Yesterday, amongst other Middling City U gigs and affairs was sent to shoot a blood drive for those less sanguine post-catastrophe down there in the Gulfish areas, to discover that the drive for bloodletting was not happening. A quick scout-out of vicinity revealed no blood, no where. Quick call to editrix revealed it was a ruse, there was no blood, yet. Today was the blood drive, manned by a bunch of femmes from American Red Cross, a bunch of humourless ladies but, I suppose, when brandishing large needles and colorful bandages (gone are the days of buff-coloured plastic strips and HELLO to ribbony and gauzey multi-coloured choices . . . I was like so jealous) it is white coat appropriate.
I have shot other blood drives in my full-throttled and illustrious career and have always made it a real rule to not look at the bags, the plastic tubing draining the blood away from the bodies. In a fit of perversity I looked at one student's filling bag of A+ (I asked if he knew his type and he did) and felt my knees get all loose and carefree about staying afloat if You will. I said OOOO, I feel woozy. One of the humourless said I should sail over to the snack and juice station. I snapped out of it, those were mainstream snacks. And I recovered, self-realizing Hey, Perfect Nance, you are tough, deal with this, you are no pussy. And so I carried on, making more images of dramatic slices of reality - the grimaces, the plastic bags, the bandages, the good wishes, the concern, the editorializing of the slice of reality, the crafty angles to show face and not too much crotch or chest and personality more than prone donor.
Wow, Prone Donor - yet ANOTHER great band name.
Time to continue along this strange work day of portraits, blood, more images and paperwork.
But, always, there is time to give You a piece of this Perfect World, these odd and even days.

Odd, even Love.