...and with a swirl of her cape...eternal life!

No, I don't remember her name. It's just another one of those vintage prints, circa 1970, stored away in boxes all these years. I don't remember why I shot it either, whether it was for an acting composite or an article in the local paper. I do remember that the dock was in her back yard in the Keystone Point section of North Miami. I probably made three or four exposures to capture the cape's swirl correctly.

Nowadays most photographers would machine gun dozens of frames with their digital SLR, and pick and choose later. I always tried to catch the peak of the action, and still work that way. Anybody who's not a professional model soon grows tired of endless shooting, and it shows.

I always loved the angular pattern of the alternating light and dark planks juxtaposed with the finer pattern on the piling, the way the one side of the cape curls gently away from her leg while the other side imparts so much life and energy as it bisects the composition. Meanwhile her expression remains serene, perhaps even a bit aloof, with just a hint of a shy smile.

Sometimes as I look back through these old prints and pick one out it makes me wonder if she ever had kids, how many grandchildren she might have, is she even still alive? I guess she'd be close to seventy now.