an old friend...
A few weeks ago, I found an old Argus C3 Brick Body camera in a Wisconsin shop. In near mint condition, I snapped it up for the fine price of $20. Without even clicking the shutter, the heavy metal body brought back a decade of images. The leather wrappers were perfect and the lens pristine. On my first trip to Italy, I packed that very same model Argus. Toward the oculus of the Pantheon in Rome, I aimed as it rained through the massive dome… I nearly slipped on the slick stone underneath my feet. When I was 19, I smuggled drugs from Tijuana across the boarder in the same camera. The pills fit ever so neatly between the shutter and film plane. I had spent that afternoon inhaling Tijuana street scenes; candid, dry, bright, dirty and cheap. It was a foolish expedition and that camera was my accomplice and confidant. In both cases, the camera was complicit in my exploits, strapped over the shoulder slung like a rifle. …it was the most perfect companion. ...It’s always nice to run across a
