I get to travel a lot for my job. So I take my camera along for drive-by photography. It seems to me that the economy in Louisiana moves East and West along I-20 and I-10. And I live in Central Louisiana. One of the recurring themes in these photographs is decaying buildings. I don’t go out of the way to find them, I have to go out of my why to find new construction. One of the things I like to imagine is what these buildings were like in their prime, with people bustling in an out of them. What kind of clothes did they wear? How did they talk? What did they eat for lunch?
I imagine this was once a thriving little grocery store. The painting makes the pain worse for me: It is fake.I thought this man was interesting. He was shuffling material from one medical building to another across the street. The crack in my windshield somehow makes this picture better. The kind of obscure photograph that you imagine a special agent gets on those old detective radio shows.Cows have a special place in my heart.“These cars always reminded me of fighter planes.” That’s what the man driving one told me once at a gas station 20 years ago. His was green though.I wonder what kind of art is produced here. I like that old chair.Something about the colors on this building speaks to me.It was exhilarating being this close to a train.This is probably my favorite picture from this week. I love this time of the morning. I imagine this is a scene from a book that you can’t put down.I love these little lizards. Anything that eats bugs can hang around my house.Name the title of the book that this could be the dust jacket for. That’s the kind of thing I think about when I am composing a shot. Another good cover for a book about a haunted house.
I think that it is healthy to have hobbies or areas of interest.
I just finished reading A Hunter’s Fireside Book: Tales of Dogs, Ducks, Birds & Guns by Gene Hill. If you were not aware, I am not a hunter, but I appreciate good writing no matter the subject-within reason of course. Good writing can make even the most boring pastime seem interesting. While I don’t necessarily think hunting boring, I do think Gene Hill was a good writer. And I really enjoyed the book. This book was a collection of columns he wrote for various outdoor magazines in the 60s and 70s. I can understand how readers felt when they got a new magazine and turned straight to where they knew his column could be found. He finished his career as full-time columnist for Field & Stream magazine. He died in 1997. All of this reminded me of how much magazines used to be a part of my life.
Zach had a big pile of second hand Field & Stream magazines that he procured from the thrift store. I used to read them too, and I didn’t really care for hunting or fishing then either. But the stories were interesting. And so were the ads. We’d stare at those rifles. Or think of how much fun we could have with one of those 6 wheeled amphibious ATVs in the tiny black and white ad spots in the very back of the magazine.
There was another author that wrote a lot for Field & Stream, Patrick McManus. We had some of his books, but those second hand magazines from his era would’ve been worn out a long time before they could be found by a country boy at a thrift store.
Every once in a while Mom would buy us a bunch of National Geographic magazines from the thrift store or a yard sale. We even had a subscription on and off throughout my life. I loved those old magazines. The pictures were so interesting that you wanted to read the articles. I still want to go to see some of the places that I discovered reading those old yellow magazines; Angkor Wat, Easter Island, New Guinea, Hong Kong, India…Steve McCurry and Rudyard Kipling have taken me to India so many times that I would like to go in person some day. The advertisements in National Geographic were quite a bit different than the ads in Field & Stream. I distinctly remember the Rolex (specifically the Milgauss) and Canon ads. It was also interesting to see ads for new cars that you had only ever known as old.
Mom subscribed to Traditional Home. Those ads made me realize that we were in fact, poor. But I loved looking at the floor plans of those high dollar houses. That magazine also gave me an appreciation for interior design. It is hard to condense 15 years of reading a decorating and design magazine into a single sentence or even paragraph other than to say that poor design choices still bother me.
I guess the only guitar magazine that I have ever subscribed to was Premier Guitar. For the longest time I liked them because they never had people on the cover, just guitars. That changed when BB King died. I have stopped subscribing because I think the editor is a smart alec. Even so, whenever a new guitar student asked me a question about say, what a phaser pedal does, I have to work hard to keep from giving them a 5 page report with works cited and audio clips because they really want a brief AI answer, not a research paper, or even a magazine article.
I think that it is healthy to have hobbies or areas of interest.
Magazines were how I discovered a lot of things, like how to identify a quality piece of furniture. And where I learned a lot of guitar and gardening techniques. I started eating honey and gorgonzola cheese on crackers because I read it in a magazine. I learned how to intonate guitars and marinate grouse in magazines. I still haven’t marinated any grouse though, but I can intonate your guitar for $45 if you’re in the Jena area.
Some magazines would print corrections from previous articles. I liked that. I like it when things are made right. It also was a good reminder that real people worked to put together the magazine. I also liked that more than likely a reader caught the mistake. Sometimes a magazine would post a letter from a reader and it was as interesting to read as one of the regular staff writers. What a cool career writing for a magazine would be.
Superman could’ve picked any job he wanted as a cover, but he picked journalism.
I suppose that some people still subscribe to magazines, but I’m not sure who they are. I imagine that your social media algorithm is a good representation of what your magazine rack might’ve looked like 40 years ago. One nice thing about that is information is more readily available. I’m not sure that social media can quite replicate the feeling of seeing a magazine in the mailbox.
They happen so fast; wrecks. In the blink of an eye, one careless motion can change someone’s entire life.
I got behind a UPS truck pulling doubles this morning on the way to work. Ordinarily I would have passed him, but after watching him weave back forth into the fast lane and then all the way onto the opposite shoulder a few times I decided it would be prudent to follow a good way behind until the interstate widened to three lanes. These are the kind of drivers that cause accidents. After a while I watched the truck driver run merge into another lane, running a pickup truck off the road and onto the shoulder. I blew the horn because I felt I needed to do something. It could have been a nasty wreck.
They happen so fast; wrecks. In the blink of an eye, one careless motion can change someone’s entire life. In the time it takes to check a text message someone could brake check you and you’ll be checked out for good.
It is rare that I do not see at least one accident per week on my commute. I have spent hours parked on the interstate behind countless accidents, making me late for work, and more importantly late for home. In April of 2019, I was late for work because of a wreck in Birmingham. As we crawled past the scene I snapped a quick picture with my phone, mainly as evidence for being late. When I finally got to work and had a chance to look at it I was struck by how powerful the image was. Since then, I’ve tried to capture a photograph of every wreck I’ve seen. I’ve captured quite a few over the past year, but I don’t even get half of them. Sometimes it just isn’t safe to try take a picture.
My first wreck photograph. I’ve often wondered about that phone conversation.
It is easy to forget that an inconvenience in schedule for thousands may be fatal for one. While someone is furious about being late to a place that they would rather not go, someone else will never get to speak to a loved one again. I try to think about this when I see a wreck.
I share all of the wreck photos on Instagram. They don’t get a ton of likes. I think because people may feel uncomfortable liking such horrible subject matter. Nevertheless, whenever I meet one of my social media friends in person they always bring up the wreck pictures. It is human nature to want to gawk at calamity, that’s why we rubberneck on the highway, even if we don’t smile about it.
I’m not sure how you look at art, but I like to imagine what is going in the picture. These images all tell a story.
I had a flat on the way home from work. I hope that this is the only time I’m ever featured on Wrecks of the Week.
You can find more wrecks of the week on my Instagram account. As always, thank you for your support.
Mostly From Memory 