La Nostalgie

I like to take pictures. In weaker moments, I sometimes even call them photographs. But the reality is, I take a LOT of pictures and all but a few are average or below, and maybe 1% qualify as "good". To provide some sense of scale, I can actually think of all the pictures I've ever taken that I consider good. And since I'm hardly unbiased, divide that number by 10 and you might end up with a few actually decent photographs. My point -- and you need to understand this to properly digest what I want to convey -- is that some of us can make photographs, and some of us just get lucky enough to occassionally capture them. I'm in the latter group.

At some point in my twenties, it was either made clear to me, or I realised, that I needed to get the car posters off my walls (or at least frame them, which led to the same result). In their place, I chose what I thought were the three best pictures I had ever taken. They are now professionally printed, framed, and somewhere in storage.

One is of a church tower in Spain, seen reflected in the water of the fountain at its base. Cliche, but with wonderful, warm blues and oranges. I took that one while traveling in Spain and Portugal with Ian the summer before our semester in Paris.

One is from Venice: a very lucky black and white shot down a narrow canal, with the sun creating beams that shine in the air and reflect off the water. That one came just after the friend I was traveling with through Europe after high school hightailed it, leaving me da solo.

And the third is of a bridge over the Seine in Paris. To be honest, I don't remember the context well. Which suggests that I was probably on a Sunday walk, trying to shake off the effects of a Saturday night spent "wine tasting." (Translate and amplify as appropriate for a 20 year old student in Paris.) What I do recall is that it was very early in the morning. Before the internet, if I woke up before a sane hour (which happens more often than I care to admit), I'd sometimes venture out just to see what the world was like that early in the day. (Still do, though I've gotten better at grabbing those extra hours of sleep.)

Whatever the story, I ended up with something I still treasure, if not for the art, then for the emotion it evokes. And yeah, it's actually a damn good picture. The exposure is perfect. Jet black to snow white. The composition is faultless. And it evokes real emotion. No cars, no people. Just a bridge, glistening with recent rainfall, and with a bit of haze still in the air. It's obviously early morning, it's obviously winter, and it's as if there are two lovers waiting off camera to come in for their posed kiss. And thanks to the fact that it was 35mm film, there's a bit of grain to drive home the reality.

Well, last weekend, I went to Paris to meet our best family friends. It was a wonderful weekend: dinner at a crowded, boisterous bistro, Sunday spent wallking through falling golden leaves, watching petanque, sitting and dining in perfectly Parisien cafes, etc. And along the way, we stumbled on to that very same bridge.

I could never have found it again if I had tried, but as soon as we approached it, I recognised it.

So, that's it up there. Digital, in color, with traffic. None of the elements match, but it still felt like bumping into an old friend whose face you have almost, but not quite, forgotten.

Thanks for indulging me.