Self-Portrait With A Black Eye

I was flipping through a stack of old prints and ran across this "self-portrait" from 1967, which reminded me a bit of my recent series of self-portraits, but more so it reminded me of the photographs my son Jonathan took of me this past January when a bunch of guys from a well drilling company working next door jumped me and beat the crap out of me.

http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/6344/1997/1600/Alfightbruises.jpg

Stephanie and I had barely finished moving into the house we'd just bought, the same one I'm living in now, when I developed another sinus infection. After being examined by a few doctors it was decided that I probably had polyps growing in the sinus cavity, and surgery was in order. I was in St. Francis Hospital on Miami Beach for three days or so. When I came home I was full of pain killers and antibiotics, and had a tube coming out of my nose and taped to my cheek. "The black eye is normal" I was told. So was the pain I suppose, but I had plenty of those happy pills.

The polyps were removed and never grew back. It never occurred to me that if only I waited long enough I'd get a second chance at being photographed with a black eye. In that drugged up state not much of anything occurred to me, but I did decide to load up the old Minolta Autocord with a roll of 120 Gevapan ($15.00 for a box of 100 rolls at Fotomart), and get few shots in the mirror by bouncing the Ultima 40B off the ceiling. It's not the best lighting possible, but direct flash straight into the mirror would have been a lot worse.

P.S. Want an archival quality print of this or one of my other photos? E-mail me at preacherpop42@aol.com for details.