I'd gone from Sydney in the 27C/80F region, trying my best to work slowly, in the least number of clothes I could without offending public sensitivity, to New York at a (relatively) bone shattering -15C/+5F. I had dragged all my cold weather clothes across Asia and Australia, but even layered up I still had to break the days and work as long as I could before the camera got too cold to hold, and my shutter release finger went numb. I know from experience (Chicago, winter 2011) that you can't keep diving into coffee bars to warm up because of condensating the camera's lenses and (worse) bringing on the pernicious effect of the diuretic caffeine. So once you are out, you have to stay out, no matter how grim it is.

 

Even worse, when it's bitter cold like that it's hard to be relaxed while working; your brain is constantly interupting you, telling you to keep moving, stay warm, seek shelter, survive, and it's a strain forcing yourself to look for images. Work is usually a slow, methodical contemplative process ill suited to the privations of a North Eastern states winter. The cold stops dead the ambling nature of my work; you need conducive warm weather to be an effective flâneur.

 

But New York as ever, gave me new things to see: staying in the upper fifties, near my client, gave me access to great swathes of midtown, endless areas to explore that I'd not been around since regularly staying at the Roger Williams on Madison ten or so years ago. What really helped to drive me on was the concrete proof that by the end of the day there would be generous deliveries of quality Bourbon waiting patiently for me at a nearby bar.