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jack_babalonIt's the humidity that brings them out. The human bugs crawling out of the asshole cracks of the city. They can smell the 'artist' on me I guess and figure me for an easy mark. Now to be honest most of these cats are just down on their luck and wanna make me for some change. No worrys there. A buck or whatever i've got under and they nod me a small thanks and make their way to wherever it is they've got to go. It's the others that bother me. The Hungry Ghosts of the Bardo Terminus.
It's Sunday and i'm working my camera on Euclid. I pull off the road, my back brakes are shot so my baby screeches to a halt. I hop off, pop the Nikon from my messenger bag and start framing some tags thrown up in an alley way between a two story home and the third world bazaar on the corner. Behind me this cyclist glides to a halt a few feet away and proceeds to eye ball fucking me like we used to date. I check this guy out to see if this is some stray character I might've known from back in the day but nothing comes up on the memory radar.
This guy is in a full gray jogging suit with the hoodie up. It's actually covered with enough stains that I made it for urban camo at first. Blond hair dangles from under the hood and he just sits on this beat up old ten speed watching intently me like a bird in a branch.
"What's up man?" I finally ask him.
"Nothin'" he says with a shrug still watching me.
"Did you do this?" I nod to the tag admiringly: Bubble gum words float on the brick wall. A graffiti cartoon man dressed all blue stands adjacent doing a hard man stance; arms folded and fronting serious attitude.
"Nah" cycle freak shakes his head, "Jes' passing through." He says this with no accent. No emotion. He continues to sit there and watch me but now I got one pissed off looking dreadlocked brother coming at me from across the street.
"You have a light!" he says inches from my face, looking me up and down. This is not a question. This is not a request. This is a statement.
"Excuse me?" I answer.
"I said You have a light!"
I feel like i'm in a bad spy movie and that this is my contact and i'm supposed to reply back to him with something equally cryptic:'and the light will guide me across the abyss.' and then we'd do the funky mason handshake and he'd give me the map and i'd give him the key...
"A light." He repeats still looking me up and down like we're gonna go at it.
"Nope." I shrug. I do of course, but i'll be damned if i'm playing straight man for the walking damned.
He keeps the bad ass stare trained on me. Cycle freak stares at me. A cop car crawls by us. I see the cop craning his neck to get a gander at the three of us. He pulls up half a block and turns into a driveway and turns around and comes back down.
Finally Mr.Angry Dreads walks off shooting me the Stink-Eye from over the shoulder. Cycle Freak takes this as his cue as well.
Well this is it. Now or never. I walk into the road. I raise my arms in the sign of a cross and stop two cars passing from opposite directions. I raise my camera and wrestle the difference between the vision and the lenses and I fire from the eye, slicing the image off the moment and making it mine.
I give a small wave and allow the cars to continue with the bored authority of a general. A single drop of rain falls a mile down from a dark cloud and against the wind, the friction and the odds, hits me square in the forehead.
I look up. Point my finger at god like a gun and wink at the old bastard. The cop makes another pass and I can see Cycle Freak from around the corner still checking me out. Fuck this. I mount my baby, bundle up the Nikon and drift on out before the shit comes down.
It's Sunday and i'm working my camera on Euclid. I pull off the road, my back brakes are shot so my baby screeches to a halt. I hop off, pop the Nikon from my messenger bag and start framing some tags thrown up in an alley way between a two story home and the third world bazaar on the corner. Behind me this cyclist glides to a halt a few feet away and proceeds to eye ball fucking me like we used to date. I check this guy out to see if this is some stray character I might've known from back in the day but nothing comes up on the memory radar.
This guy is in a full gray jogging suit with the hoodie up. It's actually covered with enough stains that I made it for urban camo at first. Blond hair dangles from under the hood and he just sits on this beat up old ten speed watching intently me like a bird in a branch.
"What's up man?" I finally ask him.
"Nothin'" he says with a shrug still watching me.
"Did you do this?" I nod to the tag admiringly: Bubble gum words float on the brick wall. A graffiti cartoon man dressed all blue stands adjacent doing a hard man stance; arms folded and fronting serious attitude.
"Nah" cycle freak shakes his head, "Jes' passing through." He says this with no accent. No emotion. He continues to sit there and watch me but now I got one pissed off looking dreadlocked brother coming at me from across the street.
"You have a light!" he says inches from my face, looking me up and down. This is not a question. This is not a request. This is a statement.
"Excuse me?" I answer.
"I said You have a light!"
I feel like i'm in a bad spy movie and that this is my contact and i'm supposed to reply back to him with something equally cryptic:'and the light will guide me across the abyss.' and then we'd do the funky mason handshake and he'd give me the map and i'd give him the key...
"A light." He repeats still looking me up and down like we're gonna go at it.
"Nope." I shrug. I do of course, but i'll be damned if i'm playing straight man for the walking damned.
He keeps the bad ass stare trained on me. Cycle freak stares at me. A cop car crawls by us. I see the cop craning his neck to get a gander at the three of us. He pulls up half a block and turns into a driveway and turns around and comes back down.
Finally Mr.Angry Dreads walks off shooting me the Stink-Eye from over the shoulder. Cycle Freak takes this as his cue as well.
Well this is it. Now or never. I walk into the road. I raise my arms in the sign of a cross and stop two cars passing from opposite directions. I raise my camera and wrestle the difference between the vision and the lenses and I fire from the eye, slicing the image off the moment and making it mine.
I give a small wave and allow the cars to continue with the bored authority of a general. A single drop of rain falls a mile down from a dark cloud and against the wind, the friction and the odds, hits me square in the forehead.
I look up. Point my finger at god like a gun and wink at the old bastard. The cop makes another pass and I can see Cycle Freak from around the corner still checking me out. Fuck this. I mount my baby, bundle up the Nikon and drift on out before the shit comes down.
