For a few months now I have been following Photographer/educator David Brommer through different media channels. In that time he has been posting photo assignments to those that are up to the challenge. The most recent assignment is to photograph a memory.
At first I wasn't sure what that meant or even how to approach it. Having a partial photographic memory it seemed difficult that I could capture a moment from the past without it being today. A little harder to explain than to show. So I was going to take a pass on this assignment.
But the thought percolated within the brain for a bit and soon one memory seems to stand out. That memory came from a few events and a nightmare when I was around 5 to 7 years old. My grand parents had a small library in their basement opposite the old workroom full of broken furniture and machinery that ran the house. A huge oil fired furnace with massive circulators to pump water throughout the house. The noise each time a circulator kicked on; you'd hear the relays snap into action and then the drone of the pump. On the edge of the furnace was a defunct gas incinerator. We weren't really allowed to go into the work room. Though I would always find my curiosity would get the best of me and quietly sneak into examine the artifacts and tools.
The Library was a little more peaceful ; rows of books on dilapidated plastic and metal book shelves, the type you buy in a box and assemble in an hour or so. A big section of plywood reside on top of two desk as a makeshift ping pong table in the middle of the room. As kids we fight over the ping pong table and who had to go find the lost ping pong ball under the bookcases.
Many of the books weren't really anything special. My grand father was an engineer and grand mother was an English teacher. Between the two there were countless Readers Digest and Time Life book sets mixed in with all manner of engineering. I gravitated towards the Time Life books. In particular was a series known as the "World of...". The World of Biology, The World of Chemistry, The World of... and so on. The one really caught my eye was The World of Machinery, or so I think it was. It had all manner of hand drawn Victorian machines Great and small, some from the great exhibition halls of Europe others contraptions to mobilize and walk for you.
Sometime shortly after spending a few nights in their house and possibly a very long day I had a dream/nightmare of the basement. in a dark room, only lit by window light were machines on pedestals. Gears and levers in the darken fear. The fear was stuck with me for many many years. And as things can have a funny twist to them. I found myself living in the house later in life. I would make the work shop my own and use it to store or repair machines.
Only a few year ago while "viewing" the room in reflection did I really remember what I was doing now, this was my nightmare as a child, now in full circle
With that, I decide to photograph my memory of theat nightmare. included in the image are "ghosts" of myself as the fear. And in a funny way of how time passes; it is as much a picture that will look at it always will, with my ghost after passing.
