garrison beau scott

regarding the last post.

i went with the safe choice. i didn’t throw the tantrum or play the dictatorial card. i hope i’m proven wrong. thanks to all for the advice.

not nearly as destructive as some other influences, but right now, the passion and it’s grip on what i think is right and what others think is right, hence the conflict, is doing it’s fair share of damage.

the vessel in which this conflict exists is mine, i dreamt it, built it, but admittedly had some help, and as such, it’s taken on a grander form than what it would have been had i kept it to myself.

so what is to be done, when 2 people with a similar stake have extremely conflicting views? how to resolve an argument of opinion when the outcome can’t so easily fall into the “let’s agree to disagree” category? unfortunately this isn’t a case of coke or pepsi, a decision has to be made one way or the other and whatever that is, one person will be happy and the other, not.

ultimately, should i want to play the card, i could throw it down and state my preference and be done with it. though i’ve never been one to take the dictatorial route, it is alluring. i could also take the other path and acquiesce, make peace and hope i was wrong all along.

i’ve asked advice on this from a wide range of people, some familiar with this particular issue and some not. while their answers have been helpful, they haven’t been unanimous. that is, i’m still in the same spot as i was last night.

the one thing i continue to hear though, is that despite the experience, despite the list of pros and cons, everyone deserves a chance. and the last thing i want to do is see this all the way to the end, having given in to the other option, and be proven right.

so what it boils down to is, which damned to i take, the one tied to “if you do” or the one tied to “if you don’t?”

Man…I remember it as if it were yesterday, even though it was over 11 years ago. Damn.

But I suppose if you had every nerve ending hooked up to a lightning bolt and decided to stand in a puddle of water, you’d remember that feeling a hundred years later.

As a photographer making my first trip to the city, that’s kind of what it felt like. It’s very cool for me to look at the proof sheets from that glorious week I spent there, and re-live the stories and the sequence of events that led from one picture to another.

I had just resurfaced after a ride on the subway and was getting my bearings when I felt a rush of urgency push past me. It was one of those things where you look, too late, behind you, as that’s where the push had come from, but the energy was moving too fast to see it, so you had to look around to find what it was that lit your senses up. When I turned around, I found this guy.

Forget about getting my bearings, this guy was my bearings, my compass, my path for as long as it took. I caught up to him after a half block or so and tried to match his pace without being noticed. It was hard not to get distracted by how cool he was, by how his attitude poured out of his creepers, shot out of his cigarette, creating a wake that washed over the litter of New York’s streets. He owned the fuckin’ place. At least he acted like he did, and I was a believer.

The thing about shooting people when they’re walking, and don’t know you’re trying to get a picture, is to capture them just as their legs have hit the longest part of the stride, anything else looks like they’re dancing, standing on one leg, or about to tip over. That’s what makes this shot work, other than the coolness quotient being blown to Mars courtesy of the subject. I just got lucky there was a complimentary shadow provided by a parked car to balance things out. Not to mention the Bud sign in the upper right corner. You think this guy drinks wine coolers?

After I got the shot, I sped up and walked past him, just wanting to see who he was. And as I was passing him, I looked down into his left hand and saw that he had a copy of the Village Voice in his hand.

I wonder if he got the gig.

Survival. If you want a prime example I guess you could travel to the Gobi Desert, or the Arctic Circle, or maybe even to the Galapagos Islands and find some amazing example of a living thing surviving against all odds.

Or you could go to New York City and study some of the trees that carve out a meager existence among all the concrete.

I’ve said it here before, but it bears repeating, I love to walk. Especially in a new city. And in the summer of 1996, New York was a new town for me and my camera. So often I’d get caught up in how much was above me. The sheer size of this city that exists above our heads is overwhelming. But more often than not, what makes this place so incredibly amazing are the people who are walking along side you. Fortunately in my doe-eyed wonder at being in the Apple for the first time, and gazing skyward at all the scrapers, I never bumped into any of the city’s inhabitants.

However, I did manage to look down every so often at the right time to witness the beauty and diversity of the population, summed up here in the best way I could manage. Granted, in a 125th of a second it’s hard to get a definitive read on a person, let alone two, but I think there are enough visual clues to start putting together a list of what makes them as different as night and day.