Posts Tagged: El Camino Real
In darkness…
In darkness
we cannot
shine a light,
so we
undervalue
our own radiance.
We pick locks
we cannot see,
taste foods
we cannot smell,
and gossip about things
we do not know.
We enslave
ourselves
and blame
others for our capture.
We stop loving
our lives
and blame
others for our cold empty.
In darkness
we dance
with the children
we used to be
and wonder why,
now we’ve grown,
we don’t dance
any better
than we used to.
(Photographed in San Bruno, California on Christmas Eve, 2020. See my other work here.)
Convenience
I’ve shopped in a lot of 7-11s in my life.
Maybe you have too.
I only started photographing people I’d encounter at 7-11 a few years ago. I was a public school substitute teacher in 2016 and 2017, and I used to stop by whatever store was on my way to work for a Dr Pepper and some kind of donut for breakfast.
I’m not a school teacher any longer, but I still treasure my 7-11 adventures. See more of the people I met at the convenience store here. I hope you enjoy them.
(Photographed in South San Francisco, California in September and November, 2016 and in May, 2017. See my other work here and here.)
My week of shooting, 24 February 2019
Codename: Pink Tuba Fire…
Welcome to the first installment of a new weekly feature here on Brisbane Graphic Arts Museum. It’s an ongoing showcase of photographs from my growing body of photojournalism and street photography work, featuring what I think are the best and/or most interesting photos I shot during a given week. I hope you enjoy my work, or get some value from it, and will come back here each week to see how I’ve been seeing our world.
Here we go…
- On Tuesday I unintentionally unnerved this adorable little girl who was walking past my house with her grandmother…
- On Wednesday there was this kid in a shopping cart at a Japanese supermarket in San Mateo where my wife and I were getting some groceries…
- On Thursday Brisbane’s only public house, the Brisbane Inn, caught fire on the top floor and burned for a while. See more photographs of the incident here.
- On Saturday I encountered this fuzzy pink kid at the public unveiling of a raccoon statue in a small park here in Brisbane. You can also see this photo in this collection…
- Also on Saturday, I came across tuba player rehearsing in a shopping center parking with his banda group for a gig they were playing later in the evening…
And that’s it for this week. Until next seek see my other work here and here.
Remember: people and the world are more beautiful, odd, and interesting than you think, you just have to stop and look long enough to notice.
Bunny Sunday
Easter is a lonely business…
(Hillsdale Shopping Center, San Mateo, California 2018. See my other work here and here.)
Tiny woman, big butt
Smoking an elongated cigarette on El Camino Real in front of the Kaiser Permanente hospital…
(South San Francisco, California 2017)
Spaceman and Mickey pants…
My wife has been in the hospital for almost two weeks. Thankfully, she should be home in a couple of days. It’s a dicey thing shooting photos in an hospital. Ethically (and morally, and legally), hospitals have very justifiably strict rules about whom and where you can take pictures. You can’t infringe upon a person’s privacy, nor endanger anyone’s patient confidentiality.
Fortunately, today I encountered a couple of good sports who allowed me to photograph them. I’m and grateful and happy to have the opportunity to showcase their visual distinctiveness…
An hospital technician in airborne disease precautionary headgear…
A fellow in Mickey Mouse pants who I happened to see in an hospital hallway…
Kaiser Permanente, South San Francisco, California 2017
Kaiser, my baby
I’m a lousy husband. I find it impossible to hang around my wife’s hospital room for hours watching her writhe in pain while the nurses and her doctor wait for her condition to stabilize. When it does, they’ll determine if she needs surgery. In the meantime, I’ve been bringing her things that she needs, and drinking too much when I’m home. This is all new and overwhelming to me. My wife’s the toughest son of a bitch I’ve ever known, and I can’t take away her pain. I can’t do anything at all right now but love her.
And take a few pictures, to maybe make some good come of this in the form of my inadequate art…
South San Francisco and the El Camino Real from the roof of the Kaiser Permanente parking garage.
Colma Creek from the roof of the parking garage.
Hallway on my wife’s ward.
Hospital gift shop couture.
Kaiser Permanente, South San Francisco, California 2017
My wife is in the hospital on her birthday…
She entered the hospital last night, for an ailment that is hers to disclose. Not life-threatening, but perhaps life-changing. She’s the best person I’ve ever known, so it was agony to see her writhing and shifting for hours in emergency room pain. I would have taken that nerve-lashing unto myself if I could.
And today is her 63rd birthday. I should be making her a favorite dinner, but she’s in a hospital bed on Opiate Street. “Time’s passing so slow” morphine-she said to me this morning. We both have less time than we used to have, but its savory quality has increased as we’ve aged.
I could’ve grown old with myself. I will likely grow old longer because of her. Not knowing what to do, and being a poor hospital tourist, I took some photographs when my wife didn’t need my attention. There will likely be more; but on her birthday when she can eat no cake on the inpatient ward, these will do…
The admitting technician was a fine fellow of compassionate demeanor.
A dinosaur-child in the hallway as my wife was moved from the ER to her room.
No names on the screen means no pain in a hallway for healing professionals.
She’s in bed and waiting, and monitoring time.
Kaiser Permanente, South San Francisco, California 2017
Dance class
His name is Joe and we were both in the same waiting room at Kaiser Permanente in South San Francisco. He caught my eye because he was so nicely-dressed, looking much classier than the anxious people one typically sees in dreary HMO waiting rooms. Joe makes a habit of dressing nicely all the time. He likes to look good because he’s a dance instructor in San Francisco. According to his card, he can teach you the Tango, the Cha-Cha, and the Boogie. I can give you his number if you’re interested…
(South San Francisco, California 2016. Also published on Scholars & Rogues.)