resolution: let your freak flag fly
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~Allen Ginsberg
One of my last photographs taken in 2007, and a stellar one wouldn’t you say? So it’s not art, it was sort of a catalyst for one of my New Years resolutions.
I noticed this crazy kid from a distance returning over and over again to the water fountain where he would fill up as much water as he could, from there determining just how far it was possible to spray the water up and out of his mouth. It would look as if he was done with this game, and then time and again he was magnetically pulled back to the fountain for another try. When I got closer I wanted him to look in my direction so called out, “wow, you must be really thirsty!”. He never even glanced at me, just kept filling up and then squirting water out of his mouth as he emphatically shook his head no. “Then why do you keep going back to the water fountain?”, I questioned again, hoping to provoke him to turn and look at me. Finally he briefly glanced in my direction, mouth half full of water, and I got this shot. A second later after he’d thoroughly impressed himself with the geyser shooting out of his mouth he answered smugly, “because I like to.”
Well there you have it, a pearl of wisdom from nine year old Carl. What more reason need there be to do anything than simply because we like to? And yet how often can we as adults say we are doing something solely and purely for this reason alone? I stayed there for a while and continued to photograph a series of pretty disgusting images until I began to suspect that Carl was now trying to soak me and my camera as part of his game and decided it was time to move on.
Realizing he’d lost his only audience young Carl called out to me, “Hey lady, why do you take so many pictures?” To which I of course answered with a big Cheshire cat grin, “because I like to.”
So here’s to a new year that I aspire to more faithfully follow my inner moonlight and become less afraid to let my freak flag fly. Thanks, Carl.
~Cynthia
