Holly Northrop Blog

The last roll of film I dropped off was free and if I would have know that I would have brought more then one roll. But as it was, they all had just found out that January 4th would be their last day. As we hugged goodbye, there were tears in everyone's eyes. After thirty years in the neighborhood the photo lab that I use for all my custom print work and color developing is closing. No more Spectra. They are the only photo lab I have ever used in New York. I feel slightly untethered from the earth, and no, that is not an exaggeration. The folks at Spectra KNOW me. They KNOW my daughter. They KNOW my work. The same people have worked there forever. The one woman I hand over all my unprocessed color film, negatives for custom work, instructions for custom print work and special requests like, don't cut the film, cross-process, and an occasional fast deadline I have know for seven and a half years. She has worked for Spectra for twenty-two years.

In my studio, I have binders full of negatives that Spectra has processed for me over the years, roughly 400 give or take a hundred, if one is counting.

Oh sure I'll find another place, probably C Lab but that is not the point. Handing someone a roll of film is a trust issue. I trust them not to fuck up by stuff. All the rolls of film I have moved through Spectra, they have only screwed up one print, which was reprinted immediately; two rolls of film that was lost for a day and then found in a different drawer; and once they overcharged me for a contact sheet and that was corrected the every next day. That's it and that is why I would walk out of my way to drop off film and pick up contact sheets no matter where I happened to be in Manhattan.

This comes on the heels of a lot of change in the neighborhood. Little places are gone, lost their leases, or pushed out by bigger fish. What's weird is even the big fish leave. Barnes & Noble is closing, which is kind of like when the Tower Records on Broadway closed. There are mixed feelings about it all. I could buy super cheap books and records at both of those stores, even though I should and do support Other Music, Shakespeare & Co. Booksellers and my personal favorite, St. Mark's Bookshop. But when a big tree falls, it makes everyone wonder what hell will crop up in its place. Astor Wines & Spirits moved from its location and a Walgreens crawled up from the sewer lines, even incorporating the old corner sign.

Yes, yes I know change is good but at what price? Is a Toys R Us better then a Tower Records? That is a tough call isn't it. How about this; is that place that I used to buy vintage purses at of more value then a Fusion Sushi restaurant? Is a used record store better then a candle shop? Does a Chase Bank bring more ethnicity to the neighborhood than the Second Avenue Deli did?

I know I sound like one of those 'old New Yorkers' but deep down I think in my heart I wish that the East Village would, at the very least, try and 'fail better'.

Tripping Out With The Money
I had to take the train home the other day solely because I am out of my goddamn mind.

I was so freaked out about a pending snowstorm that I convinced Martha to let me take the train home instead of riding in the car with her. Yep. My mind is a terrible thing.

See I just cannot seem to behave in the car when there is snowy weather. I know, I know, we live upstate what the fuck did I expect but see, there are different kinds of snowy weather and it is the ice combined with the 'two inches and hour' storms that freak me out.

When the roads start piling up with ice and snow, I become as a wild animal might behave while trapped in a car. Open-mouth hyperventilation and chewing at the windows makes for a stressful drive, to say the least. I could jump from the car.

Knowing all this and unable to talk me down at 7:30 in the morning about a snowstorm that isn't supposed to start for twelve hours, Martha agreed to letting me take the train home. She, the more rational of the two of us, would drive parallel to me on the other side of the Hudson River, meeting me at the train station in Hudson. I'm not quite sure why this woman loves me.

The good thing about the train is that I managed to snag a window seat in business Class while only paying for a coach ticket. Business Class is where the folks who take the two-hour train every day get to hang out. These people can afford to pay $126.00 a day, five days a week, every month all year long. That is roughly $57,960 a year in train costs, allowing for 6-weeks vacation and miscellaneous days of not riding the train. As I sat there among the prime rib of New York's Business Class, I wondered just how much one would have to make in a year for almost 60k not to concern your bottom line. You know, my gross yearly salary is what these suits spend on train travel in the same amount of calendar time. So what I make in a year is of no real concern to them. I am a travel expense, that is probably somehow expensed back to the company they work for.

I noticed that much like in the Coach Class travel these folks have the 'both of these seats are mine' mentality. The guy directly across the isle from me set up his very own travel office. Headquartered in the window seat, with the stunning views of the sun setting over the Hudson River out of his un-smudged with city crap/hair gel window he was in command of his domain. In 'his' adjoining passenger seat, he had pulled down the tray table where he had placed his laptop, (opened to some very important Excel Spreadsheet), and his cell phone which was blinking signals to the Blue Borg earpiece sticking out of his head.

