Is Exposure Existence?
There was a time before you were, and there will be a time after. There is nothing to fear.
There will be photos where I exist and photos where I don’t. Photos are not life but can tear holes in the cosmos with a glance. When will I be? Where did I go? Was I ever there? Will I ever be? There are times when I was not because I simply did not exist. Not here. Here. Arrived. Gone.
The before times. The after. I did not and will not know myself at either time.
Once upon a video time—which is just a photograph that moves—the talk show host Larry King confessed to comedian Norm Macdonald that he had a fear of not existing. This seems very specific. There is the fear of death, or of how you’ll die and if it will be painful or not, but not existing seems a much sharper blade on the reaping scythe. It brings in the meaning of it all. The punch-clock point. The rub.
Norm. Norm the thinker. As a way of allaying fears, Norm begins to tell Larry a story about the writer Nabokov seeing a picture of his mother and sister before Nabokov was born. Before he existed.
I stop there.
I stop there because there was also a time before I existed. There is a photograph of my parents and my brother, happy and young and unaware of my future existence. Of who and what I will be. Of when I will arrive. The if of me. If I will be of consequence is of no consequence to them, because in this photo I do not exist and they are neither happy nor unhappy about it.
They know nothing of it. And when I am gone, neither will I.
Again.
Water flows. Time ticks. Existence expands to the very edges of my page.
There is the where you are or were, and the where you are not now or anymore. How can this be? I say to you, how can it not? Present, then un-present. We should not fear this, but we do.
We are afraid of so many things.
Love the photographs, but don’t put too much stock in them. This is easy to say. Easy to say when you don’t exist and you’re not the one left behind. It does not take into account when a photograph might be all that someone has of you. All they have to hold onto.
But know this.
Photographs are a modern construct that both prove and disprove life in equal measure. Memories are unreliable and fade, but you could also say memory is a far better record. Less factually honest perhaps, but kinder. Memory sloughs off the rough edges over time and gives us an outline of a person’s existence. Without the red-eye. Without the desaturation of time. Without the poor lighting and rule of thirds transgressions.
One day, when I no longer exist—a long time from now, I hope—I’d like you to forget the mole on my chin. I would like you to forget my relentless freckles and my scraggly hair and the up and down photographic record of my weight and poor fashion choices. I was there but I am not there. In that photograph. But use it as you will. You have my permission.
Photos are not everything. They have not been the essential element to the record of humanity, though they do help speed things along. Did those who came before the photograph not exist? Of course not. Drawings, you say. There were drawings and paintings, which are photographs of sorts. And literature. Hieroglyphics. Those are word photographs. That’s what stood for proof in ye olde times.
But why do we need proof? Isn’t living enough?
Photos live in the past—existence lives in the now. We are air. We are vapor. We are the before, during, and after. Should I look at the photo of my father, mother, and brother and think I am less here now simply because I was not there, then? And my mother. Is she less here simply because she is now gone? Another tear in the cosmos.
It’s all perspective.
I was not there. I am here now, but still not there in that photograph. I am here now, but will not be, later. It is the same for everyone.
Hold the photograph, but hold it in your mind long after you hold it in your hand. The photo is merely a touchstone or a trigger to unlock that door, but it is not the real. It is an unreliable narrator to the story we tell ourselves and each other. They were here. You felt them. You are here. Be felt.
Life goes on. I appeared, and one day I shall disappear. I might have a say in it, I might not. Every day we wake up is a miracle. Every day we wake up is another photograph. Are you existing merely to be photographed, or are you ignoring the lens and just getting on with it?
We exist through our actions and the impact of those actions upon others. Empathy, compassion, love, anger, yelling at clouds, and so on. Photographs are only a small capture mechanism in the big picture of it all. People’s houses burn down, and with them, photo albums. Hard drives die but people’s memories do not. Both Larry and Norm no longer exist, yet here I am watching them talk. What worry do either of them have now? None. Zero. Zilch. There’s no point worrying about when you’ll die or cease to exist anymore. That is, to put it bluntly, a waste of your unlimited limited time.
The absence of your existence affects those left behind, but you won’t know anything about it. Don’t waste a second of your life worrying about the future absence of you from it. You are simply no longer in that picture. To exist at all you must exist in the now. Not the later, not the eventually—the now of this very minute. You must exist in every breath and stress the exhale to the world. I exist therefore I am doing things. Sure, take a photo of me for your records, but know that I don’t need it as proof of my life. If it brings you comfort I give it gladly. I give it with joy, chin mole and all.
I will not take my existence for granted. I will not take yours for granted, either.
I will wake up. I will move on. I will go. I will continue to type into this machine to make it so. This is my photograph. Put it in the cloud. Feel free to yell at it from time to time.
Yours in tiny thought,
Janeen
This week’s amends…
Some drawing tips from Gary Panter.1
“Most people (even your favorite artists) don’t like their drawings as much as they want to. Why? Because it is easy to imagine something better. This is only ambition, which is not a bad thing — but if you can accept what you are doing, of course you will progress quicker to a more satisfying level and also accidentally make perfectly charming drawings even if they embarrass you.
And another tip
Don’t worry about a style. It will creep up on you and eventually you will have to undo it in order to go further. Be like a river and accept everything.
Via a NearSightedMonkey Tumblr post with all ten tips.
On Rotation: “The Robots” by Senor Coconut.
Looking for a playlist? I’ve been collecting the weekly On Rotations in a Spotify Playlist.
Love the animation and this trailer for the film “Ice Merchants” by João Gonzalez. Colossal has more info on the project.
Via Colossal
Love something as much as this guy loves Dungeons and Dragons. His campaign has been going on for 40 years.
Via BoingBoing
Did any of this spark a tiny thought of your own?