Key West's Third Man

There is a notion floating around in the contemporary photographic universe which posits that black and white photography is somehow a way to posture and add an arty label to mundane photos. I am not in a position to argue the merits but for me black and white is just another way to take a photograph. Night photos seem an obvious time for the monochrome effect but even in daylight I like to think about the possibilities of black and white when color is not necessarily called for. As for artistic pretensions I prefer to  try to tell stories with my pictures than create High Art. 

I do like the  effect of the black and white pictures as they remind me of the film noir genre produced by Hollywood, and others in the mid 20th century. Take for example that great mystery of a film which put its  musical score front and center as well. Mercifully I'm not claiming to be a composer at least.

I grant you it is a bit of a stretch comparing 21st century Key West to the rubble of Vienna after World War Two but looking back at this handful of photos puts me in mind of The Third Man. The British Film Institute says it's the greatest British film of all time, so I suppose my modest photos ought to be good and artistic!

 In the event I was wandering around the custom house and the shadow and light were wonderful. It's part of that strange anomalous mystique of key West. This is the town you associate with wooden houses, bright colors and picket fences overflowing with tropical foliage. That's my Key West. 

But when you look around there's that other town, the brick buildings and scabrous plaster, the light falling at an angle and the darkness...I love it.  This is Margaritaville Resort in the early hours as quiet as if it were unoccupied:

 Check out the Custom House Museum from a slight distance, across from the resort:

 And round the other corner the waterfront side, in color yes, but all washed out with himself bring a touch of the usual to the scene.

We ended up not walking far but in the expanding circles we made there seemed to be lots to look at. 

 I've seen a few of these stickers show up around town as though gentrification can be held back by thinking about it.  Money talks and eccentricity and non conformity are on the wane in Key West.

 I saw puddles on Wall Street near Duval:

 And this picture of Exchange Street looking toward Front I've taken a few times.

We turned our backs on it all and Rusty led the way to the car. He was ready for mangroves and wilderness and fewer human artifacts. Not at all like Harry Lime who needs to have people around him to keep himself in business.

The Working Life

I have been on day shift now for almost two weeks after thirteen years supervising a night shift. One of my former colleagues who met me at shift change remarked that I looked more relaxed. Well I suppose so, as now I only have responsibility for my work and my day time colleagues are both experienced dispatchers who work well as a team. 

I can get used to this, I thought to myself as my wife met me for lunch on Saturday and we went for a walk on Smathers Beach under threatening skies. I suppose some of the change must seem obvious to people used to being asleep at night but it's not a question of sleeping, rather it's a question of enjoying myself more while I'm NOT sleeping. Odd that but true.

911 calls during the day have proven so far to be rather tame, let me be honest. Few, dare I say none of the callers are drunk and not many people are fist fighting in the middle of the day or engaging in drunken car crashes in peculiar places. On my last week working nights a car driver contrived to flip their vehicle like a turtle in the middle of  Truman Avenue in the early hours. How? I don't know but it happened. Daytime call taking is mostly administrative type calls, lost property, car crashes of course always, and stuff that doesn't set the blood coursing through your veins. But after more than a decade of that I find I can handle a lighter load.   

For the callers all calls are emergencies, all problems seem insurmountable without police intervention so the good part is that one can still feel useful helping people to unravel apparently intractable problems. But for me, when I am away from the desk and my headphones are back in my locker I live a different life. Dinner at home every night is pleasant. But nowadays my mornings start well before dawn, around 3:45 if its not raining. Rusty and I take off exploring in the dark of the night, back streets, quiet neighborhoods where we travel alone. Then I go home and get ready for work, a quick half hour ride on my scooter along an empty Highway One and I'm settled in to my shift before six o'clock ready to go. 

The new schedule means Rusty gets his other walk in the evening when I get home and at the moment that is well before sunset. my daily gym schedule has suffered a bit but I take classes some days after work and on others I use my lunch break to work out on my own. My days off are glorious because I wake up early as normal and have the entire day to devote to myself and my dog and working 12 hour shifts gives me lots of equivalent days off each month. I don't need to sleep half the day to prepare for an afternoon off. 

 My pictures will change I suspect. Night photography  may take a back burner especially in the summer months when days are longer by a couple of hours. But on the whole a change not much appreciated has had the beneficial effect of shaking things up. At last I am settling in to my new hours and I no longer am overcome by unnatural sleepiness mid morning when I was used to being sound asleep most days. I am becoming a day worker and like every change in my life it is merely a matter of adaptation not lamentation.

My new colleagues are pleasant to work with, the struggle to concentrate at  three in the morning is in the past and Rusty, who is getting used to my new hours greets me in the driveway every evening as though it's a miracle I'm home. I like that.  He sits in my lap unwilling to let me out of his sight.

Change is good. Embrace it. And if I say that believe me I mean it. I don't offer advice and I don't care for trite aphorisms  found on coffee mugs and on Facebook. This time I mean it. It has worked for me and I am not exceptional, it will work for you.

Conch Homes

A night walk pointing  the camera  at houses in the dark. 

 This photo was a section I took of the mansion on Southard recently refurbished. Miles of windows and wood.

 Summer is the time to rebuild and repair:

 The Congregational church on William Street shining like a multi colored beacon:

 These last two pictures came from the Theater on Eaton Street devoted t live theater and music...

 ...and apparently  guitar store. Who knew?

