I’ve been here for seven hours. We’ve been photographing the same “wood-grained wood-style wood-inflected engineered-wood” PLANK for oh god, like…. three point five hours.

When GOAT (Greatest of All Time)  asked me to come along I was like, Yes she said Yes because finally seeing the building I worked on, holy shit, it’s like seeing your thoughts first on the autoCAD and then printed out on our photo-style paper and then pinned up on our central Thinking Board of Thoughts and Learnings, but now actually getting to see my lines turned into architectural space, I’m #dead, more #slayed than when I watched #Lemonade (Beyonce, thank u 4 getting me thru the last 4yrs here), and now that we’re here I’m like oh…. so that thing I worked on forever, that singular elevated line that I spent sixteen straight days assessing the width and thickness of and wondering if the materiality was truly representative of what I was going for, “the contractor fucked that up so we went with a piece of foamcore,” that is NOT what I signed up for.

“Yes I’d be happy to get you some coffee. And you. And you. And you.”

Why are there thirty-seven people here?

I know GOAT wanted to expand the marketing staff so there’s the Director of Marketing but also the Editorial Consultant and then also the Lead Editor and then the Issue Editor and the Sub-Editