Choppy Urban Photography and Magic Writing days
The summer is neither here nor there in Berlin; The sun is hot enough to boil the oil in a parked car.
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Then it rains and brings with it a powerful electrical storm, and torrents of rain that whip and lash at the helm of life. It’s interesting.
I’ve had to choose my photography moments carefully. Most of the time I’m working on a photography book, my first, but not my first publishing experience.
I write short stories too. Longish-short stories. I’ve published one or two. I like them, that’s why I published them.
I’m always driving myself on to get to the point where I can stop writing, and begin to rewrite.
Then I edit, then the worry about what I might have missed or got wrong. It’s great fun, and it gives me a hell of stiff back.
I noticed during my writing days that the sun is dipping lower in the sky, earlier than I counted on — I’ve missed out on several good photographic opportunities.
I look out the window at 4 pm, and the shadows are already long. By the time I reach my chosen destination the streets are in the shade, and the sunlight is just about touching the rooftops. It’s Sunday and that means I should be able to do what I want, so I went out with my camera.
What’s interesting is that I spent most of my street time trying to get my mind into visual mode.
Writing puts me into a weird mixture of visual and text mode that is a world unto itself — believe me, you’d find it interesting to be inside my mind at those times. Especially if you like Magic Realism, a realm where anything can happen.
It’s taken me years to allow myself to think in terms of a world that doesn’t follow Newtons Laws of Physics. Stuff happens in my stories, my mind gallops like a horse with the bit between its teeth, and I try to ride it and control it. It’s better for a writer to let go, drop the reins and see what happens.
