The Living Room

I started this blog in a different world.

At the time I was a freelance photographer. Or, more accurately, I was an out-of-work freelance photographer.

It was 2020, and I was about a year into my plunge into making a living from photography. The main projects I wanted to do involved travel, and the pandemic had put an end to that for a while.

Also, I didn’t know it at the time but I was about to become a father. We had our first child, moved, and had a second.

This affected me in ways more profound than anyone really knows how to describe, but one observable change followed from the acceptance that it was maybe not a great time in my life to be embarking on a career in freelance photography.

So I got a regular job - if Greenpeace can be called a regular organisation.

Five years on from that decision, I have no regrets about it, though I do wonder where photography would have taken me if the pandemic hadn’t come along.

The strange thing is that I don’t really feel much of an urge to pick the camera up again and go off on a new project. But I think that day will come.

In the first entry to this blog, I recalled Samuel Beckett’s impressively contoured face and took inspiration from his words, “try again, fail again, fail better.”

When I look back at my short career as a photographer, I draw strength knowing that at least I had a go at it. I tried, and yes I failed, but it went better than I could have expected. If I ever try again, I think that I’ll re-embark with hope that I will indeed fail better.

It took a global pandemic to stop me, after all.

(Well, that and being responsible for two small children. And I’m not sure which is more overwhelming, to be honest.)

So then, why am I returning to the blog? After all, this is the wordy, neglected corner of a website that I made to show off photos. If I’m planning to keep part of this site going, why this part?

I think it’s because I honestly don’t quite know where to hang out online any more.

On social media, I always have the strange feeling that I’m talking to myself but, also, that the worst person in the world might come find me at any moment. I feel much more self-conscious on social media than I ever would in person. But I don’t feel that way here.

Ryan Broderick, the tech critic and digital culture writer behind Garbage Day, had it right when he said that we’ve moved from the era of the digital town square to one of “a million digital living rooms.”

So, I’ve decided that this little corner of my old site is my digital living room. If I feel like I’m talking into the void on social media, then I might as well do that here. It’s cosy and I know it well. It’s good for a hang.