road trip

jetlag

yes, "jetlag" just goes with the territory...some people get "hammered" and some people do not....i am one of those who suffer most from a time change...."jetlag" and the effects of time change is the one thing that kills my energy level which normally  allows me  a 14 hour work day...  and  4-5  hours of  sleep  is quite enough....

but my flight to london tonight should not be a  "jetlag" trip....usually the easiest of trips.....it is the travel with a total "flip of the clock" to say southeast asia,  which puts me down for a day or two...

i will not be able to post again until monday or so....i do have comments for "at home and abroad", "dancing"  and "family influences" which i may do today, but more likely next week...i am scrambling to pack now and i have never learned how to pack, so please be patient...which bag??  how much stuff?? hmmm, i just cannot get it right...

i will be at the Arles Photo Festival next week  and do hope to meet some of you there....my plan is to post from Arles, if good internet connections are available....

i continue to be overwhelmed by your letters....the thoughtfulness and writing skills of this readership are quite amazing by any standard....the  writings of all of you collected together would make quite a book....are we somehow making a book together???  well, let's not think about it too much....we do not want to spoil the spontaneity of this  "moment in time" dialog...

soon my mind will be on boarding passes, passport control, long lines, catching up on reading, and the joy of seeing my bag on the conveyor belt .....please be of good cheer my friends  and we will chat again soonest....

letdown

the party is over.....or , rather i should say, the parties are over...i have no idea how many exhibit openings, after parties, magnum 60th functions i have been to in the last week....but it was a lot...

the lightning speed flurry of almost out of control activity i had in the last four  weeks in preparation for my own show and then rushing to everyone else's show has totally subsided........peace....sunset...reflection....i only have a few really easy things to do in the next few days...by saturday i will fly off to london and then to the arles photo festival....but looking at  four days of relative tranquility seems like a vision of a japanese garden...

but you know how it is....whenever big events are over, there is a kind of "letdown".....not meltdown (although that at times seemed totally possible), but letdown....a loss of energy.....a slight malaise....just a low dipping  curve in the graph of life following extreme efforts....

but everything relatively relaxing is out ahead of me now....soon in london with my best friend....show and hanging with my colleagues at arles....followed by  two weeks at the beach with my family....my heretofore high stress life is now looking very very serene...

but, what will i do ??   will i be smart and catch up on scanning, organizing hard drives, getting pictures in the archive, printing, and  putting up on the wall new prints for the next book or will i totally "waste" this valuable time by riding my bike around town, hanging out with friends, and having long lunches....hmmm, i just do not know....

but i have noticed a quixotic  phenomenon about the way things work for me...when i am way way too too  busy, i get all kinds of things done that i have no time to do,  and yet when i do have time to do all the things i need to do , i get very little done....just does not seem right does it??....

so, how does it work for you??   high speed "putting fires out" marathon leading to the best of what you do or a reasonable  slow pace with a rock solid steady  drumbeat of activity making your work its finest??

keys

night before last, i locked myself out of my apartment...i had to leave in the middle of a friend's birthday party and  take  a taxi over  to  marie's house....she has keys to my place... you may know marie as my friend/manager/confidante (see story on marie under "workshops")....marie had to get out of bed in her pajamas and come  out to the car and  give me the keys and "that look"...you all know "that look"...sorry marie..

yesterday morning i got up to go to the grocery story to buy coffee and cheerios....i pulled the door shut to my place and this time locking in BOTH sets of keys, mine and hers....locked myself out twice in a row!!!

at this point i realized i was on "overload"...too too much on my mind and a little exhausted and burned out from the virginia fest, setting up my show, etc etc.....and i do not normally "burn out"...but when i start making really stupid mistakes, it usually means "burn out"....

all of us need to know our limits....but , i hate limits and therefore am subject to making many mistakes, some much worse than this....but, i keep trying to learn how to "control myself"....in this spirit, please, if you have time,  read the  "comment"  i made just now under "fame"...

my intention was to write that piece right here....but, i was writing away and forgot where i was!!!!

ad shoots

as i mentioned in a previous post, i sometimes do advertising photography.....i am in the middle of such a shoot right now in new york and then on to brazil....this work quite simply pays my bills....but, i must say, they are also usually quite enjoyable...because no client is going to commission me for a studio shot or for a "follow the sketch" photograph...they are usually looking for me to reproduce pretty much what i do anyway....

as usual, i try to push even these clients who are paying me, to go a little further than maybe what they had in mind....and i am always working "off the shoot" as in the photographs below....on most ad shoots i usually photograph a little something special for myself.....my little favorites are never actually used in the ad, but the day i stop shooting for myself is the day i hang my cameras up forever.....