I am earning patience in unusual ways these days.
The shots for the 36 frames of film were carefully chosen, not because i am very meticulous with the subjects but because my camera tends to catch some attention. It took quite some guts to take the camera out into the open and allow everyone to see me shooting. I have long been used to the quietness and discreetness picture-taking that is digital point and shoot. and because point and shoots as cameras have lost all the novelty they had the first time they came out, they don't catch nobody's attention no more.
Unlike this one.
So i decided to bring the camera again to work, as i do everysingleday hoping to catch a chance for a nice picture, so i can allocate the last 2 shots to the water taxis at the Parola port. I had a chance for a shot of them water taxis last Sunday, but i was with my family and there were far too many people, i was drowned in my own shyness than my want to snap. That day when i brought my camera to shoot the last 2 frames would have been a perfect setting because i was the first to get a seat at the ferry and there was nobody to make me so self-conscious taking pictures.
After a single snap, the lever did not budge, signalling the end of my film roll. Whoever said when I was still a kid that a 36-shot film have at least 2 or 4 extra shots sure lied. My film counter read 36 and it was the end of it. So i started rewinding the film and STOPPED, so suddenly. In the middle of the whole, almost zen-like position: me sitting alone at the far-end of the ferry, looking blankly ahead while my right finger, as if having a mind of its own, mechanically turns the film rewind knob, I remembered that i have forgotten to PRESS the rewind button at the base of the camera. The very essential rewind button, hidden by the leather protective case that i never take off because it has a hole, anyway, for easy access of the battery switch (for the meter ONLY because my camera works fine without them batteries).
I forgot to remember to PRESS the rewind button.
People started coming into the ferry and i put the camera aside to focus on the TO DOs for my dayjob. There will be people at the developing center to take care of the film, I thought.
WRONG.
Unless you did not do any physical damage to the film, yes, people at the developing center will try to make things work out your way. But not if you FAILED to press the rewind button and physically damaging the film as a result. No, they will not do anything for you.
And that's what exactly happened. After a quick instruction to the developing center lady on how to open the film slot and a little briefing on the series of little mishaps/tragedies that led me to seek help from her, she came back with bad news: I have completely torn the film off it's roll. The longest end remained stuck at the film spool--it did not rewind at all because not even halfway through it i have already torn it in half.
(SEGUE: while waiting for the Developing Center Lady to return, I took my kid to the humongous printer and showed him how pictures are produced/printed. The printing machines in this developing center is incidentally (I'm happy), displayed publicly for everyone to see while they wait for their pictures to be printed. The kid screamed: WOW!! dako dako ba na robot!!)
I did not know what appropriate reaction to give: should i panic? should i look upset?
I asked, "Regardless if it was wound back to its cartridge, is it still possible for you to develop a film that has not been rewound?"
Developing center lady (DCL): "It's already torn, Ma'am, there's not way we can process it."
Me: "Like maybe you can just process the rest of the long end of the damaged film and see if i can still get pictures out of it?"
DCL (A little confused at my question): "But it's torn, Ma'am. I'm really sorry."
I thanked the lady and promised to be back. The first time I had my films developed here, she is appeared sort of amazed to have me around; very few people now ask for these kind of services from the store.
There were 3 shots that i badly so wanted from that film roll, which i may or may not be able to get again:
One is a picture the sunny morning view of 3 birds perched upon our neighbor's concrete fence. 1 bird was pluming its own feathers while the 2 others, perched about a couple of inch away, were helping each other with pluming tasks. I shot it around 6:30 in the morning, groggy from lack of sleep after having taken a glass of almost-espresso concoction of native coffee beans from the local kapehan.
Another is a picture of my husband's grandma in a boxing stance while watching the Pacquiao-Mosley fight on May 8--Philippine time. I may have to wait for November for the Pacquiao-Marquez rematch to take another picture of that.
Last is the picture i would have entitled "Commercial Space for Rent". I took the picture at 4:00 in the afternoon with the streets deserted. Kid, husband and I just got off from the jeepney, returning from the weekend in at the Island. I just finished dedicating the 2 frames to the beautiful graffiti on the concrete fence of an old house and when i looked behind me, there they were, kid and husband, waiting for me to be done with snapping, waiting under the commercial space for rent sign of an empty building fenced off from public by cyclone wires.
It was the best shot in the film roll.
If i only took time to pause, and think of my actions before i cranked and turned that rewind lever, i would have never lost the whole batch of pictures. And the birds, the grandmother, the husband, the kid, their pictures, now gone.
and i thought, how easy it is to lose these things if you are too reckless with your actions.
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i bought Reza's War and Peace book about 2 weeks ago for PHP750.00 at booksale. it was a lucky day. my first time to have my test roll of film developed (and had about 6 shots that i really liked) and i got this book. I thought i was a good sign but comes the disaster in the second roll of film. I'd have known better than to actually believe in fate. :)
FIN.
