Stayed at home almost all day writing, and it wasn’t even a sunny day, so no real light. Here’s a study of form and composition from my locality that I’ve not yet covered, however. The School in question is Stubbings, the steps go up to its lower entrance. (Not a contradiction in terms – that’s Hebden Bridge for you.) I make this the first post box to appear on the blog, though I might be wrong.
Despite being there this morning as well Blackpool fails to trouble the blog at all, and may well now never do so. Here we are back in familiar territory, all enjoying a gorgeous day, including the Muscovy duck who seems to have stuck around for the last 18 months since it last appeared on the blog in far less clement conditions.
One of the criteria for choosing which pictures get onto this blog is whether one encapsulates the day on which it was taken. That is not true of this photo. I had a busy day today, visited my parents and then had a Saturday night out with Clare, in Blackpool – and one could do an entire photo essay on the subject of ‘a Saturday night in Blackpool’ (though I think it might be a job more fitting for a war correspondent than a humble amateur like myself). There was great light today, a beautiful high summer’s day, and I took plenty of photos I was happy with.
Nevertheless, this wins. If the art of photography is not about capturing moments, those coincidences of place and time which raise any experience above the mundane and everyday, then I feel happy with what I’ve done here. This place could not be less exotic really, just a tunnel I pass through at least two or three times a week when I am here in town. But this morning I loved the way the light was spilling down the steps and giving it a warm feeling. This photo is exactly what I wanted it to be when I took it, and that happens only occasionally.
Joe was invited to the birthday party of one of his friends, and though it was a bit cool and damp to take the picnic that was planned, we (that is, about 8 adults, 15 kids and 3 dogs) did get a walk up on the fells above the western end of Hebden Bridge. It did occasionally remind me why I do tend to walk alone… but still, like the Saturday last weekend, it showed me some parts of my locality that I have not seen, and that alone made it worth doing.
It was on this weekend last year that the summer in Hebden Bridge took a decided turn for the worse. The evening of 22/6/12 saw the first of two floods hit the town centre, an event which appeared on this blog only the following morning. The 2012 Handmade Parade did take place, albeit a week later than originally scheduled and produced this picture — that event becoming a kind of gesture of defiance in the face of the damage the town had suffered (though if it was a plea for mercy it was not answered; there was still 9th July to come, but more on that in two weeks’ time). The 2013 Parade could run as planned and became an anniversary celebration, the town still getting together in an amazing burst of creativity that impresses me each year, though I’ll never be part of it; I like photographing it too much.
Seven days in a row at home now — I mean without leaving at all, even for work — and no nights away planned until well into July. This is unusual for me. I need to look around, reconnect.
Hebden Bridge street art… and why not?
I realised today while having 45 minutes to wander around town that in 12 years of living in Hebden Bridge I had never walked up a particular street. So, I did. It looks like this: if one wants it to. (This image is further cropped from the first version after I realised there was a satellite dish on it!)
Get used to the scenery anyway: with only a very few exceptions (six or so), I’m staying in the home town every day for the next five and a half weeks. It hasn’t happened much lately…
Three days of photos back home in HB and they’ve all had a floral theme; which is certainly pervasive as a theme, round here at the moment. There is more going on in this picture than you might at first think, however: this was taken into a cloud of insects, several of which are lit up in the sunlight to the top right of the shot.
On the return home,
Fallen blossoms. I’m sure there’s
A haiku in it.
Being 42 