week of the polaroid

above: a few of my contributions to the beautiful pool that is/was spring 'roid week 2016. tenth anniversary of the flickr group! tenth! so, I'm not going to get into a whole thing about time here but, time. is a crazy thing.

should you need to see more, all my polaroids from last week are here, my favorites from the week (from fellow instant photogs) are here and the whole pool of instant goodness is here. long live 'roid week, y'all. long live instant film.

april's sixty seconds

I will want to climb inside this little film and live, from time to time. I won't be able to, but I will want to.

here's hoping some wonderful weirdo somewhere will invent exactly this kind of portal.


p.s. more wonderful little films over at the sixty second photograph, a project I've been participating in since the beginning of the year)

p.p.s. major (and I mean MAJOR) bonus points if you can tell me which film the music is from.

prince forever

preteen saturday nights, 1999 on little white casio boomboxes. cheerleading routines that begin with dearly beloved, nervously performed underneath fluorescent lights during junior high basketball games. small town saturday night junior high dances, lavender sweaters with puffy sleeves and faded guess jeans. I would die 4 U and 13 year-olds who feel like they could dance forever, live forever. 

post-football game friday nights, beth's house. under the cherry moon on cassette tape, blackest eyeliner, frostiest lip gloss, phone calls from boys, multiple so many phone calls from boys. new position over and over, again and again and again.  anotherloverholenyohead screamed out car windows, 15 year-old girls who feel like they could sing forever, live forever. 

late monday night drives in old white datsuns through cincinnati streets with cute college boys. mix tapes with extended versions of prince songs, endless forever rarest of rare extended versions. college boys who play phantom keyboards on navy blue dashboards with one hand and drive with the other while you pretend to like clove cigarettes. cute college boys who turn into boyfriends who turn into husbands who end up as best friends. adore on repeat during early dating days, adore on repeat during newly wedded days, adore on repeat through all the in between days, adore on repeat for always. 19 year-olds, 21 year-olds who feel like they could love forever, totally, forever and ever.

sweaty tuesday nights at star bar, dj romeo cologne and the sounds of early prince, rushes of sweaty, happy people onto tiny dance floors, 27 year-olds who feel like they could probably dance forever, live forever. sweaty sunday afternoons at dancespace on sixth avenue, alexandra beller's class and the sounds of new-ish prince, rushes of sweaty, happy people across generous wooden floors, 33 year-olds who feel like they could probably dance forever, maybe live forever. or, at least until the end of the song.

rainy thursday night drives into the city with your best friend for purple rain tickets. when nothing else can be done. prince on the radio, the internet, in the newspapers, on your phone, in your texts, for all the wrong reasons. prince in the news when you wish he wasn't. starfish and coffee as loud as it will go, feet on the dash, fingers interlaced. 45 year-olds, 47 year-olds who wish prince could live forever, know that he can't. wish they could be young forever, know that they can't.

RIP sweet prince. singer of the soundtrack of my life. you will be so sorely, so terribly missed.

march's five

(one)

(two)

(three)

(four)

(five)
one: ezra. plus imagined wall of preteen brain circuitry. 

two: the yearly dying of the eggs. not pictured: the dying of the ends of their hair. 

three: popcorn, early stages. 

four: ava, bunny ears. killing me. 

five: easter sunday dinner. not pictured: a bucket of KFC but with homemade mashed potatoes on the side. we are not fancy. 

(five favorite frames from march, five favorite frames each month) (thanks for the inspiration, xanthe)

not one thing

hello internet, on this monday afternoon I present you drop-in-the-bucket evidence of a well-loved film--the now discontinued fuji FP 100C.

no matter what happens to the film, at least I have these. and others. and the last two packs sitting in the fridge. and doc's vaguely hopeful travelogue updates over at savepackfilm.net.

and, the experience of holding that beastly polaroid automatic 100 in my hands, the 250 too. of anne teaching me how to load it with film, how to shoot it. the 1, 2, 3 muscle memory pack film cameras require: press the shutter, click the lever, pull. and then the dance that follows: cross your fingers, hold and count. wait for the right moment then slowly peel that gooey, chemical magic apart for the big reveal. the photograph.

there's nothing like it, not one thing in the world like it.

popcorn

the way I see it, spring is a wednesday. a thursday. summer is friday and saturday. fall is a saturday night, an all-day sunday affair. and, winter. I think we all know what winter is. winter is a monday. a tuesday, maybe. on a good day.

what I'm trying to say is, we're in wednesday territory, folks, almost to thursday. I can feel friday coming, I can feel it in my bones. the trees have all exploded, like popcorn on the side of the highway, in grocery store parking lots, in my front yard. tiny petals like white paper confetti, every time the wind blows. I find it in my hair, in the crook of my sleeve, the bottoms of my feet.

and I miss the two trees back in portland that used to explode with pink blooms every year, I really do, but now I have the popcorn tree in my front yard. I can watch it out my front window just like I did with the two trees back in portland. I can point my polaroid camera at things, try to hold onto it as long as I can, as I am wont to do, but the blooms are gone in a second.  it's the confetti it leaves behind on our driveway, though. I walk over it on my way to check the mailbox at the end of  our drive and I am reminded.

friday. friday is almost here.

