I never fancied myself a photographer, though, as a child. I colored and painted and sketched; I played with ceramics and sculpting clay, with yarns and plastics and pom-poms. All of that Meant Something; it was not what I did, but Who I Was.

And yet I played with photography continually; my mother would buy a roll of film and I’d have it filled within the hour. I loved to pick up my twenty-dollar Wal Mart 35mm camera, to follow the cats around the house taking pictures. It was so satisfying, the snap and rolling noises, removing the film at the end, excitedly filling out the film envelope at the store and waiting patiently for the week we could afford to get the photos developed — then pawing through the stacks of full envelopes, and breaking the seal, the anticipation of what might lie inside…

And yet I never imagined that I could call myself a photographer. All of this, it was not Who I Was. It was just something I did. It didn’t Mean Something.

I don’t know why.

Late in high school, just as my disability was setting in, I took a strong interest in photography. I had been working with the school newspaper, which was feeding my love of visual design, which had been developing since age twelve when I got a computer and started making my own web pages. I was the tech and copy editor(s), so much of the visual presentation of the paper was in my hands. And I loved it.

Photography was something that caught my eye: the art of photography has a strong basis in design concepts, and yet it resulted in something so much more … classic. Free-standing. Boundless.

I saved money, and did research, and between Christmas, my birthday, and graduation gifts in my senior year, I was able to purchase a “prosumer” level digital camera — not an SLR, but offering many more creative controls than your typical snapshot camera.

March of 2004 is when that small black beauty finally sat in my eager hands. That same month is also when I was just beginning to recover from the most severe and serious flare I had experienced, which had me out of school for several weeks that January, then kept from attending school continuously for some time afterward. I was just getting on my feet again that March, just beginning to catch up with everything I had missed until that point, just beginning to collect all of the make-up work I would have to do to get my report card out of the F graveyard… my very last semester of school.

I took comfort in this new little device. It was something to learn which did not weigh down my consciousness, fog up my comprehension. This was not book learning; it was tactile and visual, and it came naturally, guiding the movement of my fingers and positioning of my body to obtain fresh angles, and even the mathematical balancing, shutter speed and f-stop and film speed, was intuitive.

And it cost nothing, once I had the camera. No rolls of film, no waiting for developing. Just space on my hard drive.

My camera would become my best friend as I looked ahead to college, where I was to face multiple health crises and major life changes. Whenever I was not well, I had something to take comfort in, to help me escape from hostile reality.

There is something about photography that exceeds the intellect. Oh, you use your knowledge and intellectual ability to manipulate all the mechanics and mathematics involved. But it is so much different, so far from the problem sheets of school, occupying a different space in the brain, utlizing different mental muscles. It is grounded in that intellect, but it sprouts forth and grows endlessly, obeying no boundaries, becoming whatever you wish to make it be. No intellectual space can hold the zone I enter when I have that camera in hand.

My disability does affect this art. Most so, my hands are shaky, never steady, always moving, and with occasional spasms. I had so much trouble early on, finding it nearly impossible to take pictures requiring a low shutter speed (below 1/30). I couldn’t afford the beautiful machines that handled higher ISOs gracefully, which would have allowed me to play more within this low shutter speed situation. But they were beyond my reach — still are, really.

It has taken me years to learn how to compensate for this. Years and years of failed attempts, frustration, disappointment, self-criticism. And it has come only little by little. And it is not complete.

But there is a physical knowledge there, and my muscles are being trained to hold steady in certain places, certain ways. I have learned to brace against a wall, chair, pole or rail, or even my own body. I have learned tricks: to extend the LCD screen out to the side, so that I can hold the camera at both ends, keeping it safer from unintended movement.

I cannot steady my entire body. It is simply not a trick available to me. But I am learning where to focus my energies, which muscles to use which ways.

And my photos are turning out much crisper, clearer.

This comforts me. When my art is crisp, clean, readable, I feel the same inside. When it is foggy, unfocused, poor quality, I feel the same inside. I feel frustrated at my inability to communicate what is going on inside this complex body to the outside world.

Learning how to do that more effectively… that is a life-long lesson.

“He shares our values…”

“Family values”

“American values”

“Traditional values”

If nothing else, this election season makes one thing quite clear: in a sociopolitical context, the word “values” is nothing more than a code word for “white.”

i was conflicted: the content of the job was not impossible to perform, nor was it particularly unobjectionable. (i knew my former coworkers from the CameraShop would comment that i was “better” than food service, but honestly, i don’t see it as beyond me. it’s work that has to be performed, and i do draw enjoyment from being successful in the service of others — that is, making customers happy. that, of course, is not inextricable from the gender roles under which i was raised. but anyway) — the people at Cafe were good people, as were the people in the store in general. and they would face genuine stress were i to quit, and i didn’t want to put them through that (the whole two days i’d known them). and we would face a genuinely difficult financial situation at home if i were no longer drawing pay.

but.

when i stopped and thought about me, purely me, i knew, deep down, i wasn’t going to stay.

when i was scrubbing tables and struggling with turning over a giant floor mat while mopping the eating area, i knew that this was not a job i could perform long-term.

when i was sneaking a bottle of water in the back of the food prep area and trying to time things so i could take my medication without being seen, i knew that this was a job i could not sustain long-term.

when i finally got to steal away for break and sit my tired ass down, and all the throbbing, stabbing, burning pain rushed to my attention, and i despaired that i was going to have to return to work in fifteen minutes when what i needed was a good five days without work to recover just from that pain that i already had, much less the pain i was going to be heaping on top shortly…

when i thought about the nine-and-a-half hour shift i was supposed to perform today, a shift that would have been long for me even at CS, i knew, just intuitively knew, that i couldn’t do it. i just couldn’t.

that intuition, that’s the thing, isn’t it? i remember back in school, from grade two to grade twelve, when i had no idea what the fuck was going on with my body, hell, had no idea anything was going on with my body… i remember just knowing, in that truest sense, in that way that you can question but you can never ignore… i just knew that i couldn’t go that day. i knew i would not be able to withstand my regular activities that day, whatever they were. and, though in  that space i occupied between my own perception and the world’s perception i was doubting myself and slurring myself as a faker, as exaggerating, as sinful and indulging in luxuries nobody else got to indulge in (like sleeping six hours atop the eleven i’d already slept that night, and waking up still  drained and empty), though that was all going on… when i stripped away all those outer considerations, when i was finally left alone, when i could finally stop worrying about everybody else and just think about me, just ME… i knew better.

and that’s the only way to describe it. i know better.

even when i didn’t understand what was wrong with me, what was making me feel this way, what those feelings even were, what my limitations were, what i was facing that i had to do, what i had to do to get by with that…

even when none of that was even something i knew existed — i still damn well knew better.

and years later… that’s how i feel right now.

and now that everyone else is gone, and i’m all alone, and i don’t have to think about anybody else, i know.

and i’m grateful. i can finally close my eyes, relax my tired muscles, and just do nothing.

i can finally appreciate the nothingness.

and how fucked up is that? i finally let go, and what is it i feel? not pleasure or joy. just relief that i can stop, and not keep adding to the pain.