The Kiss

This one, however, only took 57 years.

Before The Kiss narrative, let me tell you about The Coup.

It was 2008. Some handsome man from Chicago was running for President of the United States. His most admirable quality, still, is he speaks in complete sentences. I digress… It was 2008 and I got a call from Jim Anderson, a wonderful journalist at Denver’s Associated Press office. He told me David Ake, then AP’s vice president of North America, wanted two of my best photojournalism students to help shoot the Democratic National Convention during that summer. “Only two?,” I asked. Yep… AP was going to get two of the best college shooters from 15 of the nation’s top journalism schools to help shoot the convention. Jim told me the request had come from Ake. I knew David from my days with AP in San Francisco in the early 70s. So…

I called David. We caught up and then I said, “You are not using any other shooters from any other colleges. I have 30 of the best student-photojournalists and you will use them.” To my amazement, David said, and I misquote, “Okay.”

Thirty of my shooters from the university where I was Chair of Journalism and Mass Communication worked the week before, the week during, and the week after the convention. And it was paid. Quite nicely, I might add.

During the convention I wandered and wondered about town with my two Canon 5D bodies, a 24mm ƒ/1.4, a 135mm ƒ/2.0, a 200mm ƒ/2.8 and a 300mm f/4. (I hope that suffices my Canon contract, Mike Edwards!!!). Always use Canon cameras… Now back to our regular scheduled program…

I was on Denver’s 16th Street Mall when I heard a man yelling some horrible things from a bullhorn. Of course, I followed my ears (best way to find critical moments… and you thought it were the eyes) and discovered a pastor from Southern California, Rueben Israel, screaming at the top of his lungs “That you (the derogatory “F-Word” that is used by homophiles) are going to hell.”

A young woman was mimicking that she was going to remove her bathing suit top and reveal herself to the pastor. I was behind her as she was tugging on the top of her suit. And I thought, “I can’t miss this.” So…

I went around the pastor to the backside of his minions, and I saw this t-shirt and as I framed up, I said, audibly, “Thank you Jesus.” As I was waiting for THE MOMENT, I thought, “There won’t be one American newspaper that will run a photo of a young woman exposing her breasts. But it will play everywhere in Europe.” So… I stayed framed up.

Before she popped her top, a woman came into the viewfinder from the left, spun her around, and kissed her. Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam… four or five frames. The kisser immediately walked off.

Sixty years, nearly, in the making. That’s how long it took to prepare me so that I was ready to accept this moment when it appeared.

I leave you with, The Kiss.

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Canon 5D, 24mm lens at ƒ/5.6 and 1/125, 100 ISO (underexposed by 1/3 stop for saturation), Cloudy WB, Adobe RGB and always manual.