my reality to be what I think I want to be for the picture. Disingenuous, I think, is the word for it.
Mitch Hedberg has a joke about how people show him a photo and say, this is a picture of me when I was younger, to which he replies, every picture of you is when you were younger. So no photo is accurate to NOW, so why not go ALL the way back?
Today’s NaBloPoMo Photo Prompt: Action
Introducing Dale
Postaday for May 27th: Baggage Check. We all have complicated histories. When was the last time your past experiences informed a major decision you’ve made?
I got one of them headaches here you swear you’ll never drink again. Which is a lie because in my hand, a jelly-jar full of wild turkey. To take the edge off. Woke up at 2 am to gobble some exedrin and spent the next three hours moaning at the pillow where my wife’s head left a dent.
Ha, now you got to guess if she divorced me or died, and then guess if that’s why I drink.
The name’s Dale. Jason made me up— he says that sometimes when these writing prompts leave him flat, he’s going to hand it over to me, let me say a few things. Purely fictional, of course, but then, as he says, the point’s to write, not report. No one’s building a biography about poor old bukkhead.
So where was I. Sitting here in my overstuffed, looking out the window. Hurray for us, another hazy day my little corner of LA. You know how there’s New York City, and then there’s Queens, and there’s Long Island? That’s what this part of LA is like. Right in there and no where close. I don’t look out my window for the celebrities.
Truth is, my history ain’t so complicated. I don’t have to make too many major decisions. Wouldn’t be great if I got to tell you that I pulled the plug on my wife, on account of I had to make the same decision about my ma and I let her linger too long and we all suffered for it? But nah.
Look at me shrug, slosh a little wild turkey on my wrist, and say, sorry, to you, not my wrist.
That’s the second time I’ve brought up my wife. I think Jason’s trying to get somewhere with this. Now, I can’t have murdered her or anything, because he wants me to chime in now and again, and if all I am is a wife-o-cide, that’ll get real boring real fast. I need to be more complicated.
How about this. My wife didn’t leave me, and she ain’t dead. She’s visiting her sister. In, let’s say, Berkeley. Last time she went up there, I made a few bad calls. Sowed some oats. Nothing illegal, broke no vows, but had to take a couple hundred showers to get the glitter out of my chest hair, if you know what I mean.
So this time, major decision: two six packs and the Netflix. That kept me from driving any place. My oats went sowless.
Now what I have to decide is, was it worth it. What I gained in clean conscious, I lost in pounding migraine. And here I am, 10 in the morning, wild turkey in hand, staring out the window. Hazy day. My lawn needs mowing. Gloria, the neighbor, just backed out of her driveway and got slammed by some idiot kid doing 50. 50 in a residential zone. Broken glass everywhere. Kid’s half-hanging out his windhsield. I should call the cops. But damn, this headache is something fierce.
Lighthouse Sky (Photo of the Day)
San Diego, May 2015. Out by Cabrillo National Monument
NaBloPoMo Day 27: Portrait
Today’s NaBloPoMo Prompt: Which do you cherish more: old family photos or old family stories?
I guess old family stories, since those are more fun, easier to share, adaptable to the situation they’re told in. I don’t have too many old family photos though, so maybe I’m biased. Or maybe my old family’s not all the photogenic.
There’s old photos floating around, of course, and they get passed from one person to another on occasion. But not so many as to establish any kind of record. Not that way we do with the stories.
Perhaps I am having difficulty with that word “cherish,” when I don’t know that I put that much thought into it. (Thus starting this post with “I guess.”) As I’ve said ad-nauseum, I’m not one much for memories or nostalgia.
So, to compare the two, pictures versus stories, since I like to use photography to create, and I like to create stories too, as much as I want to be an artistic photographer, I’m much more comfortable and accomplished with stories. More bias!
Today’s NaBloPoMo Photo Prompt: Portrait
Selfies are de facto portraits, right?
Bridges Like Roller Coasters
Postaday for May 26th: Nightmares. Describe the last nightmare you remember having. What do you think it meant?
We went to San Diego a week ago, and had occasion to drive over a bridge to Coronado. Have you seen this thing? It’s terrifying. It’s steep and narrow and when you’re on it you’re pointed at the sky. I don’t have nightmares very often, but when I do, often I’m in a car going up an impossibly steep road, over a bridge. There’s no immediate danger, but a feeling of deep dread.
I’m happy to report that while sighting that bridge at Coronado sparked memories of nightmares, the drive itself was not so bad. Nor have I had any nightmares since. Last night, I DID dream that I was late for Spanish class, but that’s silly because I haven’t been in school in 20 years and I never took Spanish. But I digress (doesn’t all dreaming digress?)
Another super duper scary bridge along these lines is the San Mateo Bridge in the Bay Area. Every time we visit the in-laws, there’s occasion to drive over this darned thing, and it gives me the willies when I’m a passenger. When I’m driving, no problem at all. Which is funny, because in the nightmare version, I’m always the one driving.
I did a quick Google search for scary bridges, but they were all “scary” due to length, width, high winds, terrible tolls, etc. None of them seemed to have that super-steep part that gives me the heebiejeebies. Maybe it’s a roller coaster thing— you know, that initial steep climb before the big plunge? I’m not the biggest fan of roller coasters, just because I find them a bit tedious. But my wife loves them, so I won’t hesitate to go on one.
She makes us stand in the longer line that you stand in so you can sit in the front car. I get why she wants to sit there, as opposed to elsewhere; she figures why waste time on waiting unless you get the best seat? But when we finally do, and I’m sitting there, and the car goes cerclunk and we start to move, I’m fine. And then we hit that first dip before the big climb, and I’m okay. And it inches up and up, and more and more of the amusement park comes visible as we keep climbing, and I look up and see there’s still a lot of track to climb, and I’m good, I am. I might be a little bit nervous, but that’s probably sympathetic, next to my giddy wife who’s practical foaming with anticipation.
