It was so early in the morning. My eyes were still adjusting to the unfamiliar hour as I drove through the quiet streets of St. Petersburg, Fla. I was attending a six-week journalism boot camp and the faculty encouraged us to try new areas of the craft. This week I decided to venture into photography. My assignment was to photograph a native plant nursery at the corner of 10th Avenue and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Street.
I parked near the corner and stepped out into the warm stickiness of the day. I pulled out the hefty camera gear, trying to remember how to set the right speed, the right aperture. I was surprised at how busy the corner was as the sun stretched over the horizon. I’m not usually awake before 7 a.m. To my left, three little girls clustered on a doorstep with pink beads in their braids, ready for camp or for school. Across the street an older man stood next to a phone booth, a knapsack at his feet. Another man cycled by. All of them stared at me. All of them were black. I glanced back down at my camera, concentrating on adjusting the ISO – what is ISO again? I felt exposed and out of place with this camera equipment hanging around my neck. My uncertainty felt as heavy as the lens in my hand.
In this largely black community where I reported for six weeks, I stood out. Whether it was my white skin, the big camera lens or simply because I was new, people were noticing me. I’ve always wanted to be noticed. I’ve always wanted to be thought of as unique, but not like this. Not because of my skin color.
Just blend in, I told myself. You’re not doing anything wrong.
From the time I was young, I have always wanted to stand out. So throughout my life, I’ve tried to set myself apart to prove to the world that I am somebody. That I am special. That I matter.
In first grade I was elated to be chosen as the best class reader. In the third-grade spelling bee, I was so disappointed when I misspelled the doughy companion to gravy B-I-S-C-U-T. By 12 I knew my path to fame would be on Broadway. That dream fizzled when I realized you had to sing and dance. Who knew?
Eventually, I found a home in journalism. I loved dipping and diving into other people’s lives. Compared with me, they had great stories to tell. I’ve always thought I was someone worth knowing, but I wasn’t sure the world saw it that way.
I mean, come on. I’m a white, blond-haired, blue-eyed 23-year-old who was raised by two married parents in the sleepy St. Louis suburbs. Nothing particularly interesting happened when I was growing up. I rode bikes and played catch, climbed trees and chased the ice cream truck. I worked hard, went to college, just like everyone I knew. I was a member of the majority in many senses. I grew up in the Midwest and raised as a Christian, just like about 75 percent of the country. My plot line is uneventful: no great trials to overcome, no real pain to endure, no limos, no fame. No Ivy League schools, no pregnancy, no drugs, no huge successes or failures. This leaves me with no good story to tell.
I’ve always been drawn to people with a good story – which is anyone who is different from me. It could be something as simple as having dark, curly hair, living in New York or eating your eggs with ketchup. I’m jealous of people with a strong sense of their culture; of people whose families still eat the big Italian meal on Sundays; and of people who observe Shabbat every Friday. When society lumped me in with the hot-dog-eating American masses, I struggled to find my cultural identity. I’ve gone searching for it in Scotland, England and Italy. Through thrift shops and used bookstores. In my grandmother’s basement. Writing coach Dick Weiss likes to say, “You can’t tell someone else’s story until you can write your own.” But what is my story, I thought to myself. I have no idea.
When I got to St. Petersburg, it seemed as if everyone had a great story to tell. I found out Shoshana was Jewish and peppered her with questions about her heritage. Arek is half Armenian. Mary’s parents are from Eritrea. Erin has lived in 8 different places.
The faculty pushed us to consider what assumptions we were bringing to our reporting. In a diversity exercise we were encouraged to think of a time when we felt like the “other.” For some it was their religious beliefs, for others, their geography. I came up blank.
Out on the beat I was determined to learn all I could about the people who lived there. I worshiped in their churches, ate at their restaurants. I tried soul food and I liked it … well, most of it. I spent time talking to people on the streets and in the community center. Most people were great. They talked to me and told me all about the town. But some people were suspicious of me before I even got near. Several refused to talk, didn’t want to be interviewed, or they just stared from afar. I couldn’t understand why.
On the corner of 10th Avenue and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Street, I fumbled with the camera, trying desperately to remember the right aperture, shutter speed, ISO. What was that again? I was standing on the sidewalk next to a leafy bush that had grown over a chain link fence. I leaned toward the fence to focus on the flowers. I zoomed in, trying to make those red hazy dots sharp.
Suddenly, the owner of the house pushed open her screen door. She was an older black woman with graying hair and a look of confusion on her face.
“Excuse me, what are you doing?” she said.
“Um … taking a picture of your flowers,” I explained.
“May I ask why?” she demanded.
I was surprised. Why did she care that I was taking the picture? I wasn’t in her yard. She looked at me, arms crossed.
“Because they’re beautiful,” I said, weakly.
I glanced at her, then looked away. I couldn’t meet her eye. I hate confrontation. I hate offending people. What did I do wrong? The woman turned and went inside. I walked away from her and her flowers. I didn’t understand why she reacted as she did. What did she think I would do with the photographs?
Although I can never know why she was so suspicious, I suspect it was my very appearance. To her, I was an outsider, a stranger, someone who stood out. I disrupted her beautiful morning with my 6-inch lens. In her neighborhood, I didn’t blend in. And though she didn’t know my story, I think she made one up for me.
This woman showed me my “otherness.” She helped me to see that I didn’t have the corner on feeling ordinary. She probably felt that way too. In an instant I saw myself the way she did: someone new, interesting, foreign. It wasn’t until I was pushed into a newness I didn’t hand select that I could really see that I am different too. I spent so much time looking at other people’s lives for the unique when I really needed to turn the camera on myself.
But I want to be more than the superficial kind of different that this woman saw in me. I want people to know me. I want them to know my story. I am a Ponche. My ancestors came from Scotland and England. From Prussia and Czechoslovakia. When the Ponceks arrived, they changed the name to Ponche. But, being immigrants they were illiterate. So the new name was spelled 16 different ways, ranging from Ponshack to Punchie. On the other side of the family, my great-grandfather was a gentleman farmer who paid $15 to attend Yale law school. My mom found the receipt tucked inside an untranslated copy of the “Illiad.” My grandfather was a meteorologist during World War II who liked to eat cow’s tongue when my mom was growing up. My parents almost didn’t have children. Now they have five.
I am from the Midwest, so I love swimming in quiet lakes, running on gravel roads and picking produce straight from the vine.
I am the granddaughter of a farmer’s daughter. I’ve learned to bake homemade pies, to watch vegetables grow from seeds and to smush strawberries into jam.
I eat Yorkshire pudding, bake anise seed cookies and make shortbread for the holidays.
I spent four months in England, so I like my Earl Gray for breakfast, with milk and sugar.
I’m a St. Louisan. I will ask you where you went to high school and insist you tell a joke before you get candy on Halloween.
I’m a Ponche. I eat confetti cake with confetti ice cream on my birthday. I love word games and sarcasm, a good movie and a good joke.
I am a straight-laced Bohemian.
I am a traveling homebody.
I am a sculptor of words.
Hi, I’m Kalen.
