The day I met E—the photographer—he got into the passenger seat. I remember him saying something about the rows of poplars along the trails that led from the highway, and that a good black-and-white photograph was one that showed the whole spectrum of greys between each extreme. The light made the objects appear, or it made them disappear.
The light.
He made us pull over, and got out to photograph the poplars because E, unlike us, seemed to have all the time in the world.
D and I made the most of the interlude and lit a cigarette. E was one of those people whose very presence gives others permission to act naturally. The sort of person who doesn’t expect you to arrive on time or, when you do arrive at last, to say something important. The sort of person who distrusts order and who, consequently, brings a little bit of chaos with him wherever he goes.
When finally he had photographed the trees, E showed me his photographic camera. It was a Canon FTb, the same model that reporters used to document the war in Vietnam.
The light, which made objects appear, or made them disappear.
The trace.
That was what E wanted to capture.
“I hunt ghosts with this camera.”
“And what are they like?”
“White, and covered in a sheet that has holes for them to peer through.”
What E didn’t know was that, a few months later, he would be one too. In those years, our cities were full of them.
E knew this; E was searching for them; E summoned them. And, later, he would join his family.
That day, I remember we dropped him in the town, and, in the afternoon, we collected him before going back to the city.
“Did you find many?”
“Many what?”
“Ghosts.”
“No, no luck today.”
“Next time.”
“Let me see . . . actually, I think I might have just found one, look here.” Click.
The photograph that E took of me, which he gave me on our next trip, is one of the few keepsakes I have from the period. I’m in the back seat of the Renault, smiling and opening my eyes wide.
A black-and-white photo, with the whole spectrum of greys between each extreme.