El Reloj de Arena - The Hour Glass
Thursday, September 01, 2016
I remember that half a century ago my professor of
philosophy Ramón Xirau first told our class about the pre-Socratic philosopher
Heraclitus and his idea that nothing could be really experience in the same way
twice as like the waters of a flowing river were always changing and time was
the same thing.
While looking at some photographs today of Marli W which
I took around 1978 I noticed one that escaped my scrutiny. That Marli is posing
on sand made me remember that Borges, who was quite obsessed in the philosophy
of Heraclitus had a deep interest in “relojes de arena” or the hourglasses. His
particular interest in them was that sand like water went only in one
direction.
Thinking back at these images of Marli I can remember the
heat of summer, the wonderful coarseness of the sand on my bare feet and the
fact that I was most excited at the opportunity to photograph a beautiful woman
without the scourge of clothes.
I do not believe that I could return to that beach with a
new subject and take these photographs all over again. To be precise I also
shot Kodachromes so that would be impossible.
In photography one explores, one discovers, one
innovates, one dares and as soon as all that becomes a formula you move on
(down river).
El Reloj
de Arena – Jorge Luís Borges
Está
bien que se mida con la dura
Sombra
que una columna en el estío
Arroja o
con el agua de aquel río
En que
Heráclito vio nuestra locura
El
tiempo, ya que al tiempo y al destino
Se
parecen los dos: la imponderable
Sombra
diurna y el curso irrevocable
Del agua
que prosigue su camino.
Está
bien, pero el tiempo en los desiertos
Otra
substancia halló, suave y pesada,
Que
parece haber sido imaginada
Para
medir el tiempo de los muertos.
Surge
así el alegórico instrumento
De los
grabados de los diccionarios,
La pieza
que los grises anticuarios
Relegarán
al mundo ceniciento
Del
alfil desparejo, de la espada
Inerme,
del borroso telescopio,
Del
sándalo mordido por el opio
Del
polvo, del azar y de la nada.
¿Quién
no se ha demorado ante el severo
Y
tétrico instrumento que acompaña
En la
diestra del dios a la guadaña
Y cuyas
líneas repitió Durero?
Por el
ápice abierto el cono inverso
Deja
caer la cautelosa arena,
Oro
gradual que se desprende y llena
El
cóncavo cristal de su universo.
Hay un
agrado en observar la arcana
Arena
que resbala y que declina
Y, a
punto de caer, se arremolina
Con una
prisa que es del todo humana.
La arena
de los ciclos es la misma
E
infinita es la historia de la arena;
Así,
bajo tus dichas o tu pena,
La
invulnerable eternidad se abisma.
No se
detiene nunca la caída
Yo me
desangro, no el cristal. El rito
De
decantar la arena es infinito
Y con la
arena se nos va la vida.
En los
minutos de la arena creo
Sentir
el tiempo cósmico: la historia
Que
encierra en sus espejos la memoria
O que ha
disuelto el mágico Leteo.
El pilar
de humo y el pilar de fuego,
Cartago
y Roma y su apretada guerra,
Simón
Mago, los siete pies de tierra
Que el
rey sajón ofrece al rey noruego,
Todo lo
arrastra y pierde este incansable
Hilo
sutil de arena numerosa.
No he de
salvarme yo, fortuita cosa
De
tiempo, que es materia deleznable.
The Hourglass - J. L. Borges
It is well that time can be measured
With the harsh shadow a column in summer
Casts, or the water of that river
In which Heraclitus saw our folly,
Since both to time and destiny
The two seem alike: the unweighable daytime
Shadow, and the irrevocable course
Of water following its own path.
It is well, but time in the desert
Found another substance, smooth and heavy,
That seems to have been imagined
For measuring dead men’s time.
Hence the allegorical instrument
Of the dictionary illustrations,
The thing that gray antiquaries
Will consign to the red-ash world
Of the odd chess-bishop, of the sword
Defenseless, of the telescope bleared,
Of sandalwood eroded by opium,
Of dust, of hazard, of the nada.
Who has not paused before the severe
And sullen instrument accompanying
The scythe in the god’s right hand
Whose outlines Duerer etched?
Through the open apex the inverted cone
Lets the minute sand fall down,
Gradual gold that loosens itself and fills
The concave crystal of its universe.
There is a pleasure in watching the recondite
Sand that slides away and slopes
And, at the falling point, piles up
With an urgency wholly human.
The sand of the cycles is the same,
And infinite, the history of sand;
Thus, deep beneath your joys and pain
Unwoundable eternity is still the abyss.
Never is there a halt in the fall.
It is I lose blood, not the glass. The ceremony
Of drawing off the sand goes on forever
And with the sand our life is leaving us.
In the minutes of the sand I believe
I feel the cosmic time: the history
That memory locks up in its mirrors
Or that magic Lethe has dissolved.
The pillar of smoke and the pillar of fire,
Carthage and Rome and their crushing war,
Simon Magnus, the seven feet of earth
That the Saxon proffered the Norway king,
This tireless subtle thread of unnumbered
Sand degrades all down to loss.
I cannot save myself, a come-by-chance
Of time, being matter that is crumbling.
From Dreamtigers, by Jorge Luis Borges, translated by Harold
Morland
The Comet 4C - Metal Fatigue & My PC Sync Cord
Monday, August 29, 2016
In 1959 I was getting ready to go back to St. Ed’s High
School in Austin. We were still in Mexico City so my mother decided as a
surprise to book me into a
Mexicana de Aviación flight to San Antonio. From
there I was to take a Greyhound Scenicruiser to Austin. The surprise was that
the airplane in question was a
de Havilland Comet 4C which was the first jet
airliner to come into service. In my mother’s bargain was a brand new US silver
Dollar. The idea was for me to attempt to balance it on my seat tray. Because
the jet had no vibration from piston engines the coin was not supposed to fall.
It didn’t.
The story of the de Havilland Comet involves many crashes
from previous models due to the unresolved stresses and perhaps metal fatigue.
I have always wanted to leave this world vaporized in
midflight in an airplane. This would save Rosemary money on a burial and
perhaps a windfall of money care of the airline and my life insurance.
Unfortunately Comets are not in service anymore and flying is pretty safe.
In my years as a magazine photographer I learned very
early the rules of the successful game:
1. Show up on time. This meant casing the joint on
another day so as to avoid surprises.
2. Make appointment with magazine subjects on the phone
without insulting them.
3. Leave with one useable image. This always meant that equipment had to work
and that backup stuff was readily available.
Of all the failures that I almost had or had, but I had
backup ready, the worst offender was the PC cord. This cord connects the camera’s
PC outlet to the flash. The design of the PC cord comes from the first electronic
flashes invented in the 50s. The design was never really modified.
In the picture you see here there is that odd little
brass tool. This tool (almost impossible to find in this century) squeezes the
end of the PC cord so that it will be snug and make a connection that will not
fail. Notice the PC tip has a slit on the side. It has one on the other side.
Nobody has ever bothered to use metal that will not eventually fail due to
metal fatigue. At the end of the slit, eventually you get a tear at a 90 degree
to the slit. No matter how many times you may attempt to reform the tip with my
snazzy brass tool the cord will fail. And you will get that horrible statement
from your subject:
“Your flash did not flash.”
I have two of these PC cords right now and both have
experienced metal fatigue. I wonder if the British make any of these and with
their Comet experience would they work longer?
