The Online Photographer

Well, I'm tired of Labor Day weekend already. The shore is teeming with people—the road, up and down, clotted with a jumble of parked cars. Most of the vehicles are pickup trucks, vans, and those tall but squat station wagons that nowaday-people call "ess-you-vees." They're really just vees. My window is only three meters or so from the road and thus cheek by jowl with the constant parade of cyclists, walkers, joggers, stroller-pushers, mopeds and e-bikes, one particular small kid riding in a plastic miniature motorized car that goes about .8 miles per hour, and of course dog-walkers. It's a peaceful, contented parade, though. Sometimes the solitary walkers are the loudest talkers, carrying on an animated conversation with some invisible but electronically-connected counterpart. I still find these people unnerving, as if they are mentally not quite hinged and loudly narrating their concerns to themselves.

With all the dogs going by, Butters is on a simmer of alertness and excitement, jangling my poor put-upon nerves at unexpected intervals with an explosive sort of bark-howl, the kind of noise that in the misty past was intended to signal, "The enemy is creeping up on the encampment! Turn out! All hands! To arms!" You'd think I'd get used to it, but it startles me every time. Did you know that enjoying scaring people is a sign that you might be a psychopath? Except on Halloween. Or, if you're a dog—then it's your job. Or was, in hunter-gatherer times. On the good side, the home fireworks (I am sure to die without ever comprehending the appeal of home fireworks) have been kept to a minimum this year, so far, and the teenagers haven't kept me awake with their into-the-night chattering. At least the weather is nice—hot, in the high 80s, like the vacationers like. And very sunny, with clean, clear air. Made for vacation weekend weather.

I tolerate it all. Even the heat. Even the talkative teenagers. (Not the barking, as much.) But I also keep in mind the words of my neighbor Kenny, who says, every year, during the first few days in October: "Now we get our lake back."

A parade of...portraits
What I should really do is make a sandwich board sign that says, "FREE PORTRAITS! Just call up through the window to the guy on the porch." Then when the light is right I could put my sign out front, open my window, and see if I get any takers. I could even sit outside on the big rock by my front steps and and approach them, asking if they'd like a portrait. Some of the street portraitists on YouTube are good models for learning ways of approaching people. They worked it out by doing it a lot, and I could copy them. I see so many couples, parent(s)-with-kid(s) combos, teen friends, old people with canes or walkers, multi-generational groups—every second or third one I think, "they would make a great portrait." I'd just herd the cats in front of a backdrop of forsythia or over by the woods, make a few shots with the B&W Sigma (I've even received the 65mm ƒ/2 on loan, to try), and deliver the product by email for them to use on their social media whatevers. I think a lot of them would enjoy having a record of themselves looking so relaxed and happy, and in the company of the company they prefer to keep.

On the other hand, I probably don't need yet another distraction from work. And do I have the nerve to do it, anyway? Could I overcome the inertia that keeps me not doing it? Do I have the social skills, the je ne sais quoi, the savoir faire?

Let's just say I haven't tried it yet. Maybe next year.

Happy Labor Day!

Mike

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Featured Comments from:

Dan Khong: "Mike, 'free portraits' is such a nouveau idea of people approaching you instead of the other way round. You can make new friends and grab some funny poses. With digital and email, all you need is some processing time and coffee. Go for it! In no time, you will be famous as the Magnum of the Lake."

Ken Bennett: "The problem with offering 'free portraits' is the lack of takers—people think there's a catch. The portrait is free but I'll sell you the prints at a high markup. Or some other way of separating you from your money. I helped organize a Help Portrait event for first responders a few years ago and we had a hard time getting anyone to show up for this reason, even with our police and emergency response folks promoting it. No, really, it's free and we send you the photos. Really."

ASW: "Your description of the cell phone talkers made me laugh at an old memory that hadn't crossed my mind for quite a while.

"Many years ago before cell phones were ubiquitous and we had grown used to being surrounded by one (loud) side of conversations, I nearly embarrassed myself out of graduate school.

"A prominent scholar in my field of study was visiting the university for a couple weeks to give a series of talks and lead several workshops, which I was participating in. After about a week I finally built up the courage to introduce myself and my research and ask a few questions. But when?

"While walking across campus one day I saw that our paths were about to intersect. As I was about to say "Hello" he beat me to it.

