Lou O’ Bedlam’s Friday Feature: Caitlin Swan

By Lou Noble on August 28th, 2009

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I met Caitlin at a party, couldn’t figure her out.  Some folks you can suss out fairly easily, but something about her defied a quick assessment.  Over the course of the evening I kept glancing her way, trying to get a handle on her.

Which might have been the end of it, me loathing the risk involved in talking to a stranger, in putting yourself out there, untethered, like being a telemarketer and making a cold call.

Except,  I just happen to take pictures.  A lot.

So I asked if I could take hers.  Which then led to us talking, which led to a photo shoot, which led to a meal, which led to another meal, which led to me sending her amusing emails during a trip to Vegas, which led to her telling me we should date.

Which led to us dating.

At which point I stopped taking her picture.  Something I definitely regret, because she was fun to have in front of the camera, bold, not shy or awkward.

Basically how she was in general.

DON’T DATE THE MODELS.

It’s not a rule, there’s no guidebook that says it is verboten, but it’s something that’s always in the back of my mind as a photographer who mainly photographs women.

A stranger asks you to come to his house so he can take your picture, or even worse, a stranger asks to come to your house so he can take your picture, this requires more than a little trust.

And it’s always seemed to me an abuse of that trust to have an ulterior motive, to use a photo shoot as a first date, or a trick towards seduction.

But it’d be just as dishonest to say that it never occurs to me, or that I’m not attracted to my models.  THEY’RE BEAUTIFUL WOMEN! What am I, a statue? A robot?

(Which, actually, being a robot would be kinda awesome, now that I think about it)

So when the opportunity arose to go out w/Caitlin, someone I found engaging and gorgeous, I took it.

After a few months, it ended.

She went away on business for several weeks.

Then my dad had a heart attack.

Then my dad had another heart attack.

In between those two heart attacks, Cailtin came home.

And I was exhausted from my father nearly dying.  I was exhausted, and realizing she and I weren’t particularly well-suited for each other.

But did I lay it out for her calmly and easily, effective communicator that I am?

Nope.  I avoided and flaked, hoping she’d “get the hint.” Emotional cowardice disguised as…being an asshole, I guess?

And again, she played the adult to my awkward teen, sent me an email letting me off the hook.  Humbling, being schooled in maturity by someone 8 years your junior.

Especially for someone who thinks of themselves, as I do, an effective communicator.  That’s what I attempt in my photos, to communicate something of the subject.  That’s what I attempt to do in my writing, communicate the particulars of an event, of a person, of a feeling.

Two walls of my apartment are covered in Polaroids.  Many reasons for it, but chief amongst them is they serve as a reminder.  I look at the pictures, I remember a place, an event, a person.

I look at the photos of Caitlin, I’m reminded that I should probably keep working on my ability to communicate.  And that she was a mighty fine kisser.

But mainly the communication thing.