Fear & Loathing on the Hamster Wheel

Fear & Loathing on the Hamster Wheel

Sometimes I feel like I’m a hamster running on one of those silly wheels, spinning quickly to nowhere. The futility of the exercise is symptomatic of working within the institutions of today. My protest is just another “Catch-22”-like tome to rail against the absurdity of it all.
As a professional observer, I watch a lot of re-runs. The criminals I cover commit such similar crimes that it’s tough to keep the specific incidents straight; the community events I attend are mainly traditional, annual things that happen with little script changes each year.
Many times, I feel like I’m living the movie “Groundhog Day” infinitely. Finding something new to write about or photograph in the midst of these constants is the challenge. Finding the new in the midst of all these same-old, same-old, re-runs of life takes patience and paying close attention to detail.
When something brand-new happens, it’s a time to rejoice, to write about or photograph something the likes of which haven’t been seen here before.
For ages now, men have complained that it’s all been said before, that all things are discovered and there’s nothing new under the sun.
But that isn’t true. The newness slips in unannounced, most of the time, and I’m always ready to spot when it happens.
When it does and I capture that moment, I feel like Henri Cartier-Bresson, whose artistic credo was to capture the definitive moment. His art was in photographs and that “definitive moment” was that point that makes the picture live.
It’s the same with words and there are a few creations that live with the spark of genuine life; of energy and emotion harnessed into something that people want to look at or read again and again.
When that happens, and as an artist I am able to corral that bit of this American life, it makes all the repetition worth it.
It stops the hamster wheel and justifies the time spent spinning. It’s a re-affirming thought to think that I’m not just a hamster spinning a wheel in a cage to burn energy.
Here’s to life!