Alone

Alone, Park Güell, Barcelona, 2022 (iPhone XS)

“You come in to the world alone and you go out of the world alone, yet it seems to me you are more alone while living than even coming and going.”

—Emily Carr, 1871-1945, Canadian artist and writer

The image

Like they, say, “the best camera is the one you have with you” which, in this case, was my mobile phone.

And this image was hard to resist… after all, it presented itself in such an obvious way.

What are the chances that this small alcove in a very well-known and heavily-trampled Barcelona tourist site would not be crammed with a bus load of tourists?

What are the chances that a big round guy with a big round head would sit in this very spot, rhyming the rounded design of the alcove itself?

How is it that on this day he chose this particular vest which, as I see it, rhymns fairly nicely with the surrounding checkered stone work?

What are the chances that someone would be standing nearby to actually notice this strange confluence of events and capture the moment for posterity with a camera?

What are the chances that this moment might repeat itself in this particular universe, even given an infinite amount of time?

This is why I like photography: It gives you the power to freeze and preserve a single special, unrepeatable moment in time… so that you can slowly savor it for as long as you like (or as long as the physical print–or the digital 1s and 0s–might last!).