Category: photography

Old Young Men

Aging requires courage, stamina and emotional self-control. So many myths exist from the past when people stopped living in their 40’s, errr 50’s, errrr 60’s. Now, healthier and smarter, we live longer, not just exist longer. And we look better.

BRIEN

Brien makes art, smart art. He draws, sculpts and creates where nothing has been and nothing will remain.

CROCKER

Pastor Crocker saves souls, or at least makes having one more understandable. He’s a budding photographer.

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And, Wight Manning. Re-enactor, historian, antiquarian. He collects paraphernalia, wears it and sells it.

Kevin and Vermont Special Olympics

So, I go down to the beach or the waterfront or Church Street with my camera and a lighting kit. Need to keep up my skills, looking, seeing, shooting. Oh, how I cannot deal with people telling me they have cameras or relatives with cameras or cell phones. They don’t understand portraits, posing or the importance of having a photograph, taken in ernest.

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These two people walk by where I sit with my friend Jim and we start to talk. Kevin wants to take a walk. They will talk about whether to accept my offer to shoot his photo.

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Kevin returns. Agrees to the shoot. And we talk. Seems he is a world class Bocce player who will be competing in the Special Olympics in Vermont this weekend. So, I sign up, volunteering to photograph whatever they need shot, knowing they have lots of shooters ahead of me, including the press.

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Now, I have to sort through 1,500 images, shots one more beautiful than the next. What a wonderful experience Kevin shared with me and I don’t even know his last name, where he lives or much about him.

Foggy Morning

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Chasing the sun brought great results today. Sometime you work for the shots. Sometime you just point the camera. Looked out the window. Couldn’t see the street. Washed my face, brushed my teeth. By the time I hit the street, the light had come up, but the fog hadn’t lifted. I could feel the wet in my face and smell the morning moisture.

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Clouds covered the sun, just enough to rob the scene of its yellow. Birds screamed, unable to see their morning breakfast through the mist. Good day, if you were a fish.

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Magic everywhere. Still a there, there. Clouds with nowhere to go. No wind pushing them. No waves or flutter. Water gently lapping up against the pier. It wasn’t cold and it wasn’t hot.

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The sailor doesn’t care. He waits and watches. One day his boat will come. Already packed for the sea.

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Burlington arises.

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Free Cornbread: Burlington VT’s Political Prisoner or Drug Dealer?

Free Angela was a cry from my day. Hunted because of her connections to the civil rights movement and the Black Panthers, this crusader for the rights of blacks and women has reemerged as the subject of a documentary, “Free Angela and All Political Prisoners.”  Without going into the details, she was charged with the kidnapping and murder/kidnapping of a judge, a prosecutor and a juror. Arrested after appearing on the FBI’s 10 most wanted list, she was put in segregation.Unable to make bail, she sat in jail for 18 months. A nationwide movement to Free Angela saw people wearing buttons and carrying signs, demonstrating to protest her incarceration. She became a symbol for people being held as political prisoners. Acquitted after trial, she taught college, wrote books (Are Prisons Obsolete) and, at present, leads a movement to end the prison industrial complex.

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Not in a position to go one way or the other with Cornbread, because all I know is what I read in the papers. Had a client once who contended he, too, was a political prisoner. Didn’t see the connection between either of them and Angela Davis. Only took $100,00 to free her. He is held on $5,000 which should not be too hard to come up with, if they can make the same case for him they made for her. He was supposedly an outspoken rapper, whose notoriety and presence on the UVM campus could have made him a target. I was just surprised to see this poster on a column near the fishing pier. Not a heavily trafficked place where you’d expect a movement to start or meet. If it is just about being a crack dealer, a charge he denies, then he is a political prisoner for sure.

Bernard Not a Yankee Fan

 

Don’t usually shoot people wearing hats. Got my friend McQuade to hold the reflector. Never shot Bernard. My shoot loosener fell flat. “Not a good day for the Yankees. Old. Injured. And they lost.” “I don’t follow baseball,” he said.


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Tough to work alone. When one of my guys finds the light, it makes them smile. All my photos become a bigger collaboration with the people I shoot.

Chad

 

Chad sporting a Prince Valliant look.

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Scotty has his pouch.

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Amy received a certificate for attending a Peer Emotional Counselling Program.

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New girl in town.

McCaffrey’s Service Center in Burlington VT

 

So, here is a crew that cares for cars. Most of us don’t know squat about our cars anymore. To care for the car, owners need to learn, understand and trust. Then you got to be responsible. Cannot just go from gas station to gas station, forgetting about the pipes, tubes and tires. I lost at least one much loved car to bad service. Never again.

 

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