A short note about taking pictures.
For the hundredth times, I will never get bored saying this to myself:
— I should journal more often.
I will keep lying to myself. Hoping that maybe, someday, it’ll be true.
Just a side note.
— -
I remembered having this conversation with a friend about photography. He had a polaroid camera. He had a habit of taking group pictures whenever he felt a moment is significant. Back then, I wasn’t keen on taking pictures of any moments. My view was, that your life experiences, your significant moments are deeply personal and thus should just be felt as it is. Breathe them, savor them, taste every inch of them, ONLY at that moment. Don’t be distracted by the fact that you’ll be forgetting it later on, and thus the need to excessively take photos. I kept that idealistic view for a while through half of my university days. It backfired. Now I am kind of regretting the fact that I didn’t have pictures to reminisce. I regret the fact that, by not taking pictures, I lost access to my memories. Even the simplest, low quality, noisy photo could rekindle what you felt in that specific moment.
Who knows what treasure is hidden in my messy subconscious and it’s only recent that I fully understood why people felt the need for taking pictures. Pictures are like doors. A simple picture of yourself in a park, sitting in a sandbox, smiling to the camera can open a room of feelings and sensations, and maybe make way for new discoveries. A few examples:
— I almost forgot that I had a really cool childhood friend back then.
— Of course! I lost that watch in the sandbox.
— Maybe I should stop expecting too much of myself. I used to be sooo happy doing simple things.
— -
I found out that I am drawn to photos and videos with analog film tones. Whenever I look at them, I just get this intense surge of nostalgia, of soft melancholy. It’s addictive. We tend to distort our memories, and I love distorting it that way.
There’s this book called M Train by Patti Smith, aside from the fact that I’m enjoying this well written memoir, I’m surprised by how powerful a picture can drive a story. Her accounts, would be less gripping without the polaroid pictures she took along her odyssey (the synopsis used that word, and I like it). The pictures guided me. They set the stage and the atmosphere.
I should start checking out photography books. Investigate it, find stories within it. Deduce the Waldo (I couldn’t think of a better analogy), within the picture. Get better at capturing these stories, and then maybe, I would stop losing too many memories.
In my dorm room in Rennes
14/05/2022
