"...th story you piece together, you piece together alone"
unlike "th bard of tysoe" here in th comments, you did [do] have me in tears, jon. i think you know how i feel about photography in general. magnify that x 1000 uptobojillion for photos of my family!
what a wonderful photo of your papa! what wonderful words.
you are such a good writer + photographer, jon. truly! have you ever considered pairing your [family (only?] photos + your words together in books [ ie : https://www.shutterfly.com ]? what a good way to make things easier in th future + more slowly turning to dust.
thank you for sharing, jon.
xx
.....
"there’s an entire world caught in th 1/250th of a second that th shutter is open -- not just what’s visible, but everything that surrounds it, everything that came before + after, th whole gravitational field of a life pressing against that thin slice of light...
every version of th story you piece together, you piece together alone...
you’ve been almost there, with this photograph, more times than you can count...
yet you never quite arrive...
that’s th thing about photographs : they promise a destination al+ deliver only a direction. you look, + th looking opens into more looking, + th questions multiply rather than resolve. a journey with no fixed end. which is probably right. which is probably, in some way you’re still working out, th point...
there’s a weight to photographing the people you love that you only fully understand later. in th act of taking th picture, you’re beginning a story you won’t live to finish..."
Thank you Karen. I’m genuinely touched by how encouraging and sportive you are of my melancholic snaps and scribbles. I’ve not thought of doing anything like that really. I don’t think anyone would be that interested.
You almost had me in tears there, thinking of similar images of my mum and dad. It would have been my partner’s mum’s 90th birthday today; and her dad is our only surviving parent at very nearly 93 (hanging on, he says, until all his grandchildren are born… – and a third one due very soon) – a day for considering so many issues concerning mortality.
It is not the photographs I worry about so much as the voice recordings. But I won’t be here to care, then. It’s taken me a long time to be so (relatively) placid about such things, though.
“All go unto one place; all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again.”
PS: Meant to say that it’s the Windrush at Bourton-on-the-Water. I recognized the bridge in the background. (Sorry to uproot your uncertainties.)
Brilliant! Thank you!
"...th story you piece together, you piece together alone"
unlike "th bard of tysoe" here in th comments, you did [do] have me in tears, jon. i think you know how i feel about photography in general. magnify that x 1000 uptobojillion for photos of my family!
what a wonderful photo of your papa! what wonderful words.
you are such a good writer + photographer, jon. truly! have you ever considered pairing your [family (only?] photos + your words together in books [ ie : https://www.shutterfly.com ]? what a good way to make things easier in th future + more slowly turning to dust.
thank you for sharing, jon.
xx
.....
"there’s an entire world caught in th 1/250th of a second that th shutter is open -- not just what’s visible, but everything that surrounds it, everything that came before + after, th whole gravitational field of a life pressing against that thin slice of light...
every version of th story you piece together, you piece together alone...
you’ve been almost there, with this photograph, more times than you can count...
yet you never quite arrive...
that’s th thing about photographs : they promise a destination al+ deliver only a direction. you look, + th looking opens into more looking, + th questions multiply rather than resolve. a journey with no fixed end. which is probably right. which is probably, in some way you’re still working out, th point...
there’s a weight to photographing the people you love that you only fully understand later. in th act of taking th picture, you’re beginning a story you won’t live to finish..."
Thank you Karen. I’m genuinely touched by how encouraging and sportive you are of my melancholic snaps and scribbles. I’ve not thought of doing anything like that really. I don’t think anyone would be that interested.
You almost had me in tears there, thinking of similar images of my mum and dad. It would have been my partner’s mum’s 90th birthday today; and her dad is our only surviving parent at very nearly 93 (hanging on, he says, until all his grandchildren are born… – and a third one due very soon) – a day for considering so many issues concerning mortality.
It is not the photographs I worry about so much as the voice recordings. But I won’t be here to care, then. It’s taken me a long time to be so (relatively) placid about such things, though.
“All go unto one place; all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again.”
My father would probably be more concerned about the voices too. He was a hobbyist historian and particularly fascinated by oral history.
Your note made me chuckle because it made me think of how my father was the historian, my mother the diarist, and I was the dreamer.