From now on, I promise.  A photo every day.  (Or maybe every other.)

Until last week, I had not made a digital image for more than a year, photographing only on film.  But I missed the convenience of digital and recently began carrying a Canon 5D again with a very light and compact 40 mm Voightlander “pancake” lens.  The photo was made on my way to work at the Old Navy flagship (pardon the pun) store on Market Street.  A crop obviously — some photos just want to be square.

One of the photography blogs was running a self-portrait contest, and I thought – nah.  Then I walked by this window on Market Street.  This photo really didn’t work in color.  There was too much going on and too many different color temperatures: cool shade on the sidewalk, warm reflections from across the street, the fluorescent light from the shop.  And the contest?  At first I couldn’t remember where to submit the file; then, when I stumbled on the mention of the contest mention again, it was too late.

Most mornings on my way to work, I pass this statue that I have come to think of as the headless hammer guy.  He is planted in a manner that conceals his handicap along a lovely stretch of 17th Street just west of Market,  where a row of  Victorian homes is separated from the sidewalk by a low wall and a short hillside of terraced gardens. These gardens are regularly tended without being over-manicured,  and on the street side of the sidewalk are large planters containing small trees, or big flowers, or both–creating a fifty-foot-long tunnel of green.  Lately, I would have said that the statue had his eye on me  (if he had an eye, that is) as if he wished to make a request.   Finally I figured it out what he might want, and the next time I came by, I brought my camera.