Diary Entry #4: Making Something With My Hands

An entry from my photo diary.

I recently started a real photo diary after years of making digital entries for the internet. I guess its a scrapbook, I guess I’m saying I started a scrapbook. Here are some of the first pages I put together, of no particular order or importance.

All the photos were shot on film, then printed and scanned at home.

[Coco Simone’s Photo Diary and other stuff]

Paint night/ Jerome. A friend of ours was making a short film for school. It was meant to show the transfer germs to each other via paint spread on our mouths and hands. I think there was 5 or 6 of us involved. I remember laughing too hard to transfer the paint covered card from mouth to mouth like we were supposed to. I somehow ended up being in a lot of lewis and clark school projects despite never having gone. I did used to sneak onto their campus to use their photo lab though. Apparently some of the teachers still ask my alumni friends about me.

[This is my brother shaving my mom’s head after her cancer diagnosis. She’s been in remission for a couple of years now. She was never a huge fan of this photo on account of her arms “looking huge” or something else untrue like that. But I’ve always loved this photo because of her expression. That’s my moms real smile, and I think she was really happy. This was part of a brief period of time where her, my brother, and I all lived under the same roof for the first time in a long time and also, what is conceivably last time. the last time. My brother was very serious during this process. This is one of the only photos I’ve ever taken of him where his face is not contorted into some ridiculous expression. I mean seriously it might be one of the relatively few in existence. My mom and I used to laught about the unluckiness of her cancer. “I mean what the fuck?” She would say. And then we would both crack up. Sometimes, very suddenly, life gets so serious, that you can’t help but make a joke of it. This photo always makes me think of her resilience in the face of all the unlucky cards she’s been dealt, and her ability to turn her luck around. Family photos can often feel like self portraiture. Though I’m not in this photo, I feel as if I am. (My mom’s house 2022)]

[Ali as “Best Deli”, which in my opinion, is the best. (2024)]

Look, I know that everyone who moves to new york tends to talk about the deli guys on their block as if they have a uniquely close relationship to them. I don’t think that’s the case. But now living in my third apartment, this time I spent living next to Best Deli was special, because those guys ARE the best. One of the older ones, Mohammed taught me some basic Arabic and insisted I used it when I came in. Coming from a Lebanese family which at this point is all but completely stripped of identity, this brought me great joy. He always puts his hand to his heart when greeting you or saying goodbye. I also found out I share my rare and lucky birthday (12/12) with one of the younger employees, Hamza. Ali, pictured here, holds this place down nearly everyday. The king of monotone jokes that are so predictable it somehow makes them funnier, “You know what’s happening later?” “no” “Nothing.” “You know what’s happening tomorrow?” “nothing?” “Nothing.” or his other favorite, finishing your transaction with, “That’ll be $500 dollars”.. or some other absurdly large amount.

[Ice Age] Berlin, 2023 - This is from when I joined my partner’s old band on tour in Europe for about 3 weeks. I drove with them from Germany to Switzerland to France to Spain to Portugal, staying in mostly hostels and sometimes the hard wood floor of a friend. Pretty fucking grueling trip honestly, but to date one of the coolest things I have gotten the chance to do.

[Taken in Paris 2022 after a breakup. This was my first time traveling completely alone. I loved it. Getting home ended up taking 36 hours and I had to sleep on the ground at the Vancouver airport.]

I don’t have awesome luck with international travel. But I do love a challenge.

Lahna at Windjammer in Brooklyn/ Central Park at night (2024)

[These are from a strange and brief time in Houston, Texas in 2021. I was accompanying a friend to play in her band. Over the two weeks we were there, we oversaw these two feverish ‘body modifications’. On the left- I think the vision was red splatter on a buzz cut, but the hair was so short and bleached so light that it really just looked like was bludgeoned. The shower didn’t fair well either. Unfortunately, these photos were developed improperly and only half of each frame came out. On the right- my friend gave this guy named Carl a tattoo of his own name on the inside of his mouth.]

House in East Portland 2021 - I lived in this neighborhood for about 1 month.

[On this night I was carried home. Delivered on my doorstep as a husk on the ground. My spirit had transcended my body and my body went along without it. These are the only two photos I took. // Coming home, guardian deity.] NYC 2024

[I don’t like taking pictures of people in pain. But as I spend my life attempting to document the world I see around me, ignoring the pain I see on a daily basis hardly feels like the ‘moral’ choice. Portland is filled to the brim with pain. Don’t just look away. // In the tangles of my mind, and a haze of mourning wine, as the swollen evening sun turns to a morning shroud. And the purple grains of sand, whisper through my hourglass hands, convincing my I’ve little time for sleeping. And the sullen light of morning time will come again, return my pain, take away my only escape. Keeper take my for a ride. The evening daylight stands outside upon two legged thoughts of candles burning. As the stardust in my eyes turns to earth dust, halts my cries, and life’s a masochistic dream of learning. And the sullen light of morning time will come again, return my pain, take away my only escape. Lock the canyons of my mind, and in sleep I’ll forever lie. As reality draws near to me I run screaming. And the purple grains of man, whisper through my hourglass hands, convincing me to spend my time in dreaming. And the sullen light of morning time will come again, return my pain, take away my only escape. - Janis Ian (67’) Ian was only 14 years old when she wrote that. Portland 2021]

Train home at rush hour (2025)

Thank you for reading.