Photograph. October 17, 08:15 P.M. Dinner by candlelight:
The shot is off center, canted a few degrees to the right: a group of young men and women gathered around a long dining-room table. All of them are dirty. Bundled in thick clothing. Ragged and disheveled. There are bowls of food set before each seat, but nobody seems to be paying much attention to their meal. They’re lost in conversation—broad smiles all around as a man in a backward baseball cap holds up his hands, illustrating some grand point.
Another man is looking directly at the camera, a dazed, contented smile on his dirty face.
There’s a cluster of candles burning in the middle of the table—all different heights, sporting blurred fingers of flame. The picture was taken without a flash, and the whole frame is bathed in this orange candlelight, all other colors washed away. In this respect, it is not a full-color shot, but not black and white, either. Instead, black and orange.
The photograph is blurred, the scene too dark for any reasonable shutter speed. Filled with trails of movement and bright, unsteady auras. But still, the warmth of the scene comes through. The cozy happiness.
A dinner by candlelight.