Reason for Living #6: Film Photography
pin it down; make it real
There is a need to pin things down, to commemorate a moment. Newsletter writers, essayists, and novelists work to arrange words in a way that expresses something true. Painters use color and tone to evoke sensations that can’t be aroused by anything else. When life is a mess, made strange by family medical crises and political chaos that wrecks lives and terrifies the marginalized, some of us—and I could call us artists, but you can use whatever terminology you want—turn to our chosen medium to capture life as it is or as we want it to be.
For years, I only shot film photography. I used a Contax T2 and went through roll after roll. But photography is an expensive hobby, and when my iPhone began to produce images that had people asking me what fancy cameras I was using, I went back to digital. With digital photography, you can take as many images as you wish; you won’t be charged any more for 20 photos as you will for 100.
And yet this year, after C was hospitalized, I wanted badly to use film again.
I’ve written other things about my relationship with film photography. In times of psychosis, self-portraits with 35mm film and Polaroids provided an anchor as my sense of self drifted away. This year, I’m not so much taking self-portraits as I am chronicling the small things: the abandoned fake eyelashes, my dog pressing her face against the books in my bookshelf as she dozes.
In ten years, if I can find these photographs, I’ll remember: oh yes, I did collect cassettes in that epoch of my life, and I kept them behind the door where they were often forgotten. Or: I decided that I wanted my office to have imitation De Gournay wallpaper because I was so besotten by the aesthetics of the limited series “Sharp Objects.” The images are snapped; light presses on film; film is developed in the dark; prints are made (the sour smell of developer, stop bath, fixative) and scanned. And here they are, after all of that work and that delayed gratification: the pictures that determine what 2025 was like for me. There is something different about film photography simply because it is not so easy; there is a preciousness to them as a result of all that work. There’s a reason that I have something like 72,000 photographs on my phone and so few folders of scanned film. It’s not to say that those 72,000 photographs are worthless. But are all of them as precious as something that underwent weeks for an outcome?
And yet I also pursue another method of film photography that is instant in its definition: Polaroids, which I’ve been shooting since Polaroid dumped their company and the Impossible Project worked for years to get close to the formula Polaroid guarded like the ingredients to Coca-Cola. Since then, Polaroid has realized that there’s a market for what they made, and they’ve gone back to making it. Some people, as it turns out, want the analog. C bought me a Polaroid camera to replace my ancient SX-70 and a heck of a lot of film. I’ve been experimenting with the new formula, which turns certain shadows black and tends toward yellow tones.
Eventually, I’d like to come up with a way to organize the photos that I’m taking. Their file names make no sense in the scheme of things. I need to note them by year. But as I take these photographs, I’m once again bound to the world. I’m grateful for that art that lives aside from my writing, in another part of my brain. It says: Here it is. Here I am. Here it all is, in this moment, in all the moments that are always changing. ❤️
10% of the proceeds from each REASONS FOR LIVING newsletter go to an organization of the guest essayist’s choice. I’ve chosen NMDP (formerly Be the Match). NMDP is a global nonprofit leader in cell therapy, helping save the lives of patients with blood cancers and disorders.
Please consider donating here. And if I might implore you to do take one more step, please consider signing up for the registry, especially if you’re a BIPOC person (there are far fewer BIPOC donors currently in the registry). It takes no more than mailing in a cheek swab, and you could save a life. Someone took that step, was a match for C, donated their bone marrow (a relatively simple procedure), and saved his life.
If you enjoyed this free edition of REASONS FOR LIVING with Esmé Weijun Wang, please consider becoming a paid subscriber. Paid subscribers receive two bonus personal essays from me per month. We have monthly Fireside Chats, which are gatherings to discuss, play, and learn about creativity and limitations. Finally, you’ll receive access to our amazing Creative Resilience Toolkit. Paid subscriptions also help me to pay the bills, as my chronic illness and disabilities prohibit me from working a standard job, and both my husband and I are dealing with chronic illness as he recovers from cancer.
Looking at Photos
Jesús Cos Causse
translated from the Spanish by John Keene
Dagmaris walking away on the beach.
Asunción, her fan, her trim do.
Gloria two days before dying.
Roberto, pointing to nothing.
Idermis behind Oscar, after Jorge.
I so far away I almost cannot make myself out.
My brother wasting a smile.
My aunt as ugly as the word itself.
Grandmother in her best days.
Grandfather with a festive tie.
My father drunk again.
My mother like a distantly spilled perfume.
Think of a photograph that means a lot to you—it doesn’t have to be one that you’re still in possession of, but it should be one that you can be summoned to mind with ease. Describe the photograph. Why does it mean so much to you, and what does it mean?
As always, if you feel like sharing the results of your prompt, please pop it in the comments. And, as always, please feel free to keep your writing as private as you wish.
If you enjoyed this free edition of REASONS FOR LIVING with Esmé Weijun Wang, please consider becoming a paid subscriber. Paid subscribers receive two bonus personal essays from me per month. We have monthly Fireside Chats, which are gatherings to discuss, play, and learn about creativity and limitations. Finally, you’ll receive access to our amazing Creative Resilience Toolkit. Paid subscriptions also help me to pay the bills, as my chronic illness and disabilities prohibit me from working a standard job, and both my husband and I are dealing with chronic illness as he recovers from cancer.