Almost Impossible

I haven't slept well at all of late.  I'm back to my old tricks, waking far too early in the morning and never getting back to sleep.  Today, during a meeting, I couldn't keep my eyes open.  It was like that road hypnotism you get sometimes where no matter what you do, even if you move and shake your head, your eyes will not stay open.  I know that I was dreaming with my eyes open today.  I'd come to and look around to see if anyone was staring.  How long had I been out, I wondered?  It was quite awful.

So when I found out that my boss was leaving for the day early in the afternoon, I followed suit.  I just wanted to get my workout over with and lie upon my couch.  But when I pulled into the parking lot at the YMCA and got out of the car, fatigue had gripped my body.  I didn't want to do this.  It would be stupid to work out the way I felt, I told myself.  Sincerely.  It would be a grand mistake.  Halfway across the parking lot, I turned around and headed back to the car.

I decided to go to the studio for a bit.  There were several things I wanted to try out and the late afternoon was beautiful and I surely didn't want to be in the house.  When I arrived, though, I got caught up in a conversation with "the boys."  It is necessary sometimes and it is fun to stand out and drink a whiskey and chat about whatever.  And when my friend the artist came up, I asked him if he wanted to try to make an 8x10 again.  Sure, he said.  He was up for it.  I should mention that some of his work is archived in the Polaroid Collection and the Polaroid Corporation provided him with the old color 8x10 film and a processor for free when he was working in that medium.  So it was good to have him about.

I prepared the film, placing it in the holder, and then I pulled out the cardboard sheet that protects the film. But it looked odd. . . because it wasn't the cardboard sheet at all.  It was the film itself, gray and shiny.  I looked at the artist sheepishly.  Oops.  That was $20 gone.  The next time, I was less cavalier.  I metered the light and set the aperture and the shutter speed and. . . boom!  Anxiously, I took the exposed film to the processor and stuck it in with the top sheet hoping that I hadn't ruined the machine last time when I ran the two through together incorrectly.  I pushed the button and everything sounded fine.  I was excited waiting to see the results, but after four minutes, we pulled the picture from the dark safe. . . and. . . you see the result at the top of the post.  Something was wrong, obviously.  The developing goop had not made its way evenly across the page.  Indeed, it looked like there was something wrong with the rollers themselves.  So I pulled the machine apart and cleaned it all once again, inspected it, and put it back together thinking that this was just like me to buy something and break it right off the bat.  I do that a lot.

"Let's try another," I said after I had cleaned the rollers once again, and he was willing.  Boom!

This time, the film came out blank.  I'd done something wrong.  We went back to look at the camera, looked at the settings, tested the shutter.  Everything was right.

"I think you might have put the film in backwards," my friend said.

"Well, I'm forty dollars upside down on film and haven't a clean picture yet.  Let's try once more."

And we did.  And as I set the controls, Erik Satie came on the stereo, and I knew deep down that things would go right.

Boom!

And four minutes later, I had a fairly decent picture.  The processor was working correctly now without lines or streaks.  I had overexposed the film a bit, but that was going to happen.  I was happy.  The long, slow process with this camera had begun.

Now I go outside and start a new project.  I will, I think, because this will cost me a lot of money.  I am perverse that way.  But we will see.

The good print is back at the studio, but I brought this one home to scan.  My first image on my own.  Fucked up.  Pretty cool.