Best bagels around. No matter how small-minded or small my town really is, I can always go and get a cinnamon sugar bagel toasted with vanilla cream cheese and sit in the well-lit space and read the newspaper or eat messily with family and friends.

Golden Girls has two shelves of over-priced but under-appreciated bottles from various centuries and decades. They are covered in dust and arranged perfectly.

Various bottles and glass jars.

I want a collection like this, except I would have them up against windows, making stained glass.

Yet another establishment that sells things that people had to leave behind or wanted to get rid of. This is the best smelling place in town, other than the library. I also know all the sections by heart. There are these lace curtains in the way back that are hit perfectly by the light and…okay, enough romanticizing about curtains.

Here are the aforementioned curtains.

Taking pictures of inanimate objects is easier because I know that the curtain is going to be there (unless the cat pulls it down) and that the Bagel Company isn’t going to just leave. I can photograph it, take my time, and come back later. With people, it’s harder, because they become conscious or difficult, or they immediately lose whatever quality you saw before you made contact or tried to photograph them. Like mirages, almost. I love people, and I love photographing them, but honestly, give me a 90 degree angle or a turn of the century building and I can also bring emotion and expression and individuality to it.