I wonder who gets the reference?
I mention trolling because it's something I'm very skilled at after many, many, many years of practice. I'd tell you why I do it only you wouldn't understand primarily because I don't fully understand it myself. It's just in my nature to be contrary. I've always played the Devil's Advocate and fought against any form of established authority.
Personally, I put it down to brain damage. Probably from drugs or those numerous times that I hit my head on something hard, like the front wheel of a Jeep Cherokee as it bounced from tyre to pavement to tyre a few times over. That motorbike accident also wrecked my knee permanently and ended a not very promising career as a security guard.
I have done my utmost, throughout my entire life, to avoid success. I would say that I've succeeded at it only that in so doing I'd be admitting that I'd failed at it. Which would in turn mean that I had succeeded. Which in turn would mean I had failed. The reciprocal circle of life, or at least my life.
I have wanted to be a writer, photographer and film-maker since I was about nine years old. My first passion was actually martial arts and despite secretly being a highly trained ninja-assassin, I found that I was also an excellent writer, much in the same way that Raymond was an excellent driver.
My first short story was about Biggles, the Sopwith Camel flying ace pilot of World War I. It consisted of a 900-word sentence with zero punctuation. I was very proud of it. My mother told me it was complete and utter crap which filled my nine-year old mind with confusion and resentment. After all, it was clear to me that I was ahead of my time and that she didn't understand my artistic vision.
My passion for photography started, and ended, with my sister. She worked as a photo-lab technician back when Betamax was popular. She would bring home all sorts of camera equipment that she 'borrowed' from work. She would have some amazing photos that she'd keep from people's films they brought in. I have no idea if any of what she did was legal. One birthday, I think when I was about ten, she bought me a really nice camera. Only, she didn't end up giving it to me. It just sat in her room for the next few years until I moved out.
As my interests converged and coalesced into a desire to tell stories through image, I realised that film-making was the end result of what I really wanted to aspire towards doing as a career. Much like photography and my writing however, I always found an excuse not to embark on that journey. I always told myself that I wasn't smart enough, rich enough, talented enough, driven enough, or bold enough to become a photographer, writer or film-maker.
But now? Now I've run out of ideas. My well of avoidance is now dry. I've tried everything I can think of to not follow my dreams. Failure is the only thing I've been good at so far. So I've sold off whatever things I feel I can spare and gathered what money I can scrape together and am now looking to buy my first camera. I'm very new to photography but I feel that part of my journey of discovery, and a future that I can be proud of, starts here.