Fingers poised at the keyboard, there are some photos I’d like to show you. There isn’t a blog title as I write, not even an idea for any kind of theme. I’m going to wing it. My friend Tim Huynh recently posted a video: Whatever Happened to Eric Kim. For those that may not remember Eric Kim he was a prolific Street Photographer/Educator back in the day when there was very little on the internet focussed on our specific genre. At one time he was writing three or four blogs per week and Tim was wondering what had happened to him. As a writer of a blog I imagine he simply ran out of steam, I find it practically impossible to write one a month and even when I do go completely off tangent. Four a week? How much can be said about Street Photography without ending up just bitching or ranting. Worse still, endlessly talking about gear. Eric Kim wrote one post entitled “How to earn $200,000+ a Year From Photography” which seemed to rankle with some. Essentially his advice was to charge more and alienate people, the latter he had great success with.
I might write a blog “How to earn $0- from Photography”. Tim has threatened to make a video titled “Whatever Happened to John Harper?”. Either would work I feel. Thinking of questions posed, how about this one just for a bit of fun. ‘Are you seeing anyone John?’, it’s on peoples lips lately, I’m not sure why. Convention seemingly requires everyone to be in a relationship, if you’re not then there’s something wrong with you. We should somehow be jealous of those that are, I’ve known a lot of couples and can unequivocally announce that not one of them has ever made me feel envious. In fact the antithesis is true, mostly I feel relief not to be in a relationship. Anyway, I was asked again in a Lacock pub the other week by a team mate whilst playing in the Pub Quiz. I say playing, in reality I was doing an uncanny impression of someone in the early stages of dementia. Joe Biden and I should have a debate. Where was I? Oh yes. I was asked the question and one that has now made it as the title of this post. I have a title, but looks as though it has nothing to do with photography. We’ll go back to that in a moment, let’s have a play with this relationship nonsense firstly.
I might add that question never comes from anyone remotely hoping that I’m available for love. My answer was: “No, I’m not really interested”. Sam (ex wife #2) chipped in, “John says that he’s not interested in women because he’s possibly gay!”. The quizzers response: “Are you gay John?”. A lot of laughter from the team. Unnecessarily so in my opinion. Seriously, I don’t know what they’re seeing, but I’m definitely not gay. As others, I have questioned it in the past, my appreciation of musicals often flags up, but the answer is still no. The gay community will be both delighted and relieved with that news. Perhaps I was just using it as an excuse, which of course is ridiculous as we’ll see next. A couple of days after the quiz I was reading a newspaper article about Midlife Crisis in men, how we used to deal with it compared with today. I think extremely funny, poignant and so very well written, therefore we can conclude definitely not my words. I thought I’d share an extract here. It was titled ‘Then & Now’, here’s a part of it:
“Affair with Secretary versus Claiming you’re gay”
Then:
In the past, the key for a straight man having a textbook affair is that it had to be with a younger woman. As one of the pillars of crisis psychology, feeling less attractive is the trigger for an often reckless search for physical affirmation. The theory goes that as a middle-aged man, you are both vulnerable to anxiety about a loss of potency (literally in that you may be concerned about erectile dysfunction, figuratively in that you simply feel less desirable) and the habituation of your long-standing relationship is making you feel old and hemmed in. The “remedy” used to be to flirt with a younger woman – usually a colleague – until it reached the point when a life-affirming affair could begin. For good reasons this sort of lopsided power dynamic is now frowned upon.
Now:
Discerning middle-aged men don’t want to be seen as predatory and exploitative (even if there’s still plenty of that about). For straight men, one solution to not being attractive to women anymore is just not to bother with them altogether. It’s easier and seemingly more edgy and rebellious to tell your wife or partner that you are in fact gay. This does presuppose that men will find your shiny forehead, jowls and dodgy knees attractive when women don’t, but this is precisely the kind of fantastical, wishful thinking that guides middle-aged men suffering ever increasing levels of self-doubt. Changing your sexual orientation in middle age is at least genuinely life-changing, although if you are merely pretending to do so it will only change your life for as long as it takes to admit you’re a superficial idiot.
Oh dear. In my defence I’ve never had an extramarital affair, but guilty as charged of wishful and fanciful thinking being my guide and “superficial idiot” I admit might top the crimes. After reading that article I decided that buying a medallion, opening my shirt and re-naming myself Kirk St Moritz wasn’t a good idea either. It’s not going to work now and it didn’t work then. Maybe I could grow my hair long and let it be known that I now only answer to the name ‘Fabio”. Yes, of course I’m like a Greek God, I don’t know how many times I have to tell you. The only fly in the ointment with that is I’m the only one buying into it/worshipping me. It was my birthday recently and I was kindly bought one of those DNA tests as a gift. I’ve spat in the tube, posted it off, but the results are already known. My origins are clearly Mount Olympus. Just in case anyone thinks I’ve boarded the “God’s Gift” train, I’m well aware that left the station a long time ago. As I’m writing an email has arrived with the results. 100% Northern European. For gods sake, damn that test!
I like the concept of having someone in my life, I love the feeling of being in love, but it’s never really worked out as I expected once past the Disney/Hollywood stage of any romance. What I mean is that I’m okay until the film ends, they’re my blueprint and guide, after that I’m pretty much lost. The credits are rolling and I’m left wanting more advice on how to make it last. At this point I could talk about my divorces, though evidently the only one really worth discussing is my divorce from reality. My Spotify playlist just hit ‘Desperado’, maybe the Eagles know me better than I know myself. Perhaps I’ve been “out riding fences for too long now”. Let’s change that question to Am I Seeing Anything?
I’d say yes, I actually think my Street Photography has improved. Well, it has if I only consider my definition of the term and what I believe it should be. I’m not going to bitch about that. Besides, you have to be careful because before you know it there’ll be an assassination attempt and unlike Donald trump I’m not the living embodiment of Neo from the Matrix. Let’s just say my vision or philosophy of street photography is far removed from the large majority of shots I see on social media or in competitions. That’s absolutely fine, each to their own.
I put together a short YouTube slideshow recently to sort of cement the last 12 months work. The kind of thing I’m after mostly as a reminder to me. Sometimes you have to block out the noise, stop looking at others and go your own way. That really answers both questions regards seeing anyone or anything. One thing I do know is that I need to be out spending a lot more time making photographs.
The last 12 months of Street Photography