Made a Nice Lady Cry
“All I wanted was just a simple meal… I didn’t want to go to McDonalds, you know?…” She said, sighing between each sentence. She looked over to her toddler son with affection while stroking his short blond hair. Then she started to weep softly, her hand meeting her mouth gracefully as her eyes turned a shade pink. If I didn’t feel like shit before, now it was remarkably unmistakable. They looked so defenseless and meek sitting at a big round booth big enough for 6 people and the vinyl seat cushion around her engulfed her and the little boy. They only took a sliver of space in the center designed for sturdy hungry small-town folks. She huddled the little boy closer to her, seeking some comfort. “I’m so sorry, I’ll put the order in right away…” I said. I’ve said this line many times before, but this time I meant it. My head hung heavy as a bowling ball, straining to keep it upright.
I’ve forgotten to punch in the orders before but this time... I have no idea how It was so delayed. I’ve must have made layers of errors. I mean, it happened more than 30 years ago. Those kiosk thing where you punch in the order was very confusing back then, you know? This was way before Steve Jobs and ‘user friendly interface’. You had to remember the codes and some pages didn’t make any sense… But this was unforgettable. Here I am still remembering this incident after 30 years. Still wanting to apologize more.
She sniffled, rubbing her small nose with her right hand, and with other, she stroked her boy’s hair on auto pilot, looking down at her empty placemat. The boy was distraught as she was, just staring down at his paper coloring placemat in complete silence… No playful scribbles on his placemat. I walked towards the kitchen thinking, ‘I should really look for a different job…’. Yeah, no shit.
One day, driving home from Red Lobster, where I crushed many souls, I saw this vinyl banner hung on side of an old 3 story building that said, “Photographers Wanted”. “Really?” I thought. Is that even a thing? I even thought it was bit strange advertising it that way. I mean, you would have a problem with a horde of people wanting to get paid working as a photographer, right?
Ever since I saw my sister’s black and white photo of a whistling tea kettle on a stove for her photography 101 class, I was very interested in photography. Actually, I was always interested in photography since I was little in South Korea, where I was born. I loved working my dad’s camera, looking through the rangefinder, seeing all these weird numbers and needles moving around… Had absolutely no idea what it all meant, and either my dad didn’t know himself or he just didn’t feel like explaining it to a 5 year old. Many years have passed, then my sister’s photo sparked my interest again. But I never thought that you can make a living doing it, like a doctor, or grocery store manager or a waiter at a reputable restaurant where they serve “freshly frozen, NOT Frozen” seafood? But here it was. Right in front of me. It says it right there, “Photographers Wanted”! What the hell am I waiting for?
What got me thinking about my sister’s photo was the freedom of what you can take a photo of. The freedom of choice of what you want to photograph. Why take a picture of a tea kettle? That first decision to point the camera to whatever you’re interested in is the first step of exercising your freedom. The entire process of taking a picture all the way to working it in the darkroom or in Lightroom are many many steps of making deliberate choices. And the more your choices are honest to what makes you happy, YOUR photos will come out. This is your “style” your “voice”… whatever you call it.
This takes time and many failures to understand. There are no shortcuts. 30 years of experience you can only get it in 30 years. In this blog, I would like to share what I’ve learned along the way of my photography journey. By the way, just because you’ve done something longer than others does not mean you’re “better”. I urge you to be careful how you use the word, “better”. To me, in the art of photography (any art, for that matter) “better” is when you’ve gone as close as you can to expressing your true self, with total honesty, without a hint of thought of, ‘what I should…’ That is the goal. It has nothing to do with anyone else. I hope you come back here and hopefully get entertained or learn something. Enjoy the journey.