The Mood Camera

Antoinette is in line waiting for the bank to open. She got there early, debated waiting in line, finally while she was adamantly against waiting in any line, and indeed considered it a sign of personal stupidity, she opted to wait it out, in some way she was bored, perhaps waiting in line would give her some time to think and to redirect the events of her day; maybe she would meet Lauren for lunch, but that was such a happenstance event that it could not be included in any certain plans; maybe she would flirt with the idea of going to the flower garden and convince herself that smelling the roses was some wonderful experience, or maybe she would go down to her favorite coffee shop and munch on some book; as she was a avid reader, three to four books a week. Mostly Victorian, mostly mysteries, biographies, she was fascinated by the past, she was one of those few people that wanted to go back in time, undaunted by horse manure or Jack the Ripper.

Antoinette back in the Victorian jungle of civility, makes for an amazing story, maybe some day I would send her there on a time machine, but it seems implausible, I just don’t comprehend this desire of hers.

She also wondered about her cats, Pacho and Loki, “what a waste of alertness.” She pondered their incessant emotional demands, “maybe species are specialized testing grounds for all the aspects that make up a human, cats were predefined to be the vessels of emotion, hence the reason why they seemed so emotionally absorbed, so socially needy and strangely solitary.” Her conclusion, “maybe being a cat goes against being a cat.”

Ah that is why I love her character so much, her natural distraction makes her lovable to all, both the devil and god would share her company with glee, she, so inoffensive and impossible to judge.

As she was mulling over the possibilities a man, perhaps in his late fifties or just simply perhaps a harsh life, decided to work the bored crowed. He had this huge pen, the size of a twelve year old child, the pen was; it had a long solid plastic body, colored in a still yellow color, and he was hauling it like it was a burden, moving it as if it were heavy, which it certainly could not have been, and yelling and waving to the unyielding waiting crowd; “I have a pen, some one is going to get lucky today I have a giveaway pen, heavy as it is I am not hauling it back with me, got to get rid of all the inventory today, if I have to give it away I will but I prefer a buck or two of your kindness, just enough for the bus back home; that’s right not in it for a profit.” Antoinette, smiled to herself as her eyes engorged the unfolding event. A guard from the bank stood up to the glass door so as to investigate if behind the façade lurked a hidden gun for a nice bank robbery. Instead however the man seemed congested by his huge pen and tripped over it a couple of times, while the crowd mused over the entertainment that fortunately made their wait a little less. “Yes for less than two bucks this pen, with a especial refill included, can be yours, perfect for a child’s bedroom or for a laugh at the office.” Obviously the thing would require at least two people involved to write anything, Antoinette didn’t bother to calculate the precise requirements of the task, but the man, apparently an experienced salesman in front of a captive audience undid the casing with a zipper aperture, and out came the extra ink cartridge, “yes sirs comes with a free refill, you can’t get it for less and your going to waste your time saying no to this incredible offer.” He was sure that the sale was a done thing, one of the bystanders, a young man, came forward, “I will buy it.” As he said this he was placing his hand in his pant pocket, when the salesman stumbled over the spare ink cartridge, and fumbled himself all over the casing, wrapping himself on the way to another precarious fall, “I will just wrap this up for you, here, quickly, be done right up…” and of course the pen just kept on wrinkling his intentions. The young man was dispirited and amused, Antoinette was having a spirited laugh, and holding her nose so as to prevent nerves from splattering. It did not take long for the pen salesman to realize that he wasn’t going to sell the pen, he could not get the extra cartridge back in, the guard was not amused, it seemed at times he would use his gun, the bank finally opened its doors, and the man was left outside orbiting his pen.

Antoinette walked out of the bank and found the older looking old man sitting at the bus stop bench with his unsold giant pen despondently leaning into him. Anyone else, you, me a nun, would have found the image disheartening and would have walked over and bought the pen so as to cheer the fellow on in his miserable life. Not our Antoinette, she immediately thought something which had been brewing ever since she quit her fast paced addictive life, as an Internet executive. “That’s a photograph.” Yeap that’s precisely what she felt and thought, not feeling a bit sorry for the man, she immediately saw that man’s condition and pose, as an image plenty ready as an exquisite photograph at an exhibit of modern photography. Her mind’s eye quickly capture the image, he looked like a down and out clown without the suit, a failed salesman, an ambivalent father, a careless friend now a gone loner, the whole semantic of his being shutout in a shootout with Antoinette’s shutter eye, there, waiting for a bus he didn’t have the fare to take.

