The moody part of the year
As if not every part of this year has been moody! A mix of rain, early evenings and later mornings has offered me a good prompt to go on a walk and see what I find in the fog. I'll update this post periodically, I hope.
Update, November 3, 2020:
Ok, today is grim, so I think I will write a few more words here. I tend to take photos when I feel melancholic (or, I particularly like the photos I take then). That might sound silly on the outset, but I believe it to be true. I like deep blue skies taking over the frame, small details that I find when I walk and am entirely in my head, or in this case bright pops of light in otherwise dark and foggy surroundings.
Something different here, is that all these photos were shot with my camera, the Fuji X100T. It is one of my favourite cameras, but I had not taken photos with it in the past two years. One reason for that lack is my phone. It is in my pocket most of the time, and more than capable to take the wide photos that I want, which people then view on a small screen.
Another reason is that most of my energy has gone into work. Work has a way of expanding to fill all available space, and it certainly has for me. This is not the place to tell you about my work (making sites accessible), or that I feel very strongly about digital services being accessible. I like what I do, and I believe it has a material impact, so suffice it to say that much of the learning, speaking, writing, helping others has seeped into my own time.
If work expands to fill all available space metaphorically, for me it also seems to have filled that space physically. I have been living in Finland for three years now, and such a huge part of my day-to-day motions, interactions, travel has been work. When I talk to people, I joke that I live in a 5km radius from the center of Helsinki, instead of Finland, though I guess I never put that into writing.
Fittingly enough, finding a space for writing these thoughts has been hard, and I think the photo blog is the place they feel most at home. Well, the thoughts don't ambiently feel anything, rather I feel most at home among my photos.
(This is definitely not the space for me to write about my experiences with immigration, or the lingering sense that I have to be good at work to feel valid. So it will be just a parenthetical, at least for now.)
When the pandemic hit? Nothing like being at home all day to remind me of a dwindling and fragile social circle. With the winter (and certainly the darkness) creeping in now, I've been trying to get out more, even just to be present and assert that yeah, I exist and live here. I realised I have walked these streets multiple times, but have not actually photographed them much.
If you see these photos as anything, consider them an attempt to get back into a hobby that I love, to get more into the city, to make or cultivate a space for myself that I feel sorely lacking. Oh, and do not worry about the melancholy, if you spot any; that is mostly my style.
I sometimes also wish that my photos would include more people. Again, a subject for another time!
A gray sea in the foreground, with a dockyard in the background. Cranes stand tall and get lost in the fog.
Apartment buildings with lights on line the sides of the frame. The center are tree saplings, or trees shedding their leaves. The sky is cloudy and with a tinge of purple or blue.
A building in early morning light. Above its door is a lit sign saying 'SPACES.'. Two scooters are on one side of the door, and a construction barrier on the other.
A crane standing in a dark sky, between shaded buildings.
P.S. Warpaint's albums go great with rainy Autumn evenings.