The Sad Man–Episode Two
I rush out to the street leaving the café and the newspaper behind. Reflections seem to have more life than the flesh surrounding me, and every sound swells with its own existence. The squeal of a cab’s overheated brakes, the impatient pounding of crosswalk buttons, the ensuing beep signaling it’s safe to cross, and the sounds of feet anesthetize what little feelings I have. I can separate the clicking high heels from the scraping shuffle of men’s leather soled shoes, and can even hear the hushed squish of sneakers. A couple of barefooted hippies pass by, and I shoot them a glare as if they had interrupted my ballad. Silence is the loudest note.
I stare down a subway tunnel and think about how cities are called seas of humanity. Seas have life, seas have cycles that never waste. Every organism in a sea has a purpose. So how can this be a sea? Is this life? Our greed and our disconnect will lead us to decay, and only then will we give back what we have taken.
As the skys darken, I can feel Karen next to me looking for the exact place where the sun would shine. She had a way of finding beginnings where most would only see the end. Places where things were burnt, raw and desolate were the places where she felt most alive.
Why isn’t she alive? She would chisel through these clouds, remind me how darkness is temporary. A tug on my pant leg startles me and I look down at eyes. Eyes that scream I can and I will. I know those eyes; I used to have them. A Latin American boy is looking up at me, his bright-orange garb and his soft smile brings warmth back to my body. The boy’s hands are a different shade than his face, not just dirty, but caked with the layers of survival and determination.
He sets down a bucket of flowers half as tall as him and asks, “Excuse sir, what you look at?”
I reply, “I’m looking for the sun kid, looking for light.”
“You look too hard sir,” he shoots back still holding onto my pant leg.
“Yeah, you may have something there…”
“Flowers?” he asks.
My voice cracks, “Sure kid.”
He clutches my ten-dollar bill and grips my pant leg even harder.
I smile and nod, “Keep it kid.”
The bucket leaves thin white trails of plastic on the sidewalk as he trudge off. Parts of the bucket are worn through and some of the flower’s stems stick out of the holes. Without turning around he points at the sky and shouts, “See sir! You look too hard!”
Extras!
The Latin American boy: The boy who sells the Sad Man flowers is a picture of a Peruvian lad that Lori and I met briefly during a trek in 2008. Our guide was annoying us so we lagged behind the group on purpose. As we stumbled along in the last light, a boy came bounding up the trail humming a tune. He was blissfully at home: charging along the only path he knew. I’ll never forget the freeness bursting from his eyes. We were trying to conceive at the time so we took it as a sign and now, two years later, we have a baby boy! I used the same picture in our birth announcement video, What Would Hope Be Without Disappointment?
Lori taking in the Andes right before we met the boy.
The Subway Tunnel Shots: I shot and edited this sequence for a short film back in 2004. The piece, Herded, was accepted to three short film festivals including the Oakland International Film Festival. Here’s another sequence from Herded.
Burnt and desolate places: Karen, the Sad Man’s deceased wife, loves places that are “burnt raw and desolate.” Although I love the lush green forests of the Northwest, there’s something about clear-cuts and burn areas that I love as well. Old stumps in general get me all gooey. Maybe it’s the potential, the history, or the how it reminds me of cycles. When I shot my promo video, Keep Going, with my mate, Brett Neiman, we chose a clear-cut as a location and got some fantastic shots. Check out the shot of me sitting on a giant stump with my laptop at the 2:20 mark. I think the stump was happy to provide me with a seat (Giving Tree…).
A few more pictures on the subject….
Old stumps in a drawn down reservoir and my mate, Brett Neiman, taking a Harmonica Break during the shooting of Keep Going.
Fog filled morning in a burn area: Central Oregon
Sad Man production challenges: I started writing Episode Two while Lori was in Labor (after the epidural when she was nice and cozy). Having a newborn in the house has made me reevaluate my expectations even more. The idea of glacial progress on a project has had to be adjusted again and again so I can keep going. Cliche’, I know…but it works! This piece was created second by second in between diaper changes, rocking, bouncing, and tending to Lori, three cats, a dog and a 100 year old house. And then there’s the ongoing work on my multimedia memoir (2011 Release Baby!). Somewhere in there I also managed to make a little money doing remodel jobs. Damn. No wonder why I’m so gray.
So when it came time to get the last shot (four months after starting), it felt more than celebratory. At midnight last Friday, after giving Lori and Rayden a smooch, I hopped on my old crusier with a backpack full of cameras and my computer. Dahlias from the garden picked by Lori’s gentle hands brushed my wrists as they flopped back forth in the basket; music from my I-Phone serenaded me. The river glistened in the almost full moon as wind waves fought the slow currents. City lights twinkled and homeless people mumbled and peed in the bushes. As I set up my tripod, a man asked me what I was doing. I smiled and replied, “Just playin’ man. Just playin’.”
Playin’