On the front of 'his' passenger seat, and behind the tray table he had hung his suit jacket with a special suit jacket hook, (probably from Sharper Image) and on the floor, he had placed his shoes. I noticed the shoes and strained to look at his feet, (because there is no way I would let my socks touch the floor of an Amtrak train) and I noticed that he had slippers on.

On the passenger seat, he had a large blank yellow legal pad, a few pens, what appeared to be a voice recorder and a stress ball. I think I also saw a stapler but I'm not so sure.

I was able stare at this guy for so long because he had pushed his seat all the way back, his head nestled in a travel pillow; he was reading a small used paperback book. I tried desperately to see what he was reading but was never able to get a good look at it. Plus, I got bored with him once the sun went down and then I became fascinated by the woman in front of him. Wearing the female version of the upper crust business suit she too had her own little thing going on. Complete with opened laptop, various electronic devices and instead of a legal pad, she had The New York Times; she was ready for the all-important workload that might come screaming at her. I watched her inhale a medium size cheese pizza and two chocolate glazed Krispy Kreme Doughnuts before I found myself too sleepy to pay attention anymore.

All along the Kingston-Rhinecliff Bridge there are signs bolted into the light posts that read; "Desperate? Life is worth living! Call Helpline." I noticed this last weekend when I was on my way to therapy. Fitting, I know, but what struck me as odd was that they are mostly posted in the center of the bridge. Now, the Kingston-Rhinecliff Bridge is long and tall, and if, lets just say if, you wanted to jump off the bridge I would think that any point along the bridge would work. Why make a trek of it when around 200 yards in is just as good of a location as dead center? Maybe that is the point, Dead Center but see no matter what you hit, anything over two stories is going to kill you. Thinking that you can just dive off a bridge, slip into the water and then drown is a mistake. No, no, it's hit the water and explode. Hell, I could swan dive from the top of my house if I wanted to. Not that I do, I'm just saying. Relax, it's the holiday's isn't everyone thinking about killing themselves?

Thursday, before the snow actually started in Hudson, Martha was all cross-eyed and hell-bent on going into work. She managed to make it there, but not before driving through the tip of the storm, causing her concern on her ability to drive home. After about an hour at work, longer then it took her to actually get there, she got back in the Prius (!) and drove directly into a blizzard. It took her three-hours to get home, which isn't bad considering the severity of the storm. She said there was an accident every half mile of so, and the Prius did 'not that bad' in the snow.

Once Martha was home what more could I ask for? A huge snowstorm to dump fourteen inches on us the day before my birthday seemed just perfect.

Jasmine bought me a really cool photo book and I'm so proud of her. It arrived a day early and everything. All in all my birthday was great. I baked my own birthday cake that was so good Martha had two pieces and then passed out with yellow frosting still on her lips.

A new Diane camera is in my life thanks to Martha and I've been shooting with it like crazy. I'm currently out of developer and fix so I have no idea how the little camera is performing, (to me it seems fine), or where the light leaks might be. My chemicals probably won't get here until after Christmas, which sucks and proves that sometimes I really should pay attention to this holiday.

Speaking of Christmas, I have yet to buy one fucking thing for anyone and I'm not really sure what to do about that. At this point in the game, it's almost too late to buy crap online unless I pay crazy shipping. So that means I'm actually going to have to drag my ass out of the house and go into the places that have Christmas music, or excuse me, 'Holiday' music playing. Martha and I decided not to get a tree again this year, because Zoë is such a monster and will not leave any kind of evergreen alone. She is such as suck ass cat that the only foliage I can have is cactus and she tries to eat that. Stupid thing. I've even seen her try and chew on the Christmas lights. Anyway, we are exchanging a few gifts and we do have the outside decorations up but inside, it could be anytime of the year.

Bucktooth Neighbor Wave
Our neighbor across the street is totally obsessed with outside chores. I know this because he is forever making noise and seeing how my studio and the living room face him, well... he bothers me.

