After dinner Rees and I went for coffee where we met Wolf and Liberty for coffee and tea. We sat outside and I made this photograph in the wanning evening light. Talk of the state of the world the mix of youth and us older guys disappeared as we found common ground. Most of the people I spoke with whether they were old, young, right or left were uncomfortable with the countries direction. Many unsure of the direction or even who really was at the helm of the ship of state. Personal financial distractions, cultural differences and the constant bombardment of information/disinformation led to an underlying feeling of uneasiness.
August fourteen in Chicago I met Rick in the food court. Both of us going to Olympia to Sunday weddings, could we, are we soon to be relatives? No but coincidence continued to form the Amtrak community for the trip west. Cowboys, poets, exotic dancers, professors, scientists, college students, a petty officer from a tall ship all part of this cast. All sharing experience from Canada to Zimbabwe, all riding across this great nation concerned with what comes next.
I ponder youth naivety, age experience
a youthful sparkle in the eyes
Between here and there
A cynical haze clouds vision
Between here and there.
[excerpt of longer yet unfinished piece]
On the rails the mix worked very well. August 15th a day of poets and a story teller from North Dakota who regales us with of his and his parents, grandparents history of life in the northern plains. His details and colorful remembrances of the last century handed down oral history amaze me. The good and bad times, a high school football coach, teacher, farmer, traveler, veteran, I was too enthralled by his tales to photograph or tape his exploits, across the aisle from him was an older women who confirmed and added to the local history lesson. A station stop to stretch our legs and he was gone leaving us with the feeling of his easy laugh and of times gone by between here and there. His North Dakota slogan and his laugh rings in my memory “Forty below keeps the riff raff out.”
The Cascades and Washington, loss of my I-pod virginity to come. enjoy pjc
Eyes isn’t that what it is all about? My first visit to the farmers market June 24th after a long cold winter of no travel out side my apartment it was spring. I could go out and make portraits of people, portraits of life. Evan in a mask these eyes have so much to say.
