Here's a big surprise- I like downtown. A lot. I'm a big fan of wandering through back alleys and checking out dirty little niches to photograph things that people try to overlook. Sometimes this works in my favour (see above photo) and sometimes homeless guys use those niches as urinals. While I'm standing in them.
This particular spot has become a favourite of mine. It's beside a little cafe, this side of which, faces an alley. As I mentioned above, some of Calgary's residents are not too particular about whether or not they have an audience when they need go. In order to prevent their customers from relating their beef tartare to something decidedly less savoury, the cafe installed some heavy drapes. (It's probably something a lot less exciting, like the drapes look nicer than a view of a dumpster, but just go with my story, k?) They've yellowed and wrinkled, and most people walk by without a second glance. I've done it dozens of times myself.
If you're lucky, though, you'll walk by just before sunset. The alley is east-west, and just before the sun disappears behind a behemoth building downtown, it hits these heavy drapes and, for a few moments, you see the beauty in the texture of the fabric and the play of light and shadow.
It makes you feel like the world shifted just for you. Like you were supposed to see this mundane little thing be elevated to something beautiful, and it makes you realize that everything has beauty- you just need to be open to it.
Love,
Hearts & Photos
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