a shallow realization

I just had a realization, as I was out for a walk in my neighborhood. I realized that I was not looking at the world in the way that I’ve come to normally look at it in the past several years since I started taking a lot of photos. That way of looking is to really look – to see things. 

Oh, look at that; it’s very interesting or beautiful or ugly or whatever. That thing wasn’t here the last time I walked down this street. And that thing has definitely been here every time I’ve walked down this street. I wonder how that got here or why the thing I saw before isn’t here. 

It’s not very surprising, this change in how I look at things, except that it happened relatively fast. It’s only been a month, or 6 weeks maybe, since I put my camera away and decided to take a break. That’s not very long, right? I remember several years ago when I really started taking pictures I eventually realized I was looking at the world differently. But I think it was a lot longer before that happened than 6 weeks. 

Of course, with this realization came the other part which is that the way I’m looking at things lately is just very shallow, very much a functional visual interaction. It’s like I’m missing some part of me. 

I’m also looking at people differently these days. I guess I’d have to say I’m NOT really looking at them most of the time. I think I’m mostly just looking to see who the person is, where previously I might have looked at their faces and bodies and proportions and expressions and posture and all that stuff. (Not in a creepy way. Wait, maybe... Do people think I look at them in a creepy way? I could ask, but unfortunately, people mostly are not very honest. Anyway...) I found so many people beautiful in some way or another, and often I wished I could photograph lots of people that I saw. Not just snap a quick photo of some random person walking down the street, but to spend an hour or two with the person and my camera in front of a black sheet or a blank wall, really photographing a human person being human. 

I have missed it, and thought about it, and even had dreams about doing photo shoots. But, ironically, I’ve not actually done anything about it. Ironic because that’s sort of the reason I’ve been taking this break – that while there are a handful of people who express interest in doing a shoot with me, they mostly don’t have enough interest to actually do it. And my frustration with that whole situation has led me to stop trying.