Things have been upended, we all know this and deal with it on a daily basis. Even in my neck of the global woods (shout-out to the podcast Stuff They Don’t Want You to Know for that line, which I shamelessly stole), daily life has not been the same for quite some time now. Most lately, a statewide mask order has been issued for all inside spaces. A little before that, I took to our old town with my Voigtländer Bessa T and a roll of Fomapan 100, which I shot at 200.
While April and May here were characterized by nearly empty shops and streets, since Memorial Day there has been a steady increase in tourism. For better or worse, the restless hordes will not be stopped. As local industry relies on tourists, this is a sign of the lifeblood beginning to flow again, so while businesses must be cautious and implement new protocols, they are scrambling to accommodate the traffic.
The weekends are busiest, so this is when I choose to go into town and walk around. In a normal year, I find shooting the tourists to be rather boring. But this is not a normal year by any means.
I have not decided whether the change is mainly in the people who come to town, or in myself. But there is a different note to the music on the street now. A melancholy change in the usual kaleidoscopic honky-tonk of carefree coastal day tripping. The masks and furtive social distancing attempts give many interactions a different vibe, and visitors have a subdued air for the most part.
I think we are all breathing the freer air of summer afternoons with a bit more appreciation after stay at home orders and news reports compounded upon each other to heighten everyone’s sense of alarm. For myself, photographing on the street has been a way of shrugging off a lot of the pent-up anxiety and regaining something of a sense of autonomy and proactivity. Something we all need to look for as we realize that we must make the best of where we are.
The Sprocket Docket 