The Manic Mechanic

Here's a bit of news that left me wistful and a bit sad, but at the same time there's so much pure awesome to it that I could not help but smile.

The Kodak company recently discontinued it's iconic Kodachrome film, a mainstay of color photography and film-making for decades. The last roll of film was requested by professional photographer Steve McCurry, who then loaded it into his Nikon (of course) and headed for a six week trip in order to make the best use of the mere 36 exposures on the roll. The planning alone for that trip took Steve nine months.

How cool is it to be entrusted with a piece of history as well as to be able to make that history unique to yourself? I've long been a photography enthusiast, and with the advent of digital photography, I found it way too easy to enjoy the hobby. However, I think back to when I would shoot film, and each photo taken was a wish that I had the composition, exposure and lighting correct, and except for the few times I actually ventured into a darkroom to create my own prints and slides, my hope that my wish was granted happened when I opened the envelope. Digital photography completely spoiled me, and I can barely imagine the pressure Steve McCurry must feel each of the mere 36 times he presses that shutter button.

I've only shot a few rolls of Kodachrome in my lifetime, but my father used to take lots slides in my earliest years and before. Even to this day each of those slides is still as vibrant and full of detail as they were 50+ years ago. Digital might make things so much easier for the photographer, but it's the resulting product which stands the test of time. Will a hard drive filled with files, stored for 50 years in an attic be usable, much less readable? Will the inkjet paper and ink look anywhere near as good in that time? While digital has given us the spoils of nearly ubiquitous availability and ease of use, will it even begin to have the endurance of film such as Kodachrome? I'm betting not so much. Thanks to Kodachrome, for making all the world a sunny day, for decades past and those to come.

Paul Simon - Kodachrome

Today the music world died yet again. Les Paul, guitarist extraordinaire and inventor of the fabled electric guitar that bears his name and a standard fixture all over the music world, has died. He was 94.

A heartfelt thank you for all the music over the years.

Somewhere, a guitar amp that's always set to 11, is turned all the way down to zero.

Yesterday I heard that the last remaining survivor of the sinking of the Titanic has died, after 97 full years of life. As many of you might know, I have been an aficionado of sorts of all things Titanic, the ship itself, the era it was born in, the industrial might of the day, the people, and, of course, the tragedy itself and the resulting history. With the last human connection to that fateful day gone, it transitions forever into the history books. Like every historical event, of triumph or tragedy, large or small, anything of note, once there are no longer any people who can speak of it from being there, somehow it becomes almost a different sort of event. Such events lose some of the impact when the human presence disappears. It's as if it marks the point at which history becomes 'dusty'.

My fascination of the vessel and the events surrounding it could be a book of it's own. Yet even now, I still learn things I did not know previously. Ms. Elizabeth Gladys "Millvina" Dean, the last survivor and I share the same birthday. She was born in London on Feb. 2, 1912, just over two months old at the time of the sinking. We were born exactly fifty years apart. My feelings changed a bit more with the addition of a single word. We were born only fifty years apart. Something to think about, as I speed towards my own fifty years.

Bon Voyage, Millvina.

When I was a wee young'un, one of my prized possessions was my Panasonic cassette recorder. I had actually a few over the years, as I literally wore them out from the use/abuse I subjected them to. I would record music form the radio, or from my record player, often with these homemade direct connection cables for the highest fidelity I could muster. Not bad for an 11 year old I guess. Aside from all the music I was immersed in, I also used to record the world around me, as well as myself. I taped phone conversations with friends. Taped the sounds of company at the house. Took it to school and taped the sounds in the classrooms and concerts and field trips. When I was not playing my music (which even then was not your everyday Top 40 fare), I was inadvertently documenting the world around me. Over the years most of the tapes were used over for some other purpose or trashed after they had worn out. But still, the countless dozens of accumulated cassettes, though they had dwindled in number, remained in my memories as bits of the best parts of my life.

Just shy of exactly 20 years ago, after building this new house and moving things, I was cleaning stuff from my bedroom closet. A vent pipe stood inside this closet as part of the plumbing in the old place. When I had finally cleared out all the crap I noticed something shiny behind the pipe and below the floor of the closet. It was that first Panasonic cassette recorder. I thought I had lost it for good more than a decade prior, blaming it on someone walking off with it while outside in the yard or some such. I was reunited with my buddy, mostly intact and still around after several other tape recorders had taken it's place and fell aside after being worn out or broken.

The recorder found itself mostly in storage again. Occasionally it was dragged out for nostalgia's sake or for Mom to use for playing some of her language tapes in and around the house. But my old friend stayed in storage in these recent years.

Last month I was doing some major cleaning of accumulated cruft and junk, much of which was not touched in years. While clumsily hauling the crap from the basement, I knocked over several boxes, a couple of which spilled their contents on the floor. One of the boxes was full of those ancient tapes. I knew that one day soon, I'd have to try and see if anything was listenable. I did so a little while back. I popped four C-cells into the old Panasonic and started fumbling through the mess.

Those ancient mix tapes sounded pretty bad quality-wise, but it did not matter. To me, it was the same as a pristine first pressing vinyl copy being played for the first time. Memories came flooding in, to those days in my youth, the good and the bad. It made me smile. A tape of me and my friend on the phone talking together, watching the same Peanuts TV special commenting on how Lucy is going to yank that football away as usual. I tried to figure out in my head what the hell made me tape such things way back when. I found more crazy mix tapes, many others which were broken or tangled and not playable. I then popped another one in and heard myself talking, then another voice which I remembered to be one of Mom's co-workers. Then I heard her voice. It was Mom talking. A chill ran down my spine and my heart leapt. I was so not ready for that. It was scary, but welcome. I sat there with the tape running but not really listening. My mind was filled with images and feelings and emotions and I began to shake and cry. I was about to shut off the tape and then it stopped on it's own. The tape was fine, but the belt inside the antique tape deck had broken. I guess it was too much for the both of us.