Antoinette image in frame reference, smiled to her innermost self, she had found what she wanted to do, all that time sitting, cooking, reading, waiting for Lauren’s happening life to come home to tell the tale of the outside world, all that became shadows, lighting fixtures, shades, images, she was going to take up photography. She found a phonebook, camera shop in the area, found Edgar’s photography studio. She noted that they taught the fine art of photography, only five blocks from where she stood she walked shutter eyeing everything in her path.

Edgar was a man far into his fifties, energetic fellow, dark greased hair, back towards the stern of his neck, a muscled face, hands steady as a tripod, giant cavernous eyes, perhaps of Greek ancestry. Antoinette entry into his photo-shop did not alter his stance, the door rang a warning bell, “someone has entered into your premises.” He did not twitch, simply continued manhandling a camera. Antoinette did not seem to care his absence of mind, instead she started to look at the photographs, a ballerina tending to her pained toes, gone was the leathered slipper, the toes were bruised purpled pretending to have divinely upheld Swan Lake without caring for their after the fact, her toenails had long fallen out as audience to her profession, her splendor undiminished, she graced the black and white lighting with her stingy silhouette. Next to it was a picture of three little girls all friends or sisters, sharing the same type of dress code though one was shiny pink, the other green and one reddish complementing a plum little girl that was all joy if not beauty. They all had one thing in common, their front teeth were missing. A third painting was of a dog, waiting outside a door, a terrier it was, it was dark, a lamp sprung from the top of the frame as if there to shine exclusively on this lonely expectant dog, his brown, white coat, stealing the only color in the entire photograph.

“How can I help you ma’am?” The monotone voice echoed and recoiled through Antoinette’s skull, stubbornly awakening her from some trance, “oh, yes…” her hand to her chest, “…sorry, yes, I was wondering you teach photography and I was thinking of taking some classes.” “Have you ever done any photography.” “No, well no but when I was a little girl I got one of those toy cameras…” she was smiling, “…and I did take photos of every relative that came to the house.” Edgar unamused, “Not exactly what I eman ma’am.” Antoinette recomposing herself to a more professional stance that didn’t go with the dusty, chaotic and stuffy atmosphere of the place, “No of course that wasn’t what you were asking, my apologies, I am interested in taking classes, how much do you charge and what is the class schedule sir.” “Don’t call me sir, call me Edgar, Edgar is my name. And I don’t have a class schedule you just tell me when you want to learn, I charge by the hour $33 dollars an hour. You are a beginner so I have to teach you everything, give yourself three months about four times a week, four hours a class, and if you have any talent ma’am I will make a photographer out of you.”

Antoinette, “what do I need?” “You will need to have a 35 millimeter camera, you buy all the film and development materials, they are not included.” “Do you sell cameras here?” “No ma’am strictly I am a photographer, real photographers don’t sell cameras, I don’t make much money, but I don’t betray my art.” “Is there one that you would recommend?” Edgar laughs, his beer belly helping to pronounce his laughter, “ma’am yes, I could recommend one but it would cost you ten thousand dollars, nice German brand, but I am not going to recommend one, you just buy yourself any 1980’s popular 35 millimeter and that will do, funny it was a wonderful decade for cameras, the eighties I mean, then come out then digital nasty things and killed the perfection of photography.” “Very well then, I will purchase one, when can we start?” “Well it depends do you want to learn color shots or do you want to learn pure black and white?” “I don’t know which is better?” “Well ma’am you can want color because color is good and it is happier and contemporary and concentrated in the present and future, black and white is another era, many photographers never migrated from that perfection which was oddly killed by the imperfection of color. Strange ma’am, it always seems the perfection gets killed by innovation. Anyway black and white or color either are fine by me, am not one to brand one better than the other, it’s the artsy crowd that wants to dote on the past as avant-guard needs and does that, not me ma’am.” “well I suppose then color would be best for me, I don’t have a preference, but if I take pictures of little children in the park I think color would be best.” “Well then fine ma’am, we can start Tuesday, 9am, have your camera ready. And remember it’s four hours. Oh, and also bring four rolls of film, every class.” “Thank you Edgar, Tuesday, I will be on time.”

