Kitchenbox

Last week I captured a huge moth in a baby food jar in order to inspect it a little (it was a Mellilla Xanthometata - Orange Wing Moth) but then I forgot about it and the jar stood on the kitchen sill with its captive still inside. This morning I remembered the poor bastard and released it back into the wild. What was it thinking as it tasted fresh air and stretched its satin wings? What stories will it tell its moth friends of its days in captivity? Will it eventually come back to me because of Stockholm Syndrome?

Terrifying thought: perhaps it allowed me to capture it and it used its jar-time to spy on ME and now it has reported to the moth authorities (who are like the Illuminati but real) who have already set in motion acts of punishment too terrifying to even contemplate.

Another week later: I knew that sucka would come back to me. Stalking me in the shower though, that's creepy...

SUKI: Subtle Elegance
The attraction of the unusual or idiosyncratic. The primitive mask, a mysterious object, an obscure agricultural tool. Suki is the fascination exerted by the unknown and unfamiliar.

WABI: Tranquil Simplicity
The intrinsic quality of colors and materials, forms and textures. Plain clay pots, woven baskets, shell pendant. Wabi is the spirit of poverty, appreciation of the commonplace. The fine line which precariously separates beauty from shabbiness.

SABI: Patina of Age
The enhancement of the ravages of time. The castle ruin, the armless statue. Sabi is when age, wear and tear, bring something to the very threshold of demise.

do i love my job, you ask? cleaning up after other people's shit may seem an odd choice (brave, you wanted to say?) for work, so let me assure you: working at night, at your own leasure, without supervision, alongside your best friend leaves you with countless reasons and opportunities to milk the clock til its nipples are sore. that is nice, considering what janitors get PAID! jep, it's true: i am a rich janitor.

the think-tank created by my friend and i is also something to marvel at. just last week it was time for yet another installment of "shannon believes in aliens? what a freak!" vs "kadri: fascist dictator. staple her mouth shut." rarely do good, really good ideas come more smoothly and in quicker succession than when cleaning bent over a toilet seat and nothing, i repeat NOTHING, makes you put those ideas into action faster than wiping that filtered mcdolnald's off the inner rim of some doctor's porcelain throne.

meanwhile, i'm getting ready to graduate without a fuckin penny of debt. instead, i boast polished and global skills in many areas including, but not being limited to, scrubbing, mopping, and vacuuming people, places, and things.

Kadri Rebane
Understanding Photography
Proposal for Final Project
November 9, 2006

For the final series of ten black and white prints I will attempt to capture people at work; professionals in their respective environments concentrating on tasks. A few individuals thus far considered: concrete workers laying/finishing flatwork, a physicist setting up laser beams for an experiment, a doctor performing surgery, a butcher, a baker, a stripper, a wrangler, a goldsmith, and a flippin.. lumberjack!

I am interested in the fields that still require distinctive skills, personalities, and environments, fields that may become obsolete within decades. Back in the days when women fainted freely and men fancied themselves handsome with bushy moustaches one went to the local shoe maker to get them there boots. Now we drive to Target where we are greeted by a dull eyed, greasy haired, uneducated, and uninspiring [fe]male who at once becomes our guide, our fitting room assistant, and our personal psychologist, psychiatrist, and psychic. The shoe we so desired is made of plastic and we shall feel as empty post-purchase as we did pre-purchase. Have I veered off topic? I apologize.

Candid movement and expression is what I strive for, yet if I fail to catch that moment the next challenge would be to ease my subject as far away from the typical smile-big-coz-then-the-wrinkles-around-my-lips-will-disappear poser shot. The work-specific environment is the throne of the professional. My addiction to large apertures has to be suppressed as the need to capture the detail of the place and time rises to equivalency with the human subject. The anvil in the background is as important to the narrative as the torched nose hairs of the metal smith in question.

it's finals week and everyone's on edge. the fast-paced end of the semester will surely be rewarding in the end but certain things really tick me off. school politics/policy, for one. i have a parking pass (though if i don't show up at school at 8am there is no way i'll find a spot) but yesterday i got a ticket anyway. i was cited for 'failure to register'. register what? my car? my soul? i'm already in their system and every time i get a ticket and don't pay i am unable to register for my next class. understandable, to a certain extent but this ticket is out of line. i had no idea i needed to register my car....wasn't told that when the pass was bought. i suppose it's my failure to read up on the rules pertaining to parking and registering in the 666 page fine-print booklet. yet, i've been using this pass for two semesters now and have surely been checked countless times for validity. but now, in the last week of school, i get cited. $15 is what i owe and if i try to rebell and don't pay this wretched ticked, i don't get to register next semester and the ticket get's bumped up to $30. but this is america for you: no reliable public transportation in a town smaller than l.a., takes $50 to fill up my super gas-savy subaru, $300 parking passes for university students and professors alike, plus some random citations, just to add flourish. really, a two or three story parking house would solve the problem of parking on this campus, maybe even knock down the price of a pass, but no, there's no budget for that sort of fancy feast. instead, a bunch of dim-witted junior college transfers get full-ride scholarships to play football for the bobcats (who suck...always have, always will) and graduate with 'honors' for having maintained a 2.5 gpa. i think i might faint with anger and an overwhelming sense of injustice. and to think that i was going to use those $15 dollars to donate to amnesty international..............