i’m back

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I’ve been away for a while. Not away away. Not ‘away’ as in a different location. I’ve been away from this blog. The last thing I posted was on 16 December, almost three weeks ago. I’ve been writing this blog since 2011, and this is the longest I’ve been away from it.

Why? Family crisis. I’m not going to go into any detail (partly because it’s not my story to tell, partly because it’s nobody’s business, and partly because I dislike folks who whinge online…or anywhere else, for that matter). I’m only tangentially involved in the FamCrisis (not my monkeys, not my circus); my normally calm, quiet, incredibly happy life is collateral domestic damage, so to speak. Life here has been wildly disrupted; everything is now crowded, noisy, busy, and chaotic. It’s this way, in large part, because it was calm, quiet, and happy. I mean, where else are you going to go to escape, right?

In any event, the situation hasn’t been conducive to writing. But so what? People have written under worse circumstances. And while everything is still ridiculously chaotic and rather grim (and likely to stay this way for some time), I’m starting to acclimate to it.

Even before the FamCrisis, I’d shifted away somewhat from my usual blog posting. Most of my posts over the last several years have been political. But the 2024 election left me in an absolute funk. Since the election, I’ve written more about photography than politics.

‘Annie’ was wrong; the sun ain’t coming out tomorrow. But someday…

But in a short time Comrade Donald Trump will once again infest the White House as an expression of the will of the people (the bastards). It seems pretty obvious that we’re entering into a grimdark era. Truth, decency, logic, kindness…that shit is out. Lies, grifting, loopiness, and willful cruelty will be featured in US ‘governance’ for the foreseeable future.

Ain’t no way I’m going to shut up about that. I’ll still write about photography and other stuff, of course, but I think it’s going to be necessary to call bullshit frequently and loudly in the coming months and years. So I’m back.

Editorial Note: Many/most of the problems we face are either due to or exacerbated by patriarchy. So we need to burn that shit. Burn it to the ground. Burn it, gather the ashes, douse them in oil, and burn them again. Piss on whatever is left, then salt the earth where the burning took place. Then burn the salt. Burn it and keep burning it, over and over. Burn it for generations. Then have tea and biscuits.

the curious incident of the diner at midday

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Here’s one of those photography ethics things. I was sitting in a booth in a quintessential American lunch-car diner with my camera on the table. While looking at the menu, I heard the sound of stressed voices coming from across the diner. I glanced over, saw two women who I thought had a family resemblance staring at each other. The light was nice and the scene had some drama. What to do?

  1. Mind your own business?
  2. Turn your camera on the table and shoot a quick photo without looking?
  3. Pick up your camera and photograph the situation?

Obviously, the most ethical thing to do is 1) Mind your own business. I had no idea what the situation was, it had nothing to do with me, and the two women involved would almost certainly prefer to be ignored.

But if you’ve ever practiced street photography–or if you’ve ever wanted to practice street photography–you know that people are often most interesting and most honest during emotionally charged moments. And those moments are almost always worth photographing. So some/many photographers would at least consider options 2 and 3.

You have to be a complete asshole to choose option 3; to pick up your camera and openly, deliberately invade their privacy. Option 3, however, has the dubious advantage of being honest and direct, whereas option 2 is, let’s face it, sort of underhanded. The thing about option 2–shooting without looking, without composing–is you’re allowing the fickle Gods of Photography determine if you get a decent shot or not. If the shot sucks, then it will get binned and nobody has to think about it.

If the result works as a photograph, then both options 2 and 3 set up a secondary ethics challenge: do you further violate the privacy of these two women by posting it? If you choose to post it, do you post it on a very public social media platform (like, say, BlueSky or Instagram) or on a significantly less popular platform (like, say, your blog)?

Obviously, I chose option 2. Well, sort of. I mean, it’s not like I sat there and considered all the ethical questions. I took the photograph without considering anything at all, completely unhindered by any thought process. I turned the camera on, turned it toward their table, touched the shutter release, turned the camera off, and didn’t think about it again until I got home and looked at my photos.

