Letter to a fellow Photog
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I hope this is a good way to reach you, I just read a couple of your shorter pieces, very good at the end of a loooooong fucking day, I look forward to reading the post about your grandfathers funereal, I’ve been thinking about mine alot lately…. you would of fit right in, it was a drinkers wake, but polish and italian, but every one got blotto, my grandma smoked unfiltered lucky strikes in the living room and my uncle fell down the stairs ar 4am with a full glass of makers mark, got up then drove his parents home, this all happened in Lawrence Mass, just another mill town that runs on the backs of abused immigrants and every one was there man, my grandfathers life touched so many others, he was a big talker, taught me how.
I forget about you know and again but not the look in your eye, its a hard look and I saw it in you a long time ago, I don’t remember when or where but I remember telling you that you took fascinating pictures without people in them, something i thought was impossible, and I respected you deeply for it, then you said I dealt with assholes in a way that you never could, and I only half believed you, cause they are all my friends if only for 30 seconds. I hope you understand what I mean.
I used to think I used people, grandpa Ed (I was named after him) drove the country after ww2 and sold insurance out the back of his car, he collected stories and matchbooks from every bar he ever went to, after he left and my grandmother had to be put away (Don’t do it if you can help it…. she wanted to die at home amoung friends and we kept her out with the ‘friendly’ doctors for a good 10 years… all she ever talked about at the end was why was she still here when all her friends, lovers and family were gone…
But anyways I digress after they left the house, me and my father threw everything away and the last thing we did was light Eddy Pula’s matchbook collection (He kept it in a giant glass vase) and it exploded all over the back yard.
Felt good.
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