semillerimages.com - Image of the Week 5/8/05 Horseshoes and Carmen
Steve
It's been a wild couple of weeks, wild in terms of memorable
experiences for me.
I will be thirty four in less than two weeks. I was thinking the other
day, about the birthdays that I remember, and I shocked myself that I
could not remember many of them. Scary. I don't know if this is
something that is common to many or not, or perhaps I have just had a
long string of not so memorable birthdays. No pity please. I have
plenty of memories that are quite nice... I find myself being able to
contact those memories with images, unfortunately I have only been
shooting pictures for the last eight years... I look at a picture, I
remember what was going on quite distinctly.
Something strange happened this weekend though. I was photographing a
horseshoe pit, and I felt memories. I felt them in a very abstract
sense, nothing particularly solid... but nonetheless I felt the
memories, and they were not mine. I know it sounds silly, but it's not
like I saw I ghost, but rather heard an echo from the past. A friend of
mine at the castle has a cabin down south of Lake Cachuma, and
unfortunately the land is being taken away from him by the National
Park service even though his family had signed a 99 year lease with the
government. Shades of the Lakota Nation deal of the 1870's for the
Black Hills, although not as brutal by any stretch of imagination. My
friend, incidentally named Steve, asked me to go down to his cabin to
take some pictures for a scrapbook he is making. I set out at 4pm,
exactly the time I planned, which was unusual as I can't ever seem to
get prepared at the right time when I have planned a trip such as this.
The cabin is about seventy five miles south of my apartment, partially
on HWY 101 and partially on the 154. Right past Micheal Jackson's
ranch, kinda. It was a perfect afternoon to make the drive, in fact I
would have stopped several occassions to take some pictures, but I was
afraid it would get dark and I would not be able to find the cabin. I
ended up having a little trouble finding it in the light, so it was a
good thing I did not stop... as it would have been impossible in the
dark. I got to the spot, took a look around, opened the cabin, and got
out my camera to capture some of the fantastic late afternoon light
filtering down through the oak trees. A few shots around the cabin, a
few inside. The interior was somewhat decrepit. I kicked myself for not
bringing someone along as the interior would have made for some
incredible portraits - angled window light accenting the ecclectic
collection of old furniture spread around the living room and kitchen
in an interesting fashion. It was like a set, a set for some movie or
something, but a set I would never be able to create, rather just come
across in a random fashion as I did.
I have a good memory of a party at an aquaintence's house, of whom I
cannot remember their name, but a good memory of playing horseshoes for
the first time with some others at the party. I was attracted to the
horseshoe pit and I went outside to take some images of it, shallow
depth of field, f4 or so... angled to get some lens flare and a bright
patch of the setting sun through the trees. I don't remember if she
said something or I just saw her... but as I was shooting the horseshoe
pit a woman came walking up the road... wow, random. Here I am, in the
middle of nowhere, and here is this attractive woman walking up to me.
She was swinging what looked like a couple of pillows from the ends of
some fine chain. I would find out in the course of our initial
conversation that she was practicing to be able to spin fire for a fire
dance. She lives right next to Steve's cabin. Her name is Michelle
Carmen. What luck... I couldn't believe it. We talked for some time,
about this and that, all the while I was taking pictures of her... we
ended up walking down to the river that flows into Lake Cachuma, where
we talked some more and I took even more pictures of her. A natural
model. It wasn't for a bit into our chatting that I found out she was
living with her boyfriend in the cabin. Ouch, my luck fell for the
worse. Interestingly enough, he is a May baby too, a taurus. The
calculations spun through my mind. Nevertheless, it was a breath of
fresh air to my spirit. She was obviously interested in me, and we had
an easy comfortable conversation. It was a nice diversion from the
uncomfortable talks with women in SLO that I am/was/or whatever
attracted to. Simple, nice, pleasant. The chemistry was solid. She's
tall, 5'10 or so... and her eyes in the failing sunlight were a blazing
blue. As the sun went down, we walked back toward the cabins and she
showed me the interior of hers, nicely decorated with a DJ turntable
setup in the corner of the living room. She's almost thirty, and is a
DJ and a raw food chef. She popped on some trance music (electronic
dance music for the uninitiated) and I went to get my laptop to
download the pictures I had taken. We sat around and talked about raw
food, music, photographs, and her issues with her boyfriend until she
had to leave to go to a friend's house. I took one of the pictures I am
going to present you this week as she was cueing up some music on the
turntables. I was crestfallen, even though it was clear that even with
the chemistry and her current issues with her boyfriend were going to
lead to nothing between the two of us. What a memorable experience
though. Random happenings, immortalized by my shutter finger, forever
linking the memories with something visual to connect them to.
I walked back to the cabin, arranged some things, started a fire in the
bar-b-que. I was shooting some pictures of the fire and the cabin lit
up with christmas lights when she came walking through the dark. Her
friends had gone to bed early, so test tubes started bubbling again.
More pictures, more conversation late into the morning. I think it was
two a.m. or so when she finally went home. We talked about our mutual
attraction, about being faithful, about eating only food that is never
cooked. We talked about music, about dancing, about me coming back to
take more pictures of her. It was an early birthday present, having
such a nice and strong connection with a total stranger for an evening.
I will remember that night for a very long time to come.
I awoke the next morning early. I bopped around a bit, chatted and
walked down with Steve and his companion to the river around noon. I
found a fossil in the river, a large rock with three impressions of
shells on it. Random. I decided to stick around at the cabin for
awhile, so I had to get something to eat as I had brought next to
nothing with me. A quick drive down the road led to an hour plus wait
at the Paradise store for a hamburger. Not fast food... it was good,
but I dunno about an hour good. Be warned if you ever go there...
I returned to the cabin, reveling in the escape from the grind of
normal life. I recalled my trip to Puerta Vallarta and the relaxation
of that as I laid down on the picnic table topped my my sleeping bag an
pillow for an afternoon nap under the speckled shade of the oak trees.
The weekend taught me a bit, twenty four hours can be more interesting
than a year...
The images:
http://www.semillerimages.com/iow-link/iow-5-07-05-horseshoesandcarmen.html
Take care,