Remember When

“Time. It's one of many themes I carry in the back of my mind, as I look for photo opportunities while going about my everyday life, my camera always on hand. The more I live my life, the more fascinated I become by time's many facets: how the perception of it changes depending on your mood; how it grows in speed and importance the less of it there is; how you feel its pressure and, consequently, learn to prioritise. Inevitably, that which is needed less, tends to become neglected more; and it isn't always the case that the things we value the most are the things we spend most time with. Hopefully our choices mean we live without regret, but occasionally, even then, a happy memory can feel bittersweet when it's of a joy that can never return. Nevertheless, such memories are better than regrets about what might have been.

The moment I saw this old telephone box in the overgrown grass between discarded chairs, I felt the scene conveyed some elements of that thinking around the effects of time; and it seemed to me to carry a potential for metaphor too, with an open narrative that people could build their own interpretation around. I thought of the wall as representative of the barrier that keeps us always in the present, preventing us from physically going beyond the here and now. On the other hand, in the distance, the two young people hint at both the past (we were all young once) and a future undefined, as they look towards what is yet to come. I'm reminded of the relentless passage of time and life, and that the value of things, like time, is relative. I'm reminded that of all the things we have in our lives, time is the most valuable... it is important to spend it wisely.”