KOA Reconstruction

We walked across the footbridge/bicycle path/fishing pier that connects Cudjoe Key to Sugarloaf Key. The view from the bridge can be spectacular and sometimes Rusty doesn't mind walking the half mile across the water. 

The other thing you can see is the KOA Kampground on the Sugarloaf shore and I use the term campground loosely as it got wrecked in Hurricane Irma two years ago and is still looking the worse for it. Machinery and construction workers have only been working there for a couple of weeks and progress is not brilliant.

I have taken the time on this page to point out that hurricanes in the US are rarely fatal but they are tedious. Living through the cacophony of howling winds and flying debris is bad enough but when things calm down the survivors discover they live in a lunar landscape devoid of amenity and convenience. Everything is messy and slow and difficult.

Then long after the immediate Facebook drama ("thoughts and prayers") has dissipated the clean up plods along. Some other fiasco of no great consequence or impact is put up as a banner headline and last week's heroic hurricane survivors are now history. Yet they still have to pick up the trash and figure out how to flush waterless toilets and wait patiently among the mosquitoes for the power to return... And in some cases hope that soon their campgrounds will reopen.

And that's not the worst of it. I know of people whose homes are still damaged from Hurricane Irma and the struggle for redress by insurance companies continues. God knows how the Bahamians will fare in their reduced economy on their isolated islands.

We meanwhile, we lucky few continue our daily lives on and off the water. Fishing line dangling complete with victim off the power lines. You see this everywhere among our islands:

And as we walked I took a few pictures of clouds and sea and skies and put the results through a filter on my phone to exaggerate the drama. It is I feel the way everyone likes to live on the Web, vicariously with drama!

 Some of the effects are more subtle:

 This one untouched:

 This grainy painting started out as an unremarkable low key digital image:

 Looking north across the main highway bridge:

It was getting warm for Rusty so after a companionable pause we walked back across the bridge in the rising sun. I was surprised he enjoyed the bridge as much as he did.

Southard Street Night

This is not the first time I have photographed this home before and I still like it with the palms and the symmetry. 

What with all the climate change stuff that creates so much anger, the storms that seem to be getting stronger and more frequent I walk these streets and wonder how the city has survived and thrived since incorporation in 1828. I find it relaxing to walk past these wooden homes and in photographing them I want to store them in my memory as symbols of the sturdy self reliance of Key West over the decades.

I have no particular desire to argue the merits of human caused climate change but even skeptics have given up opposing the notion that the climate is changing, human caused or not, and given that it seems likely we will be seeing more of these grotesquely powerful hurricanes in the seasons to come.

The odd thing about these storms is that if properly managed  governments can limit loss of life and event though damage to property can be hair raising human lives are not generally at risk. It's counter intuitive I know but I'm not afraid of dying in a  storm barreling down on Key West but I am fearful of living through the aftermath of no services, filth everywhere and a total absence of the civilized comforts we are used to in the First World. It just gets stressful living through a storm and dealing with the clean up, not life threatening. 

Then you see the brief video clips of Abaco and Grand Bahama literally vanishing into the sea as huge storm surges climb over the islands, that in all respects are the same as the lumps of rock this side of the Gulf Stream. Those submerged homes could easily be the homes in these pictures.

And then there are the businesses that thrive in good times and not so much when times are tough. Times when tourists stay away, times when national stories about disastrous storms hang over these islands like a bad smell even as the chambers try to over ride the bad news stories. The convenience store above survives through it all the take out food joint below has apparently closed. I liked the idea of Cajun food but Caju alligator and frog was not what I was looking for in a take home dinner.  

Manley Deboer has been in Key West forever selling construction supplies in the face of national chains. I took the picture below planting the office in a stark dark wasteland of emptiness in which they too manage to thrive. Small sparks of light that you need to keep in mind when hurricanes blow out your creative spark.

When I look at Rusty I wonder how stray dogs live through these wet and windy times. Even pets owned by callous owners, the outside dog types...I do the best I can for him and wonder how on judgement day I would justify my inaction on behalf of the animals ignored by humanity.

Then I look upstairs at the Albury Court and compare those walkways to the rising tide waters photographed from upstairs in the Bahamas. Imagine that height of water flowing through your downtown.

Caroline Street as Rusty failed to stop for my most determined effort at a shot of the bicycles flashing by on a street still in focus. I've photographed Caroline Street so many times I don't need this for the archives, just as a study in motion. Well, that didn't work too well. "I'm ready to be obliterated thank you M. Cartier-Bresson."

At least a  guitar player in a mural can't move to screw up the shot. Even if he were alive I doubt the would move considering the concentration displayed:

Sails and Rails used to be a gallery and now its some sort of museum it seems. I guess one day I'll check it out but I wonder what more there is to display on the subject of Flagler and his railroad to Key West.

I saw the sign on the bench and made Rusty stop for a second. The sun might make the bench hot. Be careful. How is it possible such warnings are necessary in a town noted for it's lack of winter weather?

You know it's summer  (and therefore HOT) because there are no dinghies at the dinghy dock. In winter when the town is bulging with people this place overflows with dinghies brought in by people living at anchor out there.

Take pride in the history of your home. The man after whom Kemp's Ridley Turtle is named lived here once.

The Fleming House cleaned up and dramatized on Snapseed. Looks good doesn't it?

A  few more pictures to round out our walk:

A church on William Street at dawn:

Mangia Mangia the Italian restaurant back on Southard Street: