The Wheel In The Sky Keeps On Turning...

Both photos (c) James Mitchell 2006

James Mitchell was in town a couple of weeks ago with his friend. The truth is that she likes Monkey more than she does James. I think he knows that, too. So everyplace we went we took Monkey. She carried him around in the mall and the parks and the restaurants (he doesn't eat much) and women everywhere were enchanted with this little fuzzy 62 year old flirt. Waitresses, students, store clerks, and passersby alike. If they were female they wanted to hold and cuddle Monkey, and hear all about his story.

We stopped off at the nearby Starbucks for afternoon coffee. All the people who work there, as well as the regulars, already knew Monkey. These two Hatian girls were sitting at the next table in the outside patio. I'd seen them there before but never had Monkey with me. He got to sit in his own chair as we enjoyed our drinks. The two girls were extremely curious about him, and James wanted to try out his new 90mm Macro Elmar lens. The black and white shot was with his Leica M2 and a 35mm f/1.8 Canon lens. He had no trouble at all getting them to pose for pictures with Monkey, then we traded addresses with them and promised to send them not only the photos but Al Kaplan T-shirts like he and his friend were wearing that day.