(Point Reyes - a building in front of the lighthouse)
I feel as if Wes Anderson would like this picture of mine. It is reminiscent, for me, of Moonrise Kingdom. Though the color scheme he used in that film differs greatly, relying so heavily on the nostalgic red, yellow, and orange tones of the 70s. Or rather, tones that were popular in the 70s.
I don't mean that he tried to make the ocean and sky a 70s red or yellow, just that my memory of the film evokes an entirely different color temperature/palette.
CS should rightfully eviscerate me for writing so poorly, so sloppily. He is no longer in the business of grading freshman essays. He is looking for new work. I am looking for the prices of certain cameras to go down on Amazon. It makes me feel as if I am being frugal, when the reality is that I'm trying to throw my money away for a quick blast of dopamine.
I have found another old "classic" Nikon manual film lens that I want to buy. It feels foolish after a while, to keep buying lenses that barely differ from ones I already own. But every now and then someone will see me out in public with a film camera and they will spark up a conversation. If they mention a lens or body that I don't have then my soul will shrivel a little bit and I will feel empty. It's some sort of personality disorder but I don't want to fix it, especially since I'm so close to owning all the flagship lenses and bodies anyway.
I've done the same with books, and records, and movies. I don't know what the disorder is called. It is when you try to convince yourself of an inner worth because of your proximity towards, or possession of, external objects. I've had to find new ways of bolstering my self-esteem lately, because my memory is fading. I was doing very well with exercise, but then the sciatica has knocked me off my bike. Masturbation can be pleasurable but only rarely does it make you proud.
Well, the Nikon lens is the one used to take the below photograph, known as "The Afghan Girl." It is perhaps worth owning just for the historical value. National Geographic seemed to me to be the very best magazine there was when I was much younger. Now, of course we all recognize it for the patronizing, condescending, colonialist garbage that it is and was. But you can still see some sweet native titty in there if you kept any old copies around.
I bought some heroin from an Afghani once in a bar in Prague. I had left the hotel without my girlfriend at the time, if I remember correctly. Or, maybe she had gone back to the hotel because she did not want to wander from bar to bar any more. She was and is a vegetarian, so she did not have the fortitude that I claimed for myself. When I came back to the hotel I imagined smoking it together and her letting me play with her butthole, and other stuff, but I have no memory of that happening. The night disappeared into itself and the dawn arrived with the room cleaners knocking on the door. We yelled for them to go away in English but they just kept knocking and knocking. I finally opened the door to scream at them, but my girlfriend had stepped from the bed completely naked behind me without my knowledge, so that when I opened the door it was only to my mute anger and her nudity.
We laughed and laughed about it. We smoked some more of the stuff and wandered out into the city of spires and likely caused ourselves more troubles. I don't remember now. It's like one of my old books, or lenses through which I view the world before and ahead of me.
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