In the summer, he was ceaselessly cutting the grass, weed whacking the trim, mulching the flowerbeds and watering. In the fall, he was constantly blowing leaves down the driveway and then into the front yard where he would blow them into a pile. He would then get the lawnmower out and mow it all up. Now, in the winter, I watched him snowplow, salt, shovel, and again snowplow all day Sunday. Every hour he was back outside making some kind of noise interrupting my enjoyment of the hours upon hours of Planet Earth in HDTV that I was engrossed in. That show ROCKS and it rocks real hard on the new TV.

Anyway, Martha and I started talking about what might be going on over there and here are the loose facts. He looks to be around our age. It is his parents' house and they still live there. He moved in around the time we bought our house. My guess was to help with his folks. The mother is almost unable to walk, yet refuses to use a walker. I've only seen her a handful of times and she has the smile of elderly dementia. The father shuffles out every now and then in his slippers to take out the recyclables. There is a sister, who looks to be within a year or two of the brother and she has a little yappy white dog. Cute as could be but it barks at everything, including the wind. The sister only comes around every few months to visit. At one point yesterday, we noticed a kid outside, chipping away at some ice. Not sure where he came from. The house is small, smaller then ours and all one floor, so when everyone is in town, (like now) it must be gaud awful. Mom, Dad, brother, sister, kid and dog. It explains why at one point I looked over and noticed that he was just standing in the driveway holding the shovel. Just standing there, not doing anything but not going inside either. It was 17 degrees outside and he was just standing there.

Oh for fuck's sake. My 45th birthday is this Friday. What the hell? Even Jasmine gave me a wide-eyed look a few months ago when she realized how old I was going to be. I am the youngest parent of all of her friends, except for Weber. Her mother is around my age. Well, it is some kind of milestone I suppose, but for the record, 45 is not the new 35. That is absurd and delusional. 45 is 45 and for some of us, 45 is the new 50.

Jasmine said I was ridiculous and Martha said that once she reached $1000 she gave up on the idea of getting me everything on the list. That's right, I'm talking about my

This is not even the whole thing; this is just stuff that I tag every now and then. I don't understand, doesn't everyone have a huge Wish List? I mean, that is why they call it a Wish List. It's not a shopping list like I make very week for the fricken grocery store. It is a 'if I had money and abundant free time this is what I might buy' list. I actually thought mine was rather small considering how long I've been shoving shit in there. I've always used it as a catch all for things I don't want to forget about. Things I simply must have, (new releases, photo supplies and balls out obsessions), I negotiate with Martha and then go buy them, or...er...I mean, do whatever she tells me to do. :)

Anyway, I thought this was a great resource. Martha was bitching the other day about how I am so hard to buy presents for and with not only Christmas to worry about there was also my birthday. I knew she and Jasmine were conspiring together over what to get me so I thought I'd just send this little list along to help out. Music, books and photography about covers it. I have enough jewelry and knickknacks to choke a horse. Clothing is always an issue, and best left up to just me, alone and cold in some unforgiving dressing room somewhere.

With all this chatter about Wish Lists, it only took Martha a week to get on board as she has made one for herself. Looks like it's not very long before she makes a page two.

The Other Shoe Hits the Floor
Ah yes, but all that laughter quickly ended when a certain letter arrived at the house. Yet again, this Christmas needs to be light but at least this year we know exactly why. Along with my shaky employment outlook, the city of Hudson is raising our tax bill. (They are calling it an adjustment; I am calling it an ass pounding.) For the first two months of next year, we will have to shell out an extra $300 a month (!) and then the rest of the year it goes down to something like $250 or so. I stopped paying attention at the $300 number. Anything other then $20 is too much. What the hell are we paying all this tax for? Jacuzzis and tiered landscaping with white picket fencing for everyone, yippy!

Martha spoke with the tax assessor and after a whole lot of number punching on his trusty calculator he came back with, 'Well you're right in line. The increase is correct."

How can this be? Nothing is selling up here, except large million dollar properties. And THAT, apparently is the problem. Taxes are based on property values and those values are all over the board. The house down the street went into auction in October but the house directly across the street from the auction house is listed for $239,500.

But then you have something like this with a list price of $299,000 but taxes are over $8000? But then this, cute little two-family home, which is what our house is considered to be, listed at $199,000 and taxes at $3,700.

Then almost all the stuff on Warren Street, the main street of Hudson, is listed either right at $1,000,000 or just under it. That's what's selling. The big, big ticket items.

