One night in Billy these kicks were hanging. Sometimes you see a little memorial near where you see shoes like this. Sometimes you don’t. I’m guessing that sometimes crews just throw their shoes up there for fun.

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Update:

Maybe this says something about our digital world, and maybe it doesn’t. I had tried to upload this photo on two previous occasions, but never got the “post successful” text message from Blogger. It’s kind of frustrating when some messages post, no problem, and some don’t. Since everything on here is from my mobile phone, my ability to post is hamstrung to the quality and availability of T-Mobile’s network. In any case, on this third occasion, I did receive confirmation that the post had made it successfully to my blog. Consequently, I deleted the original from my phone before double-checking the post online. This mangled photo is all that is left.

Most things are like that, I suppose. Ephemeral, illusory. We see them, hold them, and in a breath they pass with barely a corrupted jpeg left in their wake. It almost sounds poetic. Then you see the wing of a dead bird on the street. Somehow the rest of the bird has been crushed or otherwise rubbed out of existence. You stop to snap a picture on your camera-phone, and as you finish an old Chinese gentleman walking by hands his smile to you and laughs. “Stupid bird,” he says shaking his head. You smile, and the two of you continue walking up the street.