And hey, I got lucky. It’s a pretty good shot (in my opinion).

This is the shot in question.

Obviously, I decided to post the photos here, on my personal blog. I’ll also post links to the blog on Facebook and BlueSky. How do I justify this? I’m relying on the Men in Black defense. If you’re in a public place: don’t start nothing, won’t be nothing. If you raise voices in a public setting, the public will look at you. Sure, few of them will take your photo, but a photograph is essentially nothing more than an extended look. You don’t have a reasonable expectation of privacy in a public setting.

Another thing: I’ve no idea what these women were talking about. I don’t know if they were arguing, if they were upset with each other or with something else, if their distress was sincere or in jest, if one was distressed and the other wasn’t. I don’t know because I didn’t pay any attention to them (other than to note their voices were momentarily raised). They could have been outraged by the portions or the size of their bill, for all I know.

That said, it’s important (to me, at any rate) not to fully absolve myself. The women may not have had a reasonable expectation of privacy while talking to each other in a very public diner, but I didn’t have to pay attention to them. While I didn’t make any effort to take a good photograph, the fact remains that by taking any photograph I invaded what they probably thought of as a private moment.

Was it worth it? I don’t know. I think it’s an interesting photograph. The chance that either of them will ever see this…or that anybody they know will ever see this…are incredibly slim. I could probably legitimately make the ‘No harm, no foul’ argument. But maybe this type of photography is a social harm in and of itself. I don’t know.

Here’s the thing: I spent several years as a private investigator. Much of my work (which was primarily criminal defense investigation) involved making ethical decisions in the immediate moment–and there was rarely any obviously correct decision in those moments. So I’m used to questioning my ethics. It’s easier with photography. With photography, you can always take the shot and delete it later IF you decide it was inappropriate or unethical. In photography, you have that leeway.

Looking at the photo, I don’t think the level of tension between the two women is terribly obvious–unless you’re looking for it. I don’t think there’s any ethical reason NOT to publish it. Others may disagree, but I’m comfortable with my decision.

small love story

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I’m at the Christkindlmarket and I see this guy and his dog sitting at a table. He’s holding the dog and the dog is leaning against him. I know it sounds ridiculous, but the moment I saw them I thought, “Madonna and child.” I blame all the Christmas stuff for that. I’m not a Christian, but I’m a fan of any holiday that’s (supposed to be) about love and sharing.

Anyway, I’ve got my little Ricoh GR3X in hand as I approach them, and the guy knows why I’m coming. I could see it on his face, the recognition that I wanted to photograph his dog. And it obviously pleased him. I barely got the words out…”Would you mind if I…?” before he said, “Sure.”

The dog, though, seemed a tad uncertain, so I slowed down. Instead of the close-up I’d intended, I stayed back a bit. Instead of shifting my position to isolate the guy and his dog from other people from the frame, I stayed still. Instead of shooting 3-4 frames, I took only one. I moved slowly to take the photo.

I said something like, “He’s a wee bit shy, isn’t he.” The guy said the dog was timid around other people, which is why he’d brought him to the Christkindlmarket and why he was holding him. He wanted the dog to feel safe and protected, but he also wanted him to get used to being around other people.

I didn’t even try to pet the dog, though I wanted to. I didn’t try to shoot more photos of them, though I very much wanted to. I figured the little guy was dealing with enough already.

In the end I said something like, “You’ve got yourself a little buddy.” He said, “I sure do.” And I walked away. But seeing them together lifted my spirits–which, given the world as it is today, was quite a feat. The obvious bond between them, the care the guy was taking with the dog, the trust the dog had in the guy — it was lovely, and I was weirdly proud of them both.