And then that very top part, where we crest, and since we’re in the front car we seem to hang there for a few seconds while the weight from the rest of the cars gets redistributed, and then that click and a second of utter silence— a loud silence, since I’d forgotten I was listening to the clunk clunk clunk of the chains pulling us up. A huge silence, the breeze up here at 500 feet a cold and frosty…
And then the screaming starts. The rest is getting thrown around the roller coaster car, knocking heads with my wife, posing for the part where they take the picture. Nothing like my nightmares at all.
Orcas Truck (Photo of the Day)
NaBloPoMo Day 26: Still Life
Today’s NaBloPoMo Prompt: Tell us about the first time you held a camera.
Can’t remember. My memory’s not so good in general. How the first time I held a DSLR? Or my first DSLR? Or the first one paid for myself? Want to go back further, to my first digital camera, a big old honking Kodak that I took to a nearby swamp to photograph old abandoned fire hydrants? Back then I was using bootleg Photoshop and trying to be artsy. The only difference now is I pay for Photoshop.
My mom has been taking pictures for 50 years or so, which means there was a camera there my whole life. I’m sure the first I held a camera was very very young. Probably a Brownie Instamatic or whatever they were called. One of those black boxes with the hard edges; you’d press a button and then wind the film with your thumb.
Remember, back then, you’d have to load film with a specific IOS, there was no auto-focus, no focus at all. Nowadays, the have filters to mimic the light leaks and bokeh and other issues we’d face. Nowadays, they have whole aps dedicated to making a digital photo look like those old shots. Faded and yellow and poorly developed.
Don’t worry, I’m not being nostalgic. Or wistful. Or even a Luddite. I’m just explaining why I can’t remember the first time I held a camera.
Today’s NaBloPoMo Photo Prompt: Still Life
Another Night at Tums
Postaday for May 25th: Fill In the Blank. Three people walk into a bar . . .
Three people walk into a bar. Mary, Maria, and little Marissa, just turned 21. Three generations, none of them related. They work together at Roma, Inc, an office around the corner. The bar is called Tums. Everyone inside is more or less losing their minds. There’s sports on the TV and one of the teams has done something that has driven this after-work bar crowd wild. Mary, Maria, and Marissa glide through the chaos like cherry blossoms floating through a pre-maelstrom breeze. They arrive at the bar.
Mary, Roma Inc. VP, finance, thin as bones and skin so tight she looks like she’d bounce off of swords. Says to the bar in general, “Rum and Coke” and it appears before her, instantly.
Maria is an operations director, and she will never ever be a VP. She’s married, which isn’t the problem, but she has no kids, which is the problem. She glares at the bartender until he appears. She glares at him until he picks up a glass and a bottle of Chardonnay. She glares while he pours, glares when he sets in front of her. Glares as he backs away, slowly. Maria has curly brown hair, wears a lot of lipstick. She sips the wine with lips pursed so tight that only water molecules pull through, leaving behind the alcohol.
Marissa just started at Roma. Marissa went to college a year early, got her bachelors in two years, and decided to take a year off to back pack around Europe. She wanted to really slut it up, sleep around, experiment, just go nuts. But everywhere she went, people treated her with respect and dignity. Men we courteous, almost chivalric. She got nowhere with them. She put pictures of herself online, as a test, and was reassured when anonymous assholes unambiguously noted the dirty things they’d like to do to her. So it wasn’t her. Fine. Whatever. Came back home, got her MBA in one year, got a job, turned 21, and somehow ended up walking out after work one evening at the same time as Maria who happened to be walking out at the same time as Mary.
Marissa asks the bartender for a boilermaker. He brings her a margarita. God damn it.
Mary looks over at the other two. “I’m Mary. VP.”
Maria says “Maria. OD, been with Roma 20 years.”
Marissa says “Marissa. Just started. I have no idea what I do.”
They each sip their drinks. The bar has calmed down quite a bit. In fact, many people have left. In fact, Mary, Maria, and Marissa are the only people left. Not even the bartender is there any more. There’s a loud booming sound as the door to the bar closes. The boom echoes, then all is silent.
“Marissa, you’re young,” Mary says, like one of those questions that comes out like a statement.
“Yes,” Marissa says.
“Does this story pass the Bechdel test?”
“Uh….”
“Not anymore,” Maria says, setting down her glass. She slides off her barstool, and walks towards the door. She leaves. A soon as she does, the door opens and people walk in. The bar’s a little brighter now, and the TV’s back on.
Marissa stares into her margarita. She hates margaritas. Has hated them every since Spain, where she found the only Mexican restaurant in Madrid, and drank about a dozen of them.
Mary finishes her Rum and Coke. She stands up too. The bartender’s back, and there’s a few more people at the bar now, a few in booths. A waitress walks by, carrying a tray of chicken wings. “See you tomorrow I guess,” she says, and leaves.
Through the increasing bar noise, as more and more people are getting into the game on the TV, Marissa says “No you won’t.” It’s not cynical. It’s just that VPs work on the 12th floor, and Marissa’s stuck on three.
The bartender comes by, and without asking, sets down another margarita, and a bill for all four drinks. She picks it up, walks over to a booth where a bunch of people are going to town on some jalapeno poppers. Sets the bill down amongst their soiled napkins. Asks one where the women’s restroom is. Walks in the opposite direction when it’s pointed out to her. Leaves.
The door closes behind her, shutting out the screams and hollers of a hundred sports fans losing their god damn minds.
Save the Fairy Tale Tree (Photo of the Day)
