frank.

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Over the weekend, before the heat broke and when all of New York City was still sweltering and the idea of being outside seemed like the absolute worst idea ever, I ventured out with Percy — not a light load! — to take some late afternoon photos.   At one point I needed to reload film into the camera, so I found a stoop, shaded by some scaffolding, and sat down with the camera.  Percy, mind you, isn’t a very easy camera to load: the sprockets where you connect the spools of 120 film are tricky to latch onto, and well, I could go on, but long camera geek explanation short: it’s a pain in the ass.

While this was going on, a fellow walked up to me and inquired about the camera.  That’s quite a camera!, he laughed.  So big!  I smiled and nodded, and we talked a bit about the weather and the camera and the neighborhood.  Throughout the conversation, I was still trying to get the camera properly loaded.  Percy was ever so persnickety this afternoon!  Even so, I decided to brave the question anyway to the man standing in front of me: May I take your photograph?

The fellow smoothed down his hair, asked if he ought to wear a hat (I shook my head, Nah, you look great!), and agreed to sit on the stoop for me while I finally — FINALLY — managed to get the camera loaded and used the light meter to make sure everything was exposed properly.  He sat patiently for three shots, then ambled down and shook my hand. My name’s Frank, he said.  You should come out to the salsa party on the pier sometime!  There’s some good photographs to be taken out there!

He was awesome.  And I just might.

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