If we were wealthy, and this house that we live in was our second home, you know some part-time, weekend thing, like this which is just down the street from us and cost roughly $340,000 dollars more then our house, then I suppose things like this wouldn't effect us. My Wish List would not be on Amazon it would be on Lonely Planet. In no particular order, Austria, Germany and of course, Prague.

Ah, yes there is nothing quite like Christmas time along 5th Avenue in Manhattan. Kind of makes ya crazy if you don't have some sort of distraction. So that is why I shot Christmas in Midtown while listening to Led Zeppelin; specifically, the live twenty-five minute version of Dazed and Confused from the 1972 show at the LA Forum. When that song was over I found myself still in the feverish pitch of an international Christmas blast and unable to tolerate the sounds of directionless tourists. I shuffled my Shuffle to the twenty-three minute version of Whole Lotta Love from the same 1972 show. I definitely had a Wizard of Oz and The Dark Side of the Moon thing happening. It was, simply put, fantastic and the only way to roll around up there this time of year. It doesn't have to be Zeppelin but my god I recommend blasting something in your ears.

More talk about Zeppelin, I know, I know but there is no denying them. This is a band who electrified the blues and once they get in your head, they stay. Zeppelin's first four albums were released within two and a half year period, (from 1969 to 1971) and that is a substantial amount of excellent music to be bombarded with. I am officially deep in the trenches of a Zeppelin problem and I am taking Martha with me. She even started humming songs and the other day, she watched Black Dog online without me even being in the room. What can I say? For her it's all about John Bonham, for me it's Jimmy Page. I've taken out all my old vinyl, (all ten albums) and Miss Jasmine is now Christmas shopping online for either this, this or this.

What I really want for Christmas is something like this, only with this lens but that is a whole other subject that is never going to be talked about. But hey, look what's back on the market. Now that and a stopwatch would be a fun birthday present.

While wondering around the mean streets of Midtown, I called Jasmine in Pennsylvania for directions to the Disney store. I'd wanted to go there to shoot a Barbie® window display but didn't have a clue as to where it was. For some reason I thought it was near Times Square but as I walked by the Sullivan Theater, it occurred to me that I really didn't know where it was and before I made the huge commitment to walk down into Times Square at the height of lunch hour, I'd better double check. I'd just assumed it was in Times Square, because it sounds like it should be there. Jasmine is my dialup internet when I'm out shooting. If I need the exact address or phone number for something in Manhattan, I call her. Even out of state, she's still my photo bitch.

Jasmine informed me that it was over on 5th Avenue near Central Park and she knows this from memory because why? Because she's been there, of her own free will. Not with me, that's for damn sure. While I was waiting to cross Broadway with fifty holiday shoppers with cameras, I said to Jasmine;

"Oh man they lit that god damn tree last night and everyone here is out of their fucking minds."

Jasmine laughed in my ear as the woman in front of me turned around and gave me a total look of abject horror. I mouthed a 'what?' and shrugged my good shoulder at her and she looked away. That's right, Merry Christmas and welcome to New York.

With the hoards of crap that the foreign tourists are snapping up, New York City's economy should be just fine. The rest of the country will be homeless, having foreclosed on their dreams, but Manhattan is cleaning up. Who could blame them? If I lived anywhere else, I'd suffer through a shitty international delayed flight just to hit America's bargain basement prices. It is as though the United States has become one big discount store. We are now nothing more then one giant Wal*Mart.

United*States
Save Money. Live Somewhere Else.

The Wet Side of the Darkroom
I've been glazing my back with Tiger Balm extra strength for about a week solid now and it really seems to be pulling me through a rough patch. I'd rather smell like grandma then wear the TENS unit. That thing just reminds me that I'm fucked up and honestly, do I really need yet another thing to remind me of that?

Tiger Balm, for whatever reason, doesn't have the same reaction. Probably because I can't really smell very well. Too bad for everyone else now that it is the holiday hugging season. Acupuncture is working well and so is therapy. Lots of talk about bad things seems to be releasing some of the tension that I have all jammed up in me.

My therapist shares a space with several other head doctors in the practice. I've been to therapy about five times now and every time I've been there I've noticed a round tan device about the size of a large nut can sitting outside of her office. Finally, the last time I was there I asked her what it was. She said it was a noise machine. I laughed and joked, "Oh to muffle the sobbing." Her response was total straight-faced silence. I guess that would be an unfunny yes.