Maia Huddleston
Film photography is a bitch. Every time I decide I’m going to quit shooting film and stick to taking pictures with my digital camera, I get one good shot on film that makes me buy another roll. Film is expensive, and the cheapest kind I can get is a 3 roll pack of Fuji Superia 400 at the CVS on campus for $20. Not my favorite, but it does an alright job in a pinch. I could also get my film developed at the CVS on campus, but the only options CVS offers for film development are physical prints and scans uploaded to a CD. A CD! It’s 2020. I don’t know where I could even find a running computer that still has a CD/DVD reader. Those options don’t work for me, so I ship my film to a commercial development lab in Los Angeles.
In the end, I get an email from the lab that almost always says at least one of the rolls I sent them was blank. I mess up the film in one way or another—accidentally expose it to light, let it sit in the heat for too long, or accidentally press something on the camera that stops it from taking photos. You’d be surprised at all the creative ways I manage to destroy a roll of film. A few months ago, I completely shredded a roll inside the camera by turning the rewind lever in the wrong direction. I thought the tension I felt while cranking the lever was normal for an old mechanical camera like the Voigtlander I bought at the thrift store the day before. Clearly, I was wrong.
The last time I shot film, Sam drove because he liked to, and we went out to Lake Paradise. I watched the familiar corn fields flutter by until we passed the pale blue farmhouse that always welcomed us into the country and made my hair stand on end. I’d never been out in that part of the country by myself. Every time my mom or dad would drive me out there, they’d say, “this is a dangerous intersection” and “I hate driving out here in the dark.” I would try to convince myself I didn’t hear them.
We passed straight through the infamous intersection, and I relaxed a bit as Sam drove past unkempt woods and scattered graveyards. When we passed an old church, my mind began to clear completely. I didn’t know where we were, so I couldn’t be afraid of it. I loosened the grip on the camera in my hand and lifted its strap to drape around my neck. The bright red of the giant strap was almost comical against the pale-ass skin of my bony neck. There were a few little things I had to do before taking any photos with the mechanical beast in my hands: remove the lens cap (you’d be surprised at how often I forgot to do this one,) use the makeshift light meter app on my phone to help me choose the right settings, twist the lens to line up with the settings I wanted, and pull the film release lever. It wasn’t the smartest idea, but I completed the whole process in the car before we found any place to pull over. It could have made every photo we took that day come out as a blank frame.
Sam was going 45, I assumed because he thought driving slowly would help with my nerves. I didn’t tell him that it made me more nervous⸺what if someone was speeding behind us and didn’t have time to slow down? I asked him if we could turn around. Someone had an old truck rotting on their lawn with a tacky Halloween skeleton hanging out of the driver’s side window. I had seen it earlier, but I didn’t realize I wanted to photograph it until it was long gone in the rearview mirror. Sam slowed down but wasn’t sure how to maneuver his Subaru into a U-turn on the narrow road. My heartbeat sped up again.
“Hey, it’s okay baby. I’m gonna pull up here and turn around,” he said.
I nodded, closed my eyes, and inhaled slowly. Complex breathing exercises never worked for me, but taking one deep breath and exhaling for a few seconds helped me recenter my energy while Sam made the turn. We drove back down the road and pulled into a gravel driveway close to the ancient truck.
“Are you gonna get out?” Sam asked.
“Um yeah, I’m gonna get out,” I said.
“Okay. Hurry.” Sam’s social anxiety was almost as bad as my PTSD. He’d do anything to avoid interacting with people, especially strangers. If anyone came out of the house to talk to me about why I was photographing their lawn decorations, he would probably implode.
I got out of the car, walked into the grass, and shot a few photos. Then, I got back in the car, and we continued our journey. After a bit more driving, Sam slowed down again.
“I think there are cows up there,” he said. “Do you want me to pull over so you can take some pictures?”
Of course I did. The cows approached the Subaru when Sam pulled it up next to the wire fence they grazed behind. That was weird. I expected them to back away in fear like most animals do when people approach them. I thought maybe they expected me to throw them some food. The biggest one, a white cow with a brown patch of fur around her right eye, stared directly at me as I took her photograph. I prayed that all my camera settings were correct.
“Can I take some?” Sam asked.
I rolled my eyes. Sam knew I didn’t want to waste any film because it was so expensive, but I loved it when he showed interest in photography like I did. “Yeah, you can.” I said. “Let me get the settings ready for you.”
Two weeks later, I got the scans back from the roll of film I shot with Sam. They looked incredible. In every frame, the sun glowed behind the massive heads of the cows by Lake Paradise. My soul ached to repeat that day over and over and over again. It’s one thing to miss a person, but it’s a much harder thing to miss the time you spent with them.