Antoinette, walked out with her hands in her pockets, happy soul, she was thrilled with her decision, she had wanted to do this, there was still money in the savings to bankroll this minute-adventure, besides, Lauren would help out, they were both so liberal with their wallets, they shared everything. Worries aside, she went camera shopping, she wanted time to feel and touch the camera, time to accustom herself to it before her first class. The first camera shop she went to was pushing the digital camera’s Joey, the digital attendant, “lady this one is hot it handles 1600x1200 pixels, and it does 32 bit per pixel, you can even shoot short movies with it, has built-in auto adjust zoom…” Antoinette knew technology, but she was exhausted by the talk, she left Joey without a sale, though fortunately he was convinced that she had made the wrong decision by not buying.

The next camera shop was full of 35 millimeter digitals, and a tie robed salesman eager to explain why their cameras were still superior to digital. Salesman Freddy “Digital cameras still don’t give you the genuine resolution or color that 35 millimeter SLR does, even the industry admits that the texturing and lighting characteristics are still far from reaching the flavor of 35 millimeters…” Taking the huge black camera and putting it right up the Antoinette’s face. “…specially if you are going to be a professional photographer, this is your camera Ms.!” Antoinette walked out, she didn’t know why, she walked out, for sure the camera she needed was in that store, she walked out. Almost decided to go home and leave the camera shopping for later but opted to visit one more place though she was tired.

It was a used camera store, an old bald man with round glasses and a nice cotton sweater immediately paid attention to her. She said, “Hello I would like to buy a 35 millimeter camera, what do you have?” “Well excuse me for being intrusive lady but what do you want it for, I know you say you want a 35 millimeter camera but my customers often come in here wanting one thing and they walk out with the thing they need.” “Why do you say that.” “Its something to do with the business, I been in this business for 33 years, and not to sound hardened but I am more likely to know what you need than you do.” “Well I am going to be taking photography lessons, I start on Tuesday and I need a camera.” The old man seems to munch those words with his mouth and not his ears, he is probably not listening, he probably made Antoinette out from the moment she walked in. “I would say then that what you need is an instant Polaroid so that you can see what your shooting immediately.” “But my instructor suggested a 35 millimeter.” “That doesn’t surprise me, photographers are in love with those things, because they are complicated, because they require nursing, because you fall in love with them, they require maintenance, calibration, sunshine, and so on… lady I been in this shutter business all my life, am not saying I love photography, frankly I haven’t taken a photo in eight years, when my wife died, I stopped taking pictures, but not because my wife died but because it was time to stop. Anyways the most important thing to learn when you are taking photographs is perspective and mood, the mood is the most difficult thing to capture, that, only born photographers catch, perspective, you shoot 200 shots your bound to get some perspective in there, some people are better than others with perspective, but the difference between a genius and a good photographer is mood. Capture the mood and you have the moment. And photography is only the moment.” “Something about the man’s words caught Antoinette, he seemed right about something, “So then what camera would you recommend?” “The best camera for you is an instant Polaroid…” he slides a cabinet door open, from behind cluttered lenses and cases, he pulls out a dusty instamatic Polaroid camera. “This here is what you need, its not the latest model, there are newer, but this does the job just fine, it takes the picture, you wait five minutes and it develops before your eyes. Its just a mood camera, it takes dusty pictures, granular even, you can’t get too much color out of it, the color always seems dull as wax, and brightness and clarity are obscured, but for the mood, this is a mood camera, it only, primarily and fundamentally takes a mood picture.” While Antoinette was dealing with some uncertainty, without asking he briskly loaded some film on it, then backed away from the counter, and shot a picture of Antoinette without giving her an opportunity to pose. “These cameras are grossly underrated, it is the only mood camera in the market, and they are going to be abandoned after the digital revolution walks all over them.” The minutes pass, “See here, there you are, the sort of undefined colors, the lack of a propensity for anything to stand out, even you from your surroundings are largely indistinguishable, there isn’t a part of the photograph that doesn’t mandate complete attention to define its details, and the whole one dimensional expression of everything, nothing is far away, nothing is closer, and your eyes are the ones that define the focus, its amazing, purely a mood camera, I recommend this one.” Antoinette, intensely looked at the man, “I will take it thank you.”

And with that ended a successful purchase of the mood camera. Even though a few hours had passed, Antoinette made it a point to go by the bus stop to see if the old man was there, he wasn’t, she took out one of the many cartridges of film that she had purchased, loaded it, and took a picture of the empty bus stop. That was her first picture, she never went to class on Tuesday; an emotion like Antoinette did not need classes to handle a mood camera.