My camera shapes my life and the way I approach it. It makes the occasion. Let's take a picture, I say. We are all together and in a good mood. Enjoying our luxury of being together. I get my Nikon out of the filing cabinet. I put it on the table, the window sill, or beside me on the floor. Nearby. It's there -- impossible not to be aware of it. But it's not a powerful presence for anybody except me. Half of my head is thinking, what will work, what will be good. Should I move over? [The answer usually, no, I opt for the sense/ease of it.] We stay put. Where we are. The other half of my head is into the conversation. Responding to it. There. My manipulation/seduction is naked. I want to elicit response from my friends/relax them. Create a circumstance I can't define before I have it, but recognize when it happens. That's it. The camera reinforces our high.
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