march's sixty seconds

well, more like 139 seconds. march in 139 seconds and it's warm enough to ride the bikes now and the trees are exploding with blooms and little green leaves and the sun hangs around a little longer and finally, I can see light at the end of the tunnel, the wonderful, proverbial light.

more march films over at the sixty second photograph, friends. I sat myself down this morning, fell into each one of those little films before I put on monday's armor.

color//colour orange

in the name of the color orange, I:

ate a lot of oranges. no really, I did.
asked ezra if he'd make me an orange paper crane. (he did).
picked the orange crayon when given the choice, which was exactly once.
positioned myself perfectly over the orange paint on the sidewalk.
wished for a bundle of orange ranunculus. you guys, I can't ever find orange ranunculus anymore.
dreamt of sunsets over oceans captured with iphones whilst driving over bridges.
drank one bottle of orange fanta soda, wished for more.
because I have a problem with the fruity sodas.

fyi, this year's color//colour project has long since ended but I'm determined to finish.

february's five

five favorite frames from the month of february, idea totally stolen (with permission, natch) from my friend xanthe.

what I'm learning is that the frames I love most are not always my best photographs. they're the moments I love most, the ones I really want to remember. so I hover there, in that uncomfortable realization for a little while before I think, eff it. I'm sharing my true favorites.

february:

on a saturday afternoon with ava and the ukulele and the coat she won't take off.

on a monday morning because ezra loves gin rummy so much he somehow talked my dad into a few games before school.

on a thursday evening with the seagulls on sullivan island during a miraculous solo road trip to charleston, south carolina.

on a sunday evening with ava getting ready for her very first date.

on a saturday afternoon with ezra, who finally decided to get back on his bike and ride like the wind after something like a four year hiatus.

keep your eyes open

some links:

in the real world (a terrific documentary on william eggleston on the youtubes)

women in photography (a righteous new blog)

new york subways (rare, full color photographs from 1966)

seeing through photographs (a free (yup, free) online MOMA course I'm currently taking)

saving fuji FP-100c (a petition you must please sign to save the last of the instant peel-apart pack film) (that little photograph up there of jen lee is an example of fuji FP-100c, folks) (there is no other film like it and I'm pretty sad about losing it)

advice from robert frank (the last line, it's the very last line)

color//colour green

in the name of the color green, I:

walked in the green(ish) grass in my bare (cold) feet.
noticed the beginnings of green(ish) leaves on the trees in our backyard.
named every single green succulent that currently resides in our home.
okay, named all the green non-succulent living things too.
silently celebrated the BP gas station down on boulevard that is so totally doing its own thing.
waxed poetic about a battered old green hotel sign down on ponce and the early years of marriage.
dreamt of wild mint that grew in giant clumps back at our old house in portland.
dreamt of battered old green doorways and spanish moss that hangs crazy down in savannah.
did not hang the bundle of eucalyptus in the shower as planned.
did not eat enough green things, not even close.

(more of my greens here, more about color//colour lovers here, lovely co-collaborator xanthe's green here and both of our colors live quite happily here)

(having since blown through the final two weeks devoted to orange and blue, color//colour lovers is now officially over and obviously, I am a leetle behind) 

(expect a barrage of orange here and then probably a riot of blue and then, of course, a fond color//colour lovers adieu) 

february's sixty seconds

sixty seconds of moving pictures shot in the city with my people on the greyest of february days, a dead grey, really. but that's february for you. month two of the sixty second photograph and I really struggled this go round. fumbled my way through the process, made a crap load of mistakes. but I'm letting go, folks. make and release, make and release. and hopefully, learn a little something in the process. this is my mantra.

p.s. more about the project here, and more lovely february films over on the site.

p.p.s. music by the incomparable nathan corrona aka dj dust.

color//colour pink

in the name of the color pink, I:

consumed exactly one tiny cupcake with pink frosting,
went out of my way to drive by the mysterious section of fence painted pink near my house.
failed to photograph the neon pink bus parked outside the bail bonds joint.
found it at the grocery store in buckets of the pinkest roses.
found it down on boulevard in the shell pink pom pom of baby's knit hat.
watched for pink skies pretty much every night.
chewed pink bubblegum pretty much every day.

(more of my pinks here, more about color//colour lovers here, lovely co-collaborator xanthe's pink here and both of our colors live quite happily here)

last week: green, green, green. this week: orange!

january's five

five favorite frames from the month of january, idea totally stolen (with permission, natch) from my friend xanthe.

we ate a lot of monkey bread last month, folks. we drank a lot of coffee, a lot of tea, sometimes while sitting at old wooden tables in cute coffee houses. we watched ezra play a lot of basketball. a lot. of basketball. incidentally, I have watched a lot of basketball in my life. but that's another story for another time.

unbelievably, on the last day of january, it was warm enough for the first official backyard cookout of the year. but it was super cold before that weirdo january heat wave, cold enough to dig out all the old coats, which is when ava discovered the vintage leopard print coat I bought for myself back in 1998 at the 26th street fleamarket in new york. it looks better on her than it ever, ever did on me. 28 year-old andrea would never say it out loud but she would probably not be too happy about that. but 45 year-old andrea is pretty happy about it. because 45 year-old andrea sees the world with entirely different eyes now, including the month of january. which, really, is nothing short of miraculous.