I could have taken a better photograph of them. They deserve a better photo. But it might have made the dog nervous, and no photo would be worth that.

lesson learned

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I’ve had my Ricoh GR3x for a wee bit more than five months now. Long enough to be pretty familiar with it. Long enough, in fact, to get cocky with it. It’s SO fucking GOOD for shooting quickly and intuitively. So good that I’m starting to get sloppy with composition.

I’m usually pretty deliberate when I shoot photos. I know what I want in the frame, and I know what I don’t want. I’m usually conscious of where I should be standing in order to get the image I want. I’m usually patient. Usually. But I’m so comfortable with this new camera that I’m becoming less disciplined. Sometimes that’s good. Sometimes…not so much.

Here’s an example. I was walking down the street on a grey, sullen day when a burst of sunshine broke through the cloud cover, briefly illuminating a white building. I was immediately taken by the light and all of those lovely vertical lines. There was a sweet green patch of bike lane, some dead brown leaves still clinging to a tree, a guy in a hoodie waiting at the crosswalk. There was a wet patch on the sidewalk where a recycling bin had probably been sitting, and it mirrored the patch of turf in which the tree had been planted.

There were a LOT of elements and shapes all working together. So the Ricoh came out of my pocket, and I glanced at the screen, and took a snap as I walked. I mean, I didn’t even pause.

I chimped a quick look at the image without missing a step, and lawdy, I was so smug. Not so much with the image itself (it’s not a great photo) as with the way I shot it–on the move. It wasn’t until I got home and downloaded it that I realized I’d fucked up.

Cut off the top of the light pole.

It’s not a huge deal, partly because, as I said, it’s not a great photo to begin with. But it’s a reminder that speed and convenience aren’t always benefits. If I’d paused for a moment…if I’d taken a half step backward…if I’d followed one of the very basic rules of composition (check the edges of the goddamned frame), it…well, it still wouldn’t be a great photograph, but it would have been a properly composed one. I tell myself, “Self, if I’d paused I might have lost the light!” Which is true. But it’s also true that I wasn’t concerned with the light any more than I was concerned about the composition. I was only thinking about how cool it was to be able shoot that quickly and with such confidence. The confidence was misplaced.

Lesson learned.

(Maybe. Some lessons need to be learned repeatedly.)

we lost; bullshit won

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There it is. We lost. I’m not talking about Democrats, or progressives, or any particular political ideology. I’m not talking about the fact that the US has deliberately and with malice aforethought re-elected the most corrupt, ignorant, vindictive, cruel asshole who’s ever held high political office. That’s awful and horrific and it means this nation will suffer mightily and may never fully recover.

But I’m not talking about politics here. The 2024 election is, I think, just a symptom of a far greater defeat. When I say ‘we lost,’ I’m talking about thoughtful people. People who believe in science, in facts, in rationality. People who believe in critical thinking, who are capable of clear-headed skepticism. We lost.

We lost the fight against superstition and pseudo-science. We lost the war between reality and belief. We lost the war between law and disorder. We lost the war between awareness and ignorance. We lost the war between magical fantasy and empirical evidence.

Objective reality lost. Bullshit won.

Fox News won. Alternative facts won. Thoughts and prayers won. Ivermectin won. UFOs won. Crop circles won. Oak Island won. Bigfoot won. The Templars won. Magical thinking won. Apophenia won. The White Queen won (“Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.”).

It’s not just that science is under attack–you can fight back against an attack; it’s that science had been summarily dismissed as unworthy of consideration. People would rather invest themselves in exploring how Rosicrucians worked with Mayan shamans to bury Viking gold in a South Carolina swamp where ley lines between pyramids in Egypt, Mexico, and the Cahokia Mounds in Collinsville, Illinois meet than try to understand the scientific method.

The very notion of verifiable Truth has collapsed in on itself. “And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” Nope, not anymore. Who are you going to believe, the Bible or Donald Trump? Keep your Truth; we have opinions. Sure, our opinions may be based on the momentary whim of a malignant narcissist, but we have the right to hold fast to our opinions.