Scholar: 'Hello. How are you?'
Me: 'Oh! I'm fine. How are you?'
Scholar: 'Good, good, things are going well here.'
Me: 'I'm glad you're enjoying yourself. It's great to have you here.'

"Obviously I don't remember the exact words we said, but after several more rounds of increasingly personal back-and-forth he turned to me and with a frustrated look on his face and said 'Excuse me, I'm trying to talk to my wife!'

"I'm not sure if he recognized me throughout the remainder of the workshops, but I was too embarrassed to ask questions or even participate in discussions. I mostly spent the time imagining him complaining about me to my graduate supervisor. Something like: 'You let this guy use computers? By himself? He doesn't even know how phones work.'

"It's funny now but it certainly wasn't then."

Mike replies: That is pretty funny now, but also tragic for you! I'm sorry you didn't have a better interaction with that person you admired.

I had a somewhat similar interaction when I was in my early twenties with Daniel J. Boorstin, who was the Librarian of Congress at the time and an historian who had written a number of well-received books. I wanted to be a writer and was in awe of authors. He and his wife happened to be my customers when I was working at a garden center selling bedding plants. We would tally customers' boxes of bedding plant "starts" outdoors, jotting down the charges on small pieces of paper, and then take their cash or credit cards indoors, stand in line at the cashier, and then bring them their change. When I saw Mr. Boorstin's name on his credit card I acted like I was meeting a celebrity. We had read one of his books (The Discoverers) in a high school class with a favorite teacher back in the Midwest, and as it happened, right at that moment I was in the middle of reading another volume of his trilogy "The Americans," which had been getting a lot of press at the time.

I told him all this, and he seemed complimented. But when I got back outside with his change, he looked at the bill and said, almost angrily, "Where did you say you were prepared?" At first I didn't understand the usage; I had attended a private high school, which were known as college preparatory schools; their purpose was to prepare young people for university. He was asking me to tell him again where I went to high school. I answered, and he said, cuttingly, "it must not be a very good school, because they certainly didn't prepare you very well!" So saying he handed my little chit back to me. Again, it took me a moment, but I saw I had made an error of a few cents in adding up his bill. I was crestfallen. Not only had I made myself look bad, but I had drawn the ire and the odium of the Librarian of Congress, no less, down upon the reputation of my beloved and blameless alma mater! I think his wife interceded at that point to smooth things over, but all I remember is that Mr. Boorstin turned away in disgust and didn't look at me again or say another word to me.

He was probably just having a bad day, when I think back on it.

Of course I had to go back inside and stand in line again to remedy my error, have the change on his card reversed and redone, and that took a few minutes. I felt very ashamed. I didn't finish that book of his I was in the middle of, and never read one of his books again. Not out of spite; only because of the feelings it would dredge up.

It did help me to formulate a principle which I still think is good advice: "Never meet your heroes."

Graeme Scott: "Meters! Meters! You said 'Meters'! There's hope for your nation. Of course it should be spelled 'metres.'  😄  Belated Happy Labor Day wishes."

Robert Roaldi: "If they only show up for a day or two, that's not so bad. You'd best hope your area doesn't become the new 'it' place where the rich(er) buy their third or fourth home and drive the locals out. It has happened elsewhere.

"As for people on cell phones, I was criticized the other day because they were trying to reach me when my phone was powered off. But I tell everyone that my phone is almost always off and it's a waste of time trying to contact me that way.

"Try putting up a sign by the roadside that says 'Quiet Zone'; it would be fun seeing if it's respected."

Mike replies: Oh, we get summer people all summer long, not just on the Memorial Day, Fourth of July, and Labor Day weekends. I would say three-quarters of the houses around me are summer-only residents. Just guesstimating.

I think that first thing you mentioned is happening—there are a lot of lavish new houses being built around here, even on the hillsides above the lake, and there is a critical shortage of houses for sale—at this moment, there are only four houses for sale in town, and only six houses for sale on the entire 60-mile shoreline of Keuka Lake!! Which has no zoning and is jammed with houses, by the way. I've seen lake houses here so close together that you can't walk between them. And this is the season when people sell their lake cottages, too. On the good side, the value of my house almost doubled earlier this year, although it has gone down a bit since then. (I'm sure Dave Ramsey would tell me to sell it immediately. I often hear his voice in my mind's ear giving me financial advice and saying "The house is gone. Sorry, I know you probably have some emotional attachment, but the house is gone.") The vacant hillside lot next to me was offered to me for $20k in 2015, and recently was listed for $99k!