kulturbrille:amanuensis

There has to be a way out of completely giving my life over to a singular cause that will consume the rest of my third decade.

For the first time this year, ill, a shredded throat and a febrile haze filling up most of today. But there was redemption, despite all the unfulfilled moments and disillusionment; there was Annie Leibovitz. If you were there, among all of us voyeurs, yes, it was me, it was me hacking and tearing through the documentary, as through the tears, defying a deflated, fibrillating heart to savour each moment of photographic apotheosis. At one moment I blinked, lost, unsure of who I was, and where I was, mimicking the act of photographing, being there in the moment.

I outdo myself. There are decades to come, years to come, a day when I will have family, shoeboxes full of photographs, not just juvenile snapshots, each of them a story that isn’t just a one-liner. Armed with a dogged determination to make something out of so little at all, I should take on a little ambition, if only to warm the chilly inside of my still faintly incandescent vessel. There was once a time when I went forth - to New York, through alleyways, into paroxysms - where everywhere I looked, I was framing, when I filed envelopes of negatives and learnt how to be non-existent behind the camera. There was once, if I might clumsily explain, when I found that space between a macro and a full-length portrait on a 50mm lens, a space available only to those who knew how to press a shutter and not run away.

But you had to have been there to understand why it was the best cathartic experience I’ve had all year. It was searingly authentic, masterfully brief, full of reminders of what it takes to make meaning out of the pernicious present. There is no counting of the hours, but only a measuring of the years, as perspective is brought to bear on the most salient moments of a life. And, as silent testimony, there are photographs, ineluctable, each a sudden, piercing, intrusive reality that one had to force back to stay in one’s seat. It became a universe within a single narrative, all those lives, all those things, ideas, emotions, fate, all splashed across a screen and pointing to the one central theme.

Perhaps now, even as the I contemplate a half-successful but increasingly bland life, even as I scale back the dreams and fears that hold me down each day, I remember what it felt like to become one with the lens; one with the world that I so longingly gazed at and poorly captured, in my own way. But there are no regrets; for even though every hope and every desire was impossibly far-fetched, silly, far too elaborate and outlandish for its own good, when it was made real, it was…good. Sometimes it takes longer than we think, that’s all. I see, you.

We are one. And finally, a full spread.

In between one moment and the next, having run out of time to do work, or prepare the ground, or make a difference, this evening shall be spent in deep, indulgent, excessive contemplation. The long weekend was pleasant - Bones, Monocle, relishing the feeling of letting oneself go, mornings and afternoons spent in the pleasant pursuit of a languor that somehow eluded us both. There be dreams in the making.

Food, naturally, after a month’s worth of occasional photos, spoilt lenses, obligations, erstwhile friends and happy dreams. There will be time to balance talk of the here and now. Oh, and: Werner’s Oven, Borgos, Ghim Moh. Yum.

Yes, I am, I am happy.

At this point in time last year, I was juggling a dozen different responsibilities, and dark, dark nights. Fear drove me through books and material; I was endlessly moving from book to book, from book to class, from class to meeting, meeting to meeting, food, madness, and love. I had taken on too much, and I didn’t need hindsight to tell me that. At the end of the year, I collapsed, nearly insensate, weakly counting my blessings.

It is starting to feel almost the same, now. Hour after hour, grappling with abstract plans, blatantly leering glances at rows of books nearby, cabinet after cabinet of files, careful manoevering amongst responsibilities, obligations, new ways of doing things, everything a whirl of newness and unfamiliarity, every moment spent in momentary reflection a respite from the torrent.

This year, I am standing still, while all around me everyone stumbles along. Plans, dreams, hopes, fears, somehow or the other we are all swept along. I feel, guiltily, envy, at the plans of others laid out by chance or by design; I count my blessings and I cling all the tighter to all that makes me whole. Perhaps I have spent too long living through symbols, motifs. Doors, books, hearts that will forever remain unseen, substitutes and replacements for the act of living. Out there, there are 3 boxes of books, still on their way back from Hay-on-Wye, in the picture above, a place of escapism and alternatives, the aesthetic of which is not made any less by a repudiation of their permanence.

My dream of opening a bookshop has remained, however, from its distant beginnings when I had the freedom to roam and imagine myself in the shoes of others. Today it stands, a monument and blueprint, beckoning with its imperative stare that I find my way to its doorstep. Each day, every page I spend in a half-wakeful stupor, drinking, imbibing, in denial and mesmerised, a broken record and turntable, woefully clinging to the sensation of flight and ascension, I remember the dream.

The fine line between this unwholesome fear and the miniscule beyond; dare I hope to be able to pull us through? Dare I speak once more of thoughts and ideas, knowledge and information, meanings and consequences, instead of spinning, spinning, in a void made by my own hand? How shall I reassure, how shall I choose?

(I feel the quickening of a litany.)

I learnt about humility today; to watch with open eyes, to withhold judgement, to be clear about why and wherefores, the objectives, the destination, the purpose, and to roam far, and wide, and with wild abandon.

Having passed through London, Oxford, and finally arriving in Paris, all in the space of 24 hours, I am almost halfway through my week in a gorgeous, bracing, half-familiar city; so many have come before me that I have almost vicariously lived here, but it is made anew. Words, dreams, ideas, hopes all swim before my eyes; I am happy beyond measure.