Today I was looking through Flickr, my new obsession, searching for symbolic or particularly artsy photos. I cued in "whimsical," "daisy," "portrait," "fall in love," and "black and white," curious to see what I would find. I found some breathtakingly spectacular prints of children in sub-Saharan Africa, and drummers on the New York City subway. Then I came across one that piqued my interest. A polaroid. So I looked for more polaroids, and discovered that such beauty is a dying art. Polaroids, like so much else, have been deemed unprofitable, inefficient, and discontinued. The world continues to be consumed by the high-tech, fast-paced, and the Wal-Marts, and we let Polaroids fall by the wayside. It's pretty sad, actually, so I started to learn about the Save Polaroid campaign, and flip through pages and pages of people's shared memories, grainy and simple, neatly centered on little white blocks.
In fifth grade, I got my first camera. It was a polaroid and I'd like to think I just barely beat out the camera trend, although most of the cool kids bought digital ones when we hit middle school. I don't know where my camera is now, but I remember the unreasonably high price we paid for the film, and how we had to track down the rare joint that sold it. There wasn't much to my infatuation with snapping pictures back then, it was just fun. The way the film rolled out and slowly began to show the image. Corners first. The color and lines, slowly pinching inward. Memories captured almost immediately. But I didn't put too much stake in that deep stuff back in fifth grade. I liked the sound. I liked the way it looked. I liked the colors and the idea of having a camera.
Now I see why this discontinuation of Polaroids bothers me so much. I haven't even picked one up in years. It's just like everything else in this world. Getting caught up in the whirlwind of changing times, these symbolic and beloved treasures of years past are just "not good enough" anymore. Quality and meaning doesn't matter anymore; it's all about profitability. In a world of NikonD8,000,000s or whatever Ashton Kutcher's using now, Polaroids don't cut it. At least to those who make the decisions. Polaroids should though. I like them because they recapture not only memories, but they elicit emotions, feelings, of simpler times. Happier times, perhaps.
The other day, a friend and I watched one of my all-time favorite movies, The Sandlot. We couldn't help but express regret that we didn't get to experience the idyllic, stereotypical American childhood in the 1960's. The eggs and bacon for breakfast, and toast popping up out of the toaster at exactly the right moment. We gaped at the neat storefronts, brick walls, painted awnings. The barbecues, and all day baseball games that never ended. But all I see driving down the street nowadays is poverty, CVS, Rite-Aid, Wal-Mart, Drive-Thrus (as though adding the o, g, and h would kill them.) The flashy neon and cheap materials clash. The pawn shops, adult entertainment theaters, and chain restaurants. Trash drifts down the streets, blowing in the wind, catching on street signs, fire hydrants. Small children wait in cold, grimy bus stops, alone, for dirty buses that run late and are full of disrespectful, selfish people.
To me there is value in the family owned joints, one-of-a-kind diners, doughnut shops, and coffee spots. It's so sad to see the deterioration of these values. It's even harder to know I never got to experience any of this in its fullest expression. I'm sure that my simplifications and idealizations of past times are inaccurate, insensitive, and immature, but there must be some truth to my musings.
I like to think family mattered back then. Honesty and learning lessons and little league baseball. Block parties and soda jerks and 5 cent haircuts. Heaping slices of apple pie with vanilla ice cream. Pearl necklaces and big hairdo's, Hairspray style. Trading cards and sandlots and treehouses. L-7 weenies and community pools. Sally Peffercorns. I feel like people took more time to enjoy their newfound prosperity and appreciated where they came from. I feel like this showed in the way they kept their homes, their shops, their yards, and their cars. The way they combed their sons' hair, even if it looked really lame. The "Honey, I'm home!" and "Gee, that's swell," and all that good stuff. The mowing lawns and playing catch. That must have been a nice time to live in.
I bet those are the kinds of moments Polaroids captured. And as Polaroids disappear, will these moments, too, disintegrate? No, I retain some hope that some of this will stay the same, maintain a constancy that will help carry me through life without losing complete faith. I feel like Barack Obama values these things, and that one of his great promises to America is his ability to bring some of this warm sixties fuzziness back. America was exceptional, and, please, let's not lose sight of all that. So, although I'm no longer in contact with the friend I spoke to a year ago today, I'd like to think some of the sentiment in our friendship is still somewhere, trapped forever on a small blank square. The image of us is now grainy and faded, I'm sure, but nonetheless it's waiting for someone to take a big black sharpie and put a caption on it, Dec. 22, 2007. And here's to many more chances to whip out that marker.
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