I really appreciate our association with Yellow Door Concerts. They put us in interesting places in Alexandria, VA and we generally have a good time. Add to that : this time we had a friend pop in from Columbus OH AND my photography teacher from high school, Mr. Don Fear, and it was a recipe for joy.
Lots of sun?
Okay. A little less joy.
VERY WINDY being on the WATERFRONT?
Okay – a little more challenge. The madness of getting down to Alexandria VA from Baltimore, MD and navigating when someone named rob reads the wrong address off the contract? It wasn’t just the environment throwing us both metaphorical and literal roadblocks, but still, music makes it better.
There’s something really special about having someone who… frankly helped MOLD you in your youth, come out and enjoy what you do now. I am SO far outside the ken of anything I imagined being, back when I was working in Mr. Fear’s darkroom, but somehow he seeded some of it. He was the Young Hip teacher (at least till Miss Austin joined the school… she was a MISS!!!!) and at that time that meant a man still quietly recovering from being a Vietnam wartime photographer. He introduced me to Tom Waits. Strange sounds in the darkness. A hidden world.
Hell, sometimes I think it was photography that started me on my Journey – not because it taught me to See or was part of a grand aesthetic realization or anything – but rather because it’s a strange combination of technical prowess, required nerdery as it comes to KNOWING one’s gear to realize one’s art, and then the actual realization of the … import of moment? A flick of the shutter isn’t so different from a moment on stage. You blink and you miss it. You’re trying to freeze it, chase it, immortalize it – but the moment of creation is LIGHTNING fast.
The moment of perfection takes Lifetimes.
It was a joy to see him not-at-all doing battle with a local photographer who comes out to see us in Alexandria, and all I could think as I watched Don snap a couple of photos was THE STRAP IS NOT FOR DECORATION.
Formative indeed. He instilled a couple of good habits that continue to this day.
Thanks Mr. Fear.
