Dyke March

When I first saw this picture, I thought, wow, none of my other photographers has ever zoomed in like that before!

Then I realized, doh, it was me—just before this I’d zoomed in to get a picture of the pink Portajanes & forgot to zoom back out.

Summer Solstice farmers market

Today’s photographer at first seemed not so thrilled to be asked, but he warmed to the task. Maybe he was having a hunger fit or something; I found him in line for Flacos. A few moments later as I was getting in my car I saw him again, food in hand, & he gave me a much more cheerful smile.

After that, I went & had a spectacular waterfight with two of my old college pals & their daughters. We managed to wash two cars in the process & an excellent time was had by all. Perfect way to celebrate a scorching solstice!

The curious photographer

I was so engrossed with the fruits & veggies that I forgot about finding a photographer until I was just about to leave the farmers market. Luckily, here he came, wheeling his bike along. I asked for the picture, & instead of simply pausing & holding my camera with his one free hand, he put his bike over to the side—a sign of Taking Photography Seriously.

Just then, a man with a baby asked him about the rack on his bike. He answered the question & then, making a sort of move-closer-together corralling gesture, asked, So do you want to be in the picture together?

Oh, I laughed, we don’t know each other! We just both happened to want to talk to you at the same time.

(I think that’s the man & baby’s shadow in the picture.)

He took the picture & then, wonder of wonders, asked what I wanted the picture for! People, this is the FIRST one out of over 40 Camera Shy photographers to ask me this as a direct question.

Surprised, I answered, It’s an art project.

What kind of art project?

Somewhat dumbfounded, I said, Wow, you’re the first person to ask me! & explained it to him.

Turns out he is a photographer who is interested in telling stories. He moved here from San Diego, where, he says, he never ran into anybody doing interesting art projects like mine. We had a nice conversation & exchanged cards, & he’s almost certainly gonna read this, which feels quite novel. Really, it took so long for this to happen that I’d almost forgotten it was a possibility.

Nice to meet you, Rishi!

Cartoon mural

I pass by this goofy mural once a month, & today all forces aligned to give me a picture of it: I’d zipped across the bridge in record time & found parking closer than ever before, which made me so early that I actually had a few minutes to kill… & then here came the photographer walking down the street at just the right moment.

She looked like she could be either Latina or Pilipina, so based on a ghost of a shadow of a hunch, I’ll just say she was Pilipina, what the hell.

Kara’s Cupcakes

Happy Malcolm X’s Birthday!

I lived many, many years on this earth before I finally figured out that I actually like looking at cupcakes more than I like eating them. You understand why I may have been a bit slow on the uptake; it’s just not normal.

I also like graphic representations of cupcakes, apparently, enough to impulsively toss aside all consideration of light & shadow. However, it’s interesting to me that this is the first shot (of this project) in which you can see the photographer—dimly, as a reflection between the cupcake & me.

I felt that purse strap falling down just as she snapped the picture.

This may well be the first blog post in the history of the net to mention Malcolm X & cupcakes almost in the same breath. Welcome to my world.

Temescal farmers market

One of my zucchini seedlings met a bad end. No crying over spilled milk; I ran over to the Temescal Farmers Market to fetch a replacement from Kassenhoff. Things were a bit off-kilter there as the whole market had been moved across the creek to a different section of the DMV parking lot, & I wandered around looking for the Kassenhoff booth until I realized they simply weren’t there today. Maybe they were scared off by the back-to-winter, rain & hail weather forecast?

I did get the first peaches of the season though! & I liked having the market under the trees for a change.

My photographer snapped away with casual abandon, saying, oh, one more for good measure—it’s digital, right?

Shadowshop pickup

I almost didn’t post the first image, but, you know: The Rules.

Today’s photographer wins the prize for Most Earnest Effort. He obviously knew his way around digital cameras; first he said, oh, it’s in macro mode. After that, he zoomed into one of the shots & shook his head disapprovingly at the fuzziness of the image. Knowing that I was going to scale it down, I told him it was okay, but he took another shot anyway. He noted that the light was not great in that part of the museum lobby; I happened to be sitting in the shadow of a column. He moved around trying to get a better angle as I laughed in embarrassment & apologized for getting him into such a complicated & difficult thing.

I was still apologizing & thanking him when his girlfriend(?) came back from the bathroom(?). He was very gracious about the whole thing & seemed wholeheartedly invested in giving me the best possible picture. He explained that his hands shake, but his camera is heavy, so he doesn’t have that problem with it.

I wonder if he was a Real Photographer?! He kinda acted like one….

Anyway, why I wanted my picture there in the first place was that I was picking up my unsold stuff from Shadowshop & had just found out that I, excuse my French, made fucking bank on the whole endeavor—mostly from $1 pencils!—& thought it would be nice to document my happy moment. Besides, I had documented the dropoff back in October, so why not bookend with the pickup?

Friday night

I treat Whole Foods as my corner store, so when dinnertime rolled around with nary a drop of olive oil in the house, I ran down there to fetch some.

The students in front of me were buying fennel & spinach; the checker was possibly new, or bad at memorization, or unfamiliar with produce (or all three, or none of the above, what do I know), & had to ask his coworker at the next checkstand for the codes.

Fennel-buying guy asked, as if thinking of it for the first time, “Wow, you have to memorize a number for every vegetable?”

The checker nodded, fennel guy reacted with amazement, & I chimed in, “Isn’t that crazy? I’ve always thought that must be so hard to remember all those codes, & then it’s even worse at the Bowl, where there’s a zillion fruits….”

“Where?”

“At the Bowl….” Noting his blank face, I clarified, “...the Berkeley Bowl.”

“Is that another store?”

Fixing him with a grave stare, I said, “You need to check it out.”

As if he’s gonna listen to me.

Flavors of the Day, Ici

I actually interrupted two women in conversation on the bench outside of Ici. How far will I go in the name of art?! I think not that far again, anytime soon.

Too bad you can’t see the detail on the beautiful envelope I’m holding from my pen pal. (Yes I have a pen pal!)

No, that’s not my bike.

Richmond BART

Bright & early this morning, I drove a friend to Kaiser Richmond for an Unpleasant Procedure. I had a good chunk of time after bringing her in, so, naturally, I went out for a walk.

Right away, shiny signs pointed the way to BART. For all my years riding the Richmond line, I’d never seen the Richmond station, so I followed the signs past the Hacienda Grill & a beautiful old deco post office, & then through a new-looking affordable-housing village. When I came to the station, it, too, looked surprisingly new—freshly remodeled in the shape of a ship, to evoke the WWII shipyards that transformed Richmond.

All surfaces gleamed as if just painted, & in fact the parking lot was still very much under construction. I thought a picture including both the shiny ship station & the parking lot construction would be nice, but the light was all wrong for that, & my potential photographer for that shot turned out to have not just a phone in one hand, but a cigarette in the other.

There was hardly anyone around; we were between trains. Fortunately Photographer #2, a bored kid with a skateboard, was standing in the right place for a parking lot shot. I could not get a good read on his ethnicity, but “Middle Eastern” would seem to cover it. (Many competing ideas & acronyms exist for naming that region of the world; SWANA appears to have gained some traction but I never hear it in casual conversation, even in the PC crowd I run with.)

I wondered why he turned the camera vertical. Because I asked for a photo of myself & I’m vertical? I’d sort of hoped for a wide horizontal shot that would include part of the housing complex, but that wasn’t the moment to change my rule about letting photographers compose their own shots.

After that, I wandered further, eyes peeled for the Chinese restaurant that I knew must be nearby. I found it.