Tag: seattle

by jad

Water

Cosmically, they say I’m meant to be by bodies of water, but I never was much of a beachgoer, preferring the cool of the mountains over the oppressive heat down below. I figured it was more metaphorical—like I’m meant to be hobnobbing with the coastal elite, wherever they may be. But the amount of joy I’ve been feeling from being a stone’s throw from Lake Washington is changing my mind. Here’s our neighbor Chuck, the beaver, doing his daily laps. I don’t know if it really is the same beaver every day; all beavers are now Chuck, just like all … Continue reading “Water” →

by jad

Disposable Memories

I found a disposable Kodak camera while packing up our old apartment that I must have had stuffed in a backpack or something, because it expired in 2014, four years before I moved to Seattle. I have no memory of buying it (was it in the UK?) and after taking a couple of shots with it, I realized that I had only ever taken two frames after I got it. So I used up the rest as we shuttled back and form, half expecting the roll to be completely nonviable—I mean, the thing endured a heat dome and possibly several … Continue reading “Disposable Memories” →

by jad

Liminal Time

I’m writing this post on my phone in an almost completely bare bedroom with spackling on the wall in front of me covering up the many holes Christine drilled there, being the handy Andy that she is; she’s leaving the place better than we found it. We’ve been alternating several nights separately, staying here and in our new place to make sure our more sensitive cat has time to acclimatize by herself, while not leaving our more spunky one alone for too long. And all of this shuttling back and forth, packing and unpacking, sweeping and spackling, is happening on … Continue reading “Liminal Time” →

by jad

Hello, Madison

This is the first official post from our new place’s Wi-Fi, now lovingly called “LakeStinko,” after the regional lore. It took the Comcast guy a couple of tries to hook us up this morning because the wiring was so shoddy, and the previous tenants were either offline luddites or used something else completely. I took these shots on the same roll that Christine was using in the Nikon Lite-Touch. This was near the second apartment we viewed before we found this one. We were seduced by the amenities and soaring views, but the price they sent us later that day … Continue reading “Hello, Madison” →

by jad

Goodbye, Cascade

This strip of human existence by the urban wound that is I-5 has been a significant part of my Seattle experience since before I moved to this country, so I wanted to capture and keep some of it in our last weeks in the neighborhood. One of the first things we did once we moved here is set up our Wi-Fi to say “CascadeNotSLU,” and that’s all you need to know about how we feel about the neighborhood. We’ve seen this block go through many changes over the past six years, but the general rule with only one singular exception, … Continue reading “Goodbye, Cascade” →

by jad

Birthday Breakfast

We’re not quite moved out but we’ve started moving in; the liminal time in between. Empty rooms are beginning to take their form. Boundless time is beginning to clump up and congeal into rhythm and routine. This is our first morning waking up in a new act in this city. This is also the first light of yet another solar return. We’ve made it through. There is symbolism to this space. There’s a moral to our decisiveness and a lesson in our good fortune. It’s too early to find meaning in the day, but I’ll start making some anyway. This … Continue reading “Birthday Breakfast” →

by jad

Christine’s Project: Kent

Working with @christine.bingham.art on this photo-documentation project has been a thrill and an honor, and sometimes pretty nerve-wracking too, since I only picked up a camera two years ago. The learning curve’s steep, but I’ve always learned best in situ and in media res. My brain’s wired that way. This particular shoot, documenting Saint Kateri, was especially poignant. It took us over a year to make it happen, and in that time, we got to learn so much about Kateri and the people of Kanawake, which we even had the privilege of visiting (it’s just outside of Montreal). So, I’ve … Continue reading “Christine’s Project: Kent” →

by jad

The Art of Moving

I don’t know what the property people really thought of us, but one did say nothing fazes her anymore after I joked about our quick and dirty photoshoots in every apartment we viewed. “We turn everything into a project,” I laughed. But it’s no joke. Life would be a thousand times more stressful without these tricks I play on myself. Compete with every other lease ending this month? Sure, why not. And let’s be art-farts doing it.

by jad

U-Haul Season on LomoChrome ’92

It felt like spring had only just arrived, but now it’s time for another solstice; the wheel turns and stops for no one. The unrelenting march of time can mean many a thing to many a person, but in a city like ours, there is one certainty that it inevitably brings: U-Haul season is upon us. That’s right. After six years atop our brick tower, the time has come. I’ve walked these streets for about as long, occasionally catching myself playing “beyt byout” in my mind, wondering what it would be like to live behind that window or another, with … Continue reading “U-Haul Season on LomoChrome ’92” →

by jad

Folklife 2024

It’s difficult to be cynical about post-Expo spaces like the Seattle Center when they’re so successfully integrated in and activated by the urban fabric, especially when you compare them to the legacies of Expos like Montreal’s. And Folklife itself is an admittedly impressive enmeshment of the very best of Northwest granola culture with the most humanizing of atomic age modernism. I almost can’t stand admitting this. It’s hard to believe that this thing has been going on for 53 years. And this was my first time here. It was especially impressive to me how formally Folklife embraced the Palestinian cause. … Continue reading “Folklife 2024” →