Photographic Evidence 
I resolved to set up Daddy's reading list at the end of the week. Just because I was opening my father's practice to a fault in the world of fine literature, while the survey desperately all possible career alternatives to be an English teacher, does not mean that I should losing my mind. I have been giving me the summer to get my shit together. If I had not realized in August to reinvent myself - an air hostess? speech? librarian? beautician? - Can I be sentenced to the gulag of academia for another year.
Ugh. The conference podium. The thought turned my stomach.
Dad tried to detach myself from my discomfort based on her life experience. "Do not forget the two years we spent in Trinidad? This was not a picnic."
He spoke of the job he had accepted in Port of Spain in the late 70s, shortly after my birth. The company was building a steel plant there and the opportunity to live in a tropical paradise had met my parents as a great adventure.
The first months were the honeymoon phase, but the reality set in. blackouts. cultural isolation. TV for only one hour per day. The supermarket had rarely onions, cheese and diapers.
Daddy's point in raising Trinidad was clear: everyone must pay dues career. I paid for my education in the wilds of Nova Scotia. Things would get better. Think positive.
Yes, whatever.
I dug up an album of old photos. "You have not half as bad as me." I took a photo of him lounging on the beach, eat a sandwich cook shark. Mom was sunbathing in a bikini Turquoise Paisley.
"Oh, you have no idea what was happening behind the scenes," Papa said. "I was losing my hair."
"No, you were not." I took the picture at its own hairstyle 1970s. Long before striking brushed, diapers falling on the ears.
"Believe me - the place was a Gong Show."
But basically I do not think so.
Later that day, I was surfing the archives New York Times online and I came across Susan Sontag's brilliant 1974 article on photography. Each sentence was struck with a new idea, illuminating my reaction perfectly:
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Published by blogerzoom
Posted on May 27, 2010.
