CONTEMPORARY EXPLORER

  They say its progress. I suppose they’re right. Growth and all. And yes, the hum of commerce and more neighbors are reflective of human needs. Supposedly reassuring in their sameness. The forests are gone though. The fertile farm fields too. Now just rows of commerce and sprawls of home tracts. You wonder if anyone really has a master plan or what their vision is. Not long ago, deer visited our small forest across the way. Giant birds sat on tall trees and looked out, liking what they saw. Both are gone now, pushed farther back to the remaining trees far away. Now just remnants of open spaces remain, crowded by stretches of retail buildings, forests of apartments and unending homes. All our fields of folly. David Young

THE LAST EXIT The miles finished. All the memories still there. Scrapes, winter cold, endless rain. Driven way past its years. At the exit it stood, Wanting one more Ride. It had continued to serve, To carry, to pay bills. Deeds not to be left behind. Until fate and time says no more. David Young

The rich farmland of the Piedmont stretched for miles in every direction from a small one street southern town. Far enough away from a major city and a Walmart, the town enjoyed its own economy and a railroad spur for farmers to ship crops from. A fixture of the town was Oak Hardware. It had been there for ever started by Fred Oak. The store prospered in long time clients. Farmers who needed everything from bolts to an extra bag of feed from the back warehouse. It surprised everyone, when Oak retired and sold his store to his long time hispanic employees, Peter and his wife Lupe. Rumor about town was that he sold it on a handshake and an exchange of a $100 bill. If you really knew Oak though, you would know this had been in the works for years.  Oak first hired Peter as a runner, answering calls from farmers who could not leave their fields, but needed some hardware item. Peter would go and in doing so got to know all of the clients.  Lupe always worked in the store keeping sh...

  Opportunity Under the Rainbow Two vastly different economies have emerged. One is the well to do. The other the rest of us trying to adjust to rapid changes, keep our lifestyle or just hanging on to survive. 45.6% of the population in the US have household incomes less than $75,000. We are programmed by nature to look at the best of our economy. After all, we are Americans, why should we not strive and long for the best slice of the pie. It floats above us like a tempting rainbow. Often our business efforts focused on it. We live in a time of mixed messages, where sorting out the best opportunities moving forward are difficult. The appearance of wealth is not always true wealth. The Mercedes next to you may be paid for, but it might have a stack of payments due, be on a lease or about to be repossessed. Then there’s the people just striving to survive. Ones that once lived in less traveled areas of the city or at obscure food banks. Now they are near you in homeless camps. Ones d...

  They call them ghost malls, I’ve heard. This mall, The Great Asian Mall, seemed well on its way to becoming one. The parking lot looked like a vast unending museum for potholes, most of the markings on parking slots worn away. The mall looked like a giant white whale, faded and beached by time. Life still held onto this place though, there was a large Asian market, a kitchen supply company, a dollar store, a nail training school and the Dragon Court Restaurant keeping the lights on. Each separated by long hallways and closed smaller shops with paper over windows.  I walked the mall many times just to try and get a feel for the place. Mostly, it seemed it had become a shopping spot for the growing asian immigrant community in the area. The place had changed hands a number of times, the yellow and red striped flag of South Vietnam flew next to the American flag at the end of the parking lot. I suspected the mall owners were from there. Many years had passed since I fought thro...

  It’s so easy to feel lost these days. Things are so different now. Nothing is or looks the same. It’s all a confusing blend, lines crossing everywhere. We try to read between the lines, to find the truth, to sort things out. The masks hide so much. The eyes though are still filled with hope, wanting to relate, searching for the new bindings of life.  David Young

  THE WOMAN WHO PAINTED FACES The two weeks of commercial work left Joel drained and tired. He needed this day. Free to wander with his camera shooting what he wanted, trying to recapture how he saw the world and who he was.  His wandering took him to a corner of SoHo were a row of shops formed an L to a small park. In the park a young woman with a painted face danced, swaying side to side in rhythmic motions like a ballet dancer. Evan at a distance Joel could see the brightness in her eyes and life in each dance move. His camera could not resist the opportunity. Joel moved closer and disarmingly said, "I'd love to get you picture, you embody so much of what New York is or could be." She stoped, looking surprised by him, but cautiously said, “OK, my name is Amelia, the island name where I was born, a picture would be lovely." Everything he sensed from a distance reflected in her warm smile. Joel said, “As you might guess, I am a photographer. You are a refreshing sig...