We lost and we are seriously fucked. Donald Trump and his Nazgûl Collective will do catastrophic damage to the US and the world at large. But sadly, he could just be the worst symptom of a larger problem. Are we on the brink of a new Dark Age? I don’t know. Maybe. We could ask the question and shake the Magic 8 Ball, but I’m afraid the answer will likely be, “Reply hazy, try again.”

clothes with history

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Okay, first: here’s a photograph shot in October of 2020 of a blue flannel shirt draped over a stairway railing. You may be wondering why I’m posting a photo of a blue flannel shirt. Patience, grasshopper.

Now, here’s me loafing on a Sunday morning, drinking coffee, scrolling through Bluesky, and I see a post by my friend Kim Denise. It’s about knitting, a subject in which I have absolutely no interest at all; something to do with ‘fingering/4-ply/sock yarn,’ whatever that means. But she’s included a delightful photo of a young girl wearing a colorful knit jacket thingy, pushing a wheelbarrow. Kim explains, “This is a long cardigan/coat I made for a young friend of mine who was four at the time. She requested a number of specific elements. She wore it for years!“

Photo by Kim Denise

I don’t know when Kim knitted that cardigan or who she knitted it for, but the child wore it for years, which means she had a history with that piece of clothing. I have a thing for clothes with history. Everybody has some item of clothing they cherish, whether they use that term or not. A shirt, a hat, a jacket, a sweater–something they’ve worn for years, something that’s comfortable or comforting, something that’s been through the wars and shows its age. Something they’ve become irrationally attached to.

For me, it’s that blue flannel shirt. In fact, I’m wearing it right now, this morning. I was wearing it when I saw Kim’s post, which is why I’m writing this blog post.

Here’s the weird thing: it’s not really my shirt at all. I didn’t buy this shirt. In 2001, when I moved from Manhattan to an old farm house in rural Pennsylvania, one of the movers accidentally left this shirt behind. Initially, I considered contacting the moving company to return the shirt. But then I discovered the movers had also walked off with my shepherd’s crook (yes, I owned a shepherd’s crook; it’s a long story) and a hand-carved mushroom-hunting stick made for me by my brother. The moving company informed me no such sticks were reported by the movers. So I kept the shirt. I’ve moved twice since then.

I don’t know how old the shirt is; it wasn’t new in 2001. Twenty-three years later, it’s getting pretty threadbare. These days I wear it exclusively around the house or to do yardwork; it’s too ratty to wear in public now. I’ve actually worn two holes in the front shirttails by fussing with them; the holes occasionally catch on doorknobs and drawer handles, jerking me to a halt. My partner sometimes teases me about the shirt; she says a hobo wouldn’t be seen wearing it.

In 2016 (photo by Sweet Jody Miller)

The shirt is soft with age now. Comfortable. I’m afraid to put it in the washing machine for fear it’ll disintegrate. A quarter of a century is long enough to turn flannel into something like gossamer. I have a history with this shirt. I have an irrational affection for it. I’ll wear it until it’s rag-worthy. But I’ll never turn it into rags. This shirt is my friend.

in which I look at an old photo (part 4)

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Okay, why am I looking at one of my old photographs? I explained all this back in May, but to recap quickly, I happened across an article on some photo website that suggested looking at and analyzing your old photos as if they were made by a different person. Although that idea strikes me as silly, I thought I’d try it.

This is me, still trying it–although, to be honest and transparent, this is also me trying like hell NOT to think about a future under Trump Unbound. So, the photo.

9:22 AM, Saturday, May 14, 2016

Okay, see that dog, barely visible in the upper left hand side of the frame? That dog was my main interest. It was Saturday morning, we were at the local farmers market (which actually has a policy discouraging dogs, but that policy is almost universally ignored, for which I’m grateful). I keep my eye out for dogs at the farmers market because dogs do unpredictable things. Unpredictable things can make good photographs. Unpredictable things in a crowd, even better.

