Up until now they've just been sitting there: a rich mine of pre-selfie selfies, extreme thumbshots and increasingly unimpressive sunsets.
I couldn't really tell how good any of the photos were because my screen is the size of a Shreddie.
Shreddy?
Shreddie.
So I transferred them all and browsed.
It was quite moving seeing myself age, one jpeg at a time. I was a more prolific photographer in the early years, but things have tailed off... There are only about six photos from the past couple of years, and four of them are of the dog I kidnapped. Still waiting for that ransom.
There are several decent ones buried in there. I posted this one on Facebook:
I like it because I'm captivated by pepper.
It's from several years ago. I can't remember if I planned it to look like this, with the camera hidden. Also, Lucy's face is obscured by flowers, so you'd think I would have done better. But it's a real trompe l'oeil. As long as l'oiel is suffering from l'astigmatism.
Then there's this one. It is a generic sunset, but also includes raindrops:
Most of the ones I kept were photos of Lucy. I should probably just post them all to Facebook and embarrass her. She's not reading this, so she'll never know until she's tagged. And by then it will be too late.
Anyway, the upshot of this is: I should be an eventual photographer.
The reasons for this are many. One is that I use photographic idioms in my daily life. Like "upshot".
It's difficult to be an eventual photographer in this day and age.
It's too easy to take photos and immediately see, edit and share them.
In the past, everyone was an eventual photographer.
You'd have to take the photos, travel to a "dark room shop", leave the film, return home, worry impotently about framing, return to the "dark room shop", fumble for change (contactless card payment - or even chip and pin - was a long way off), pay the "dark room technician", and leaf through the results.
They were almost all terrible. People would look at the shoddy snaps over your shoulder and would laugh. Old-fashioned analogue laughs.
If you want to develop photos (as the old Jessop saying goes), you must first develop a thick skin.
But we liked it that way.
Eventual photography was a noble profession. Waiting and disappointment was part of the thrill. Just like a job at Bella Italia.
In today's world of Instagram filters and that thing where you swap your face with a dog's face or whatever, everyone is an immediate photographer.
Where's the fun in that?
Creativity should be slow, inefficient and impossible to share with others. Also it should mostly not end up happening.
It's taken me years to get these photos. I could easily have bought this USB cable at any time. But I didn't.
I'm clearly cut out to be an eventual photographer.
Slow and steady wins the race. The tortoise has still got a Minidisc player.
I'm glad to have discovered my vocation. I'm sure I'll get around to following up on said discovery in a couple of weeks/months.
This build-up of inaction has increased my self-confidence and made me realise that I can accomplish anything as long as I put my mind to it in 2010.
In the years to come, I'm sure I'll be equally proud to be an eventual sculptor, an eventual viewer of Channel 4's Misfits and an eventual toenail-trimmer.
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