My Trusty 2010 Ford Escape I just put what probably will be the last set of tires on my trusty 2010 Ford Escape. I had a lot of cars, way to many. Every nameplate you can think of. I never drove a car more than 40,000 miles when I was in business. Always a new car or image beckoned.  This one has stuck though. Now I have over 135,000 miles on “old dollar.” I bought it in the desert and roamed almost everywhere since then. The high desert of Eastern Oregon, Canada, the vast Sonoran, across the country a couple of times (west to east and back again), big cities up North and now the gentle roads of the South who reveal themselves so slowly. I thought about a new car from time to time, not because of ego, like in the past, but because of concern about dependability. Still “old dollar” continues to move down the road flawlessly. More important it fits in everywhere. It still looks proud enough to take uptown, but not too gaudy for the small towns and rural South. Big splashes don’t work...

    These pandemic times spur a virtual Ferris wheel of divergent thoughts. Call it what you want, free flowing, spontaneous, reaction or non linear. They push and pull, manifesting themselves in new and numerous ways. There’s the romantic versus the practical. You dream about travel when it’s all over. You remember the well planned short trips of the past. Now though, your thoughts touch on the romance of taking a train or long voyage. Traveling through several cities on the way to your destination. Trips taking a month instead of a few days. There’s isolation versus being part of the whole. At times you just want to get away from it all. To divorce society and live remotely. But the extra time you have because of the pandemic affords more time to observe. And when you do, you see more about humanity. How hard people work, how they strive and at times struggle. How joy can be found in all walks of life. How rich and thick life is.  It makes you want to be part of the...

  They were just marks on the pavement, but somehow they resonated in me. One time I worked for a very regimented company. Their rules were stringent down to dress code and punctuality. Every morning I drove my car and parked in the company lot. Surprisingly, almost to the minute other co-workers from my unit would arrive in their cars. Every morning was the same. Now mind you, these people lived in all corners of the city and took many different routes to work. Still, they all found themselves in the lot at the same time.  Being a work alcoholic at the time, I often left the office late. The lot empty by that time. All that remained were tire marks on the pavement of those leaving. Some gentle pull outs, others dramatic statements of wanting to get away.  I clearly was in the later group and eventually left that place for other adventures, but remember the marks on the pavement...some still there. David Young

  Rivers run next to rocks, next to grass, surrounded by birds and animals. How is it possible for all to exist side by side? It’s all about 92 natural elements that exist and how they interact with each other to form our world. The pure atoms of life. Only four elements make up 96.2% of all humans; oxygen, hydrogen, carbon and nitrogen. Eleven other elements make up trace amounts in our bodies. No matter what your origins, race or culture, we are all the same. Our lives are played out in a world that comprises beautiful elements, like gold and silver, and dangerous ones like mercury, polonium and radium. There is so much we don’t know about the natural elements and how they make life work. It’s like an abstract puzzle that dances around us. One we study, trying to figure it all out. The beauty and wonder of life is to behold, to embrace, to enjoy and be thankful for it. Above all though we are part of the natural elements, the world. We are all the same. David Young

  The age of digital photography is all about chasing perfection. Constant improvements create ever sharper photos and bolder colors. While they all look wonderful on the screen. There’s something about being able to hold a photograph in your hand. Not just a digital image produced by phone or camera, a real physical record of the shot you just took. Thats the allure of Instant Photography.  With time on my hands during this pandemic, I took the plunge buying two instant cameras (Polaroid Now and Fuji Neo Classic) and three, count them, three instant printers (Canon Selphy 1300, Lifeprint and Fuji instax). I really got the bug. Over the last fifteen years, I have just taken digital photos, my film cameras long departed. So I wanted to try something new. Thus began my instant photography adventure. After running around and playing with these devices, would I recommend them? The answer is NO, YES, MAYBE.. . The cameras produce what can be disappointing results. With Polaro...

          Plant Windows - Wadesboro NC

  Like some slumbering dinosaurs brought down to the ground, sitting silent uncared for by time. Names like Pacolet, Saluda, Lando, Flint and Great Falls no more.  Once great trucks parked here carrying raw materials and supplies, feeding the machines inside. Managers could tell by the sound if one worked wrong, shouting out its number to repairers. Legion of workers collected checks and kept small towns alive. Each carrying with them the pride of work and product done. Now only grass grows there. Machines long ago silenced. The same trucks that fed the plant were used to carry off production equipment, shipped over ocean to a cheaper labor force. Trucks that never came back again, the names of the drivers no longer spoken behind the plant. The small houses of the towns still holding the workers that once were there, but not their pride. The plant sits empty except for echos of the sounds, now only grass grows behind the plant.  David Young