I shot this with my cellphone, using a dedicated monochrome app (well, that’s not entirely true; it was a general photography app that I’d set up as my dedicated b&w app). So I opened the app as I approached the dog. That’s when I noticed the two couples in front of me separate so a man could pass between them. I instinctively snapped a quick frame, then went back to concentrating on the dog.

The dog apparently didn’t do anything unpredictable or interesting, because I have no other photo of that dog. Later, when I downloaded the photos, I was drawn to the photograph above, but I didn’t give it much thought. There was nothing farmers-markety about it, so it didn’t hold my attention. But I kept going back to it. There’s something about the arrangement–ten feet forming a sort of arc; eight feet walking away, two feet walking toward the viewer. Maybe it’s the balance. Or maybe it’s the implied movement, the sense of coming and going, of people fluidly making way for others. I’m sure I posted this photo online in some venue, but I’m not curious enough to track it down.

Why did I choose this photo to re-examine today? I don’t know. Maybe I picked this particular photo to look at on this particular day because it offers a hopeful metaphor. It feels like everything in the world right now is somehow going away, and I’d like to believe that at some point in the future all that ‘going away’ feeling will part and allow something good to get through.

That sounds a lot like bullshit, doesn’t it. It probably is. Like I said at the beginning, the idea of looking your old photos as if they were made by a different person seems silly. Maybe I just need a bit of silliness today.

border collies, civil war, and murder for the fun of it

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A million years ago I wanted to write a novel about border collies. I’d just published a detective novel (my first and only) and a couple of nonfiction books on detective stuff, so I was able to wrangle an invitation to spend a few days on a sheep ranch in the Appalachians. It was a wonderful and fascinating experience, and it helped clarify the story I wanted to write. I wrote the first couple of chapters over a weekend.

But the world, as Lula Pace Fortune pointed out, is wild at heart and weird on top. Stuff happened, I moved away from Washington, DC, and the manuscript ended up as a mostly-forgotten file on a thumb drive. I continued to write, but my focus became short detective fiction. Short stories are a more difficult form than novels; they require more discipline to write well, but are more elegant when they work. They also pay considerably less.

I didn’t write a lot of them, but I sold every manuscript I submitted. Well, all but one–and, of course, I like to think the editors made a mistake there. I even won an Edgar for Best Short Story in 2023. But a part of me still wanted to carve out enough time to write another novel-length manuscript. So after Mr. Poe’s head was delivered to my door, I plugged in that ancient thumb drive with the border collie story, downloaded the early partial draft, and started thinking about it.

After reading it, I decided to scrap everything–the plot, the characters, the style. I scrapped everything but the setting and the border collies. I added two sisters–one who’d left rural Appalachia to become a conflict photographer, one who’d stayed home and raised sheep. I added a Civil War diary, whose author died mysteriously after surviving the war. I added a writer for a monthly American history magazine who was interested in the diary. I added a rural community worried about the future of their Civil War memorial, a community suspicious of an outsider poking around in their past. I added an escalating plague of vandalism and racist graffiti. I added a sheriff who tries to cope with the unrest disrupting the community he loves. I added a wealthy, gentleman farmer–a relative newcomer to the community who wants to fit in. And I added townsfolk, some of whom struggle to be decent while being conflicted about their community’s racist past.

Then I killed one of them. Which brings in the State Police, whose presence isn’t entirely welcome and whose agenda differs from that of the sheriff.

It’s taken me about a year to write, edit, and revise the manuscript, but early this afternoon, I put the final period on it. Now I can relax, right? Nope. Now comes the hard part. Now I have to find the energy to start the agony and humiliation of an agent search, which is SO MUCH WORSE than writing.

You know, short fiction may be harder, it may pay poorly, but once you’re done with a short story, you send it off and forget about it. This novel business is work.