highway #12

Highway #12 was made on a cold dreary day when my friend Jay and I left the city to take pictures of rural landscapes — fallen barns, abandoned homes, cars that had been forgotten, anything that conjured images from a Flannery O’Connor tale of lost souls waiting to be met by God’s grace. Outward scenes that reflected how I was feeling on the inside. But over time this picture moved from darkness to light and became a testament to male friendship. I was so depressed at the time trying to repair a marriage that turned out to be beyond repair. It was a traumatic event that triggered an OCD episode characterized by an onslaught of constant distressing intrusive thoughts with accompanying feelings of despair. It sounds strange but I was lucky to have a friend who was going through an equally awful time. It was so helpful to have someone who was just there. It’s rare that men can be a support to each other because our misguided notions of masculinity tell us we’re not supposed to be vulnerable and express hurt and sadness. Shortly after this, Jay moved his family to Quebec, and me and my ex separated then divorced, much like the two beat-up cars going in opposite directions but hanging on to their former glory, surviving the weather and the attempts of the earth to swallow them up. I’m forever grateful for this friendship and when I look back on this time in my life I can choose to remember it differently - not with bitterness and resentment but rather I can see how God spoke to me, cared for me, and brought healing through a friend like Jay.

the violent bear it away

“He knew that he was the stuff of which fanatics and madmen are made and that he had turned his destiny as if with his bare will. He kept himself upright on a very narrow line between madness and emptiness and when the time came for him to lose his balance he intended to lurch toward emptiness and fall on the side of his choice.”

The Violent Bear It Away was made about an hour north of Montreal. If you’re not paying attention this stretch of road’ll kill you — you’ve never seen drivers so fast and reckless as in rural Quebec. Whenever I look at this picture I’m reminded of a passage from Flannery O’Connor’s novel of the same name: “He knew that he was the stuff of which fanatics and madmen are made and that he had turned his destiny as if with his bare will. He kept himself upright on a very narrow line between madness and emptiness and when the time came for him to lose his balance he intended to lurch toward emptiness and fall on the side of his choice.” Leading up to making this picture I was sitting in a coffee shop with my friend Jay and he was telling me he was going to this cabin in Northern Quebec to get away for a few days because he was depressed and despairing. “Yeah, me too,” I responded and proceeded to invite myself. I brought a handful of point and shoot cameras for the journey — Ricoh GRD, Yashica T4, and finally the one this photo was taken on, HOLGA 120N most likely with Kodak T-Max 400. It’s one of my favourite pictures and a great reminder of how far I’ve come in the past decade — from despairing and thinking I might end up in a mental health hospital to feeling a sense of hope and feelings of joy and gratitude. I no longer feel like I’m choosing between madness and emptiness.