switching channels

it has taken me hours to pack for the short holiday in england that starts tomorrow morning when we drive off the ferry - fifteen minutes for the personal necessities like clothes and shoes and soap and toothpaste, and ten-times-that for the spiritual ones.



i can never decide which cameras and which film to take: each combination records
each scene in its own sublime, specific manner (like these two, taken a half-turn from one another, using the nikon FE and the great wall).
looking later at the images, i am happy to have had choice.
*
have a fine week!

time let go

"direction is more important than speed. we are so busy looking at our speedometers that
we forget the milestones."
- anonymous

the camera is old.
the film is old.
and i am a year older today.
i'm just fine with all three.

by its right name

"between our birth and death we may touch understanding, as a moth brushes a window with its wing."
- christopher fry (english writer, 1907-2005)

the sadness has lifted, finally, its cumbersome heaviness hoisted high by time and love and circumstance; a tender translucence has taken its place.
this wistful weave of memory and mystery allows light in, gently, and light out, and the sheer splendour of life is visible once more.

no for an answer

adopting a homely, but working, near-giveaway polaroid camera from a local recycling centre is all well and good, but keeping it fed - with its expensive appetite - is another matter entirely. i was delighted, it follows, to discover unsaleable.com, a nice little austrian online shop with a wealth of new and expired instant film, and accessories.
they are friendly, and fast, and charge realistic shipping fees, and i have been pleased with all my purchases, so approaching them, a few months back, with a request to sponsor the europephotobloggers' amsterdam meetup in september with a few small items, seemed a excellent idea.
at the time.
i was totally unprepared, i will admit, for the curt, condescending - indeed, sarcastic - answer that i received, and surprised by the short-sightedness of it, too. i had rather expected, perhaps naïevely, that they would astutely realise the possibilities of supporting an event involving photographers from two continents, and with a projected audience of thousands of enthusiasts.
i will still buy from them - their product is excellent, as is their service - but dismay, and disappointment, will niggle.
i'm like that.
*
rachel and i have bumped into a number of brick walls as far as sponsors go.
any ideas?

when in doubt

i foraged through a profusion of images this evening, in frustrated pursuit of colour in the day's dullness,and inspiration in my own.
i found the first.
the second may need a bit more time.

a beautiful goodbye

"won't you miss her?", i am asked. "won't you worry?"
*
i will miss her, yes: of course i will. and i will worry. but i have raised her to follow her dreams, and if her dreams mean crossing oceans, and she crosses oceans, then i have done what i was meant to do.
*
mine is a mother's love.
it is as powerful, and as neverending, as tides, and time itself.

a crowning glory

"that vertical thingamabob," we asked the gentleman weeding his driehuizen
garden, "what is it called?"
(our new house - in broek op langedijk - has a perfect steeped gable, and we rather think that a typical north-holland embellishment would make it even lovelier, much to the chagrin of our children, who would prefer that we focus our attentions on buying a dishwasher.)
that's a "makelaar", he told us - in this case meaning, for some obscure reason, "the
honest division of possessions". builders, he explained, used signature spires,
representing either their own business, or symbolising the trade or profession of the
home owner himself. every curve, every angle, has a meaning.
we may need to do a bit of research.
i wonder if there's a finial for photobloggers?

the eves of distraction

jan - one of the many exceptional people i have met through the rangefinderforum - is absolutely right when he says, in a comment on an earlier image: "but enjoy some of the season before it slips into fall!"
i am aware of how neglectful i have been. i see the light at the end of the alleyway, and i see the colours; i just need to get the focus right.
i will, in the end.

from the chaos

i am not feeling particularly serene, nor particularly focused, but our old house is past tense, and our new house is present tense: it is starting to feel, sound, and smell like us.
there is equanimity in unpacked boxes, i am assured, and in tidy cupboards, so i shall unpack, and tidy, and count on an inevitable calm.

when you're having fun

our move is alarmingly imminent; i am going to have neither the hours nor the inclination to update here until we are settled into there.
it's time, i think, to hang out the "moving house" sign, but i couldn't find one of those,
so a "gone fishing" sign will have to do.