  Los Angeles is not all cars and the glitter of Hollywood. Likewise, you don’t find the true LA in districts like Beverly Hills, West Hollywood, Malibu or Pacific Palisades. The already wealthy and famous live apart in enclaves. The real LA is in the working districts of Melrose, Korea Town, the Miracle Mile and Downtown. Walking through them you have time to absorb the real city, street life and its people. Here lives aspirations on steroids. They fill the air and have a sound. The waiters who want to be actors. The retail clerks who want to be stand up comics. The garment district worker who wants to start a fashion line. The business person in the food ally pitching a deal. Alter egos dance off each other, reflect on glass windows and seemingly splash off the sides of walls and buildings. Bright bold marks bounce everywhere. Some marks and aspirations wait for a long time, others start to fade but resist. No one here wants to say goodbye to them. Not here. Not in LA. Da...

  William Shakespeare said “All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players: they have their exits and their entrances.”  He surely imagined a stage more dramatic than the entrance to a grocery store.  Most are bland with little fanfare, simply moving people in to do their shopping.  Not for glamorous things, but just the necessity of life. A backstage of life for sure.  Still drama of everyday life exists in the coming and going of people.  All with their stories to tell and families to feed. David Young

George Gershwin composed “Rhapsody in Blue” while riding on a train between New York and Boston… The chill of an early morning Boston caused me to pull my coat tight as I walked into South Station. The station looked like a half circle inside cast in northeast (NE) gray. A couple of coffee stands and an eatery were busy. Travelers getting their nourishment before boarding the train. I looked forward to traveling to New York. A giant electronic leaderboard flashed the status of departures and arrivals. Just beyond the gates sat the Acela and Northeast Regional Trains. The Acela with its noble nose and the Northeast Regional with a square working face.  I sat with my coffee looking out in awe at them. Maybe just a usual sight to people in the NE. As a westerner, it was special for me. They were like gleaming keys to the NE. Stallions that would take me through the best and worst along the tracks arriving in the gleaming place called New York. They were magic, eac...

The coffee shop was filled with people on their phones. Me too, I read all the latest on the new iPhone 12. Faster they said, better camera than my trusty iPhone X. Yes, It seemed my phone took more pictures than my camera in recent times. Still the experience left something missing, but I was’t sure what.  Maybe the phone is just too easy, too immediate. There were other things too, the phone proved difficult to hold for me when taking a photo. Most importantly though, it let in all the rest of the world. All those news updates, emails waiting, advertisements and applications lurked in the background. Some even popped up as notifications when I tried to take the photo.  My thoughts turned to how different using a camera was. How it could silence the rest of the world allowing a more compete experience with what you saw. How you could create your own world with it. A world only limited by your creativity. How wandering became something different, more thoughtful a...

I spotted it from a distance, just a field of debris, but it drew me. Even far away, I could see random patterns chance had created. It had been tossed there near a simple brick building, but did not belong to it. Closer, I noticed markings on the stones strewn in between the tossed wood. The different colors making parts stand out. The building they came from a mystery, not visible in the area. Why were these still useful and beautiful things now debris. What would happen to them? The debris existed someplace between usefulness and the dump, purgatory of sorts. It remained here in limbo for nature, man and fate to decide what will be done with it. Too valuable to give up on, but no longer of value enough to do something with. The debris like evidence of some misdeed removed from where the event happened. It did not move or change. It was just there. There was an undefined art about it. The way it was scattered, the color muted by elements and the imagined story behin...

Just an empty parking lot now. Once beautiful things were made here. Some thought they were real. Even owners began to believe. Things get old though, Machinery and all. Too easy for silk flowers To be made far away. First the employees go. Then the machinery left, then the building. Only stray parts left now And swirls on the parking lot from employee’s cars once there. …

There is another city, away from the glitz on its rough edges. A place where railroads cross, trucks run and work is done. Here you will find the pieces that make the city work, build buildings, fuel engines and factories. Some are vital and humming, others forgotten scraps. All supported by a legion of workers, the keepers of the city. Once in a while you may find an artist or inventor working in humble surroundings with big dreams. Most often though, there are just workers whose dreams are measured by long days, a paycheck and being a part of these special places. They are proud of what they do, not afraid to wear worn gloves and dirt on collars. If you wander these rough edges with your camera, rewards abound. You find colors and beauty only forged by the wear of time. You realize life is not always the well ordered place you are used to. Special skill are needed in the rough edges to live and work there. The initial risk and trepidation you feel going to these...

Some say windows are the eyes of the city. Whether you are looking out or passing by them, there is always a bit of mystery. Things left unsaid and unseen. An incompleteness that draws you, wanting more of the story and what you see. Maybe like the times we are in, they defy a complete description. They are just reflections.