Life through a lens

While visiting my parents in October last year, my dad gave me his old Olympus OM10 on an indefinite loan. A roll of Fuji 400 later and I had reignited an interest in photography that had waned for almost a decade. Fast forward a year and I have four cameras that exist in my rotation regularly and if i’m out of the house will almost always have at least one of them on me. They are an:

• Olympus OM10
• Olympus OM2n
• Canon Sure Shot Ace
• Olympus Pen F Digital

In August 2023 my partner underwent a routine medical procedure and suffered from complications that nearly killed them. It continued to nearly kill them for several months, and severely crippled their quality of life to the point that they are finally starting to wean off the medication that kept them alive over two years later.

I lost count of the number of emergency visits after the twelfth, about four months in. I have panic attacks when Im presented with the possibility of having to present to an Emergency Department.

Prolonged periods of intense stress can disrupt normal brain function, and lead to impairment to the way the brain encodes and stores memories. Impairment levels can vary, from difficulty with recalling simple everyday events to larger gaps around traumatic memories. Losing the ability to accurately recall aspects of your life is pretty confusing and upsetting, and has created a sense of disconnect with my past self. It’s also disrupted my sense of the passage of time, events feel out of order, scattered. My thoughts aren’t much better, bouncing around in my skull like a pinball, making them difficult to track.

The stress, combined with work pressures and semi-regular travel impacted my climbing, and so, desperate for a creative outlet, photography came along at the right time. This interest has turned into mild obsession. While my memory feels unreliable at best, scattered normally, and completely missing at worst; photography provides relief as a way to document the things happening around me.

Pictures feel more reliable than a brain with all the retention capabilities of a wet paper bag. They provide a reference point from which other life events can be arranged around.

Existing in my own life

My friends initially only just tolerated my obsession with documenting them as part of my life. I think people are understandably a little suspicious of photos these days. They are often moments to be presented on social media to others, small, context free, slices of life offered up for the validation of others. Even from other friends. I’m absolutely guilty of doing it at points, attempting to curate an ideal version of my life. Who wants to make it seem like their life is difficult? Maybe i’m doing the same thing with making these blog posts.

Honestly, my insistence on taking pictures of them is completely selfish. I get a reminder of having people in my life who care about me and enjoy being around me. In return they get the occasional dump of photos of them, some good, some bad, many silly, all meaningful to me. Recently however, a friend who has been a consistent support through things while also dealing with their own shit said something to me that has really embedded in my brain.

“It’s nice to get a reminder that I exist, that I exist in other peoples lives.”

It was probably one of the most meaningful things anyone has ever said to me. I often wish the people in my life could see themselves the way I do, we’re all far harder on ourselves than we should be. I don’t know if i’ve ever had a close friend who hasn’t shared to me that they sometimes believe that their friends don’t like them that much. Its a thought I have all the time myself! Its nice being able to share with someone the way you see them.