7/23/10

"Climbing Mt. Fuji is something every Japanese does at some point, but it's harder than you mght think. I was young, and I started up the mountain fast. I didn't know about pacing. My brother Phil was even younger-he was thirteen-and he ran ahead of me. The camera felt like it weighed a ton. It was akward. It got heavier the higher we went. After a whle I was pretty sure I wasn't going to make it, but just then a group of elderly Japanese women in dark robes came marching along in single file. They were chanting in an encouraging way and I fell in behind them. We passed Phil at the seventh way station. He was lying flat on his back.
When you climb Mt. Fuji you stay overnight at the eighth way station and get up in the morning so that you can reach the top at sunrise. It's a glorious moment. Spiritually significant. When I got to the top I realized that the nly film I had was the rol in the camera. I hadn't thought much about the film situation. I photographed the sunrise with the two or three frames I had left.
I took this, my first experience with a camera on the road, or path, as a lesson in determination and moderation, although it would be fair to aqsk if took the moderation part to heart. But it certainly was a lesson in respecting your camera. If I was going to live with this thing, I was going to have to think about what that meant. There weren't going to be any pictures without it." -Annie Leibovitz

I just recently bought this book from a small bookstore in Soho. It was a small little bookstore, black bookshelves and littered with books. They were everywhere, something out of movie. I've been really enjoying this book, a great purchase, definitely something worth it.