Landscapes lost to the archive, jumping headlong into nonfiction, idyllic motorcycle adventures, and burning the candle at both ends.

August was a tough one for me, creatively. My thoughts are all in my short essay Is This What Burnout Feels Like?, so I won’t go into much detail. Long story short, photography has been difficult, and I think there are some clear reasons why, and I’m working on how to remedy the situation. Feel free to read the essay if you’re interested. Also, it’s possible that this email will be affected by this situation, so my apologies for any lazy-sounding writing.

Thanks to that strange encounter with burnout(?), I took some time to look back at my archives. I’ve been thinking a lot lately about all the photos I’ve taken that were in some way lost. Some might have been held back by my past inability to properly edit them, or maybe they just didn’t make the cut into whatever project I was shooting at the time. Whatever the case, Lost Frames is a new series I’m excited to share, where I go hunting for those photos lost to the past. This time I focused on some landscapes I shot while living in a van in the American west, and I’m looking forward to future editions from eastern Europe, Mexico, Cuba, etc.

Lastly, after finally accepting that my life circumstances make the reprinting of my 2020 photo book, Transmissions from Japan, an impossibility, and sharing it in its entirety as an E-book, I was surprised to see how many people picked one up this month. I’ve never put much stock into E-books, but that’s also silly because the way I consume 99% of media is digitally, so why would this be any different? I even read books on a Kindle. If you missed out on snagging a physical copy, this is the next best thing, for a fraction of the price. Click here to check it out.

The Paradox of Choice. I find this kind of book to be extremely hit or miss. You know the type. Somewhere close to self-help, minimalistic cover design, the author probably has their own/has recently been on a popular podcast, largely stuffed with repackaged common sense. Thankfully, The Paradox of Choice didn’t disappoint me, so I’ll keep one foot in the door for now. In a world full of stuff, so much stuff, navigating it can be difficult for our little brains. The book talks about how an overabundance of choices can lead to any decision feeling wrong. With so many options to choose from these days, from appliances to pants, we’re perpetually suspicious of whether or not our final choice is the best one when we should really be looking for good enough. I think he’s right.

What I Talk About When I Talk About Running. Maybe my favorite book in a long time, and that’s saying something for nonfiction. Murakami somehow transfers his magical fiction-writing powers over to this memoir about running, and it hooked me instantly. Murakami was one of the first authors I read when I picked reading back up in 2018; Kafka on the Shore is still up there bouncing around my top ten. While What I Talk About When I Talk About Running isn’t of the same caliber as Kafka, it is a peaceful yet motivating peek into something about which I never thought I’d care. The book follows Murakami on his long relationship with running and how it connects to his process of writing. It was so moving that I started running the day after I finished it. I loved this one.

The Psychopath Inside. This book has an engaging introduction and proceeds to drag it out until the end. It starts with a fascinating story that I won’t ruin here, but everything past that falls flat. It’s like the author is constantly pointing us back to the original punchline as permission to say little else. What I’m referencing is probably on the back of the book, which is an even harder slap in the face, but I’ll leave the decision to search for those details up to you. This book could have been a blog post.

The Hot Zone. Don’t read this book if you suffer from germaphobia, hemophobia, or nosophobia, the illogical fear of developing a disease, because that’s The Hot Zone’s schtick. The Terrifying True Story of the Origins of the Ebola Virus is its subtitle. This nightmare of a book takes us on a handful of disgusting journeys from a deep, dark cave in Kenya to highly contagious laboratories where medical staff members practically bathe in blood. Ebola is a horrible plague that I really didn’t understand until now, and I kind of wish I could forget about it. 10/10, would read again.

Photo: Spencer Backman

Spencer is one of those social media friends that you know shouldn’t be constrained to a social media friendship, but proximity deems it so. We’ve talked back and forth for a few years, and in this time, Spencer’s abilities have skyrocketed. Recently, he’s shared a lot of incredible work from dirt-biking trips with his family, and I’m not jealous, you are. His photos showcase an idyllic lifestyle on two wheels, something straight out of the dreams of any moto-enthusiast. It’s been a long time since I’ve been on a dirtbike, but these recent photos, most specifically the one above, make me want to change that, fast. I encourage you to take a look at the rest of what Spencer has going on. I think we’ll be seeing a lot more from him in the future.

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News to catch you up: Allie’s luggage was returned, the weather has cooled significantly in the past two days, and we know where we’re going next. We’ll be spending September in Tallinn, with a short trip somewhere west next week, and in October we’re off to Transylvania. Romania still isn’t part of the Schengen Zone, so it’s a good place for us to reset our visas, as well as enjoy the spookiest of months in the spookiest of towns, just thirty minutes from Bran (Dracula’s) Castle. We’ll be there for one month, likely staying down in the Balkans until we can legally return to the zone.

No other news for now, so hey, that's all for this month. I hope you enjoyed this issue of Recollect. If you did, or if you didn’t, let me know. Hit the black box below to send me an email with your thoughts. I’m all ears. Thank you for your support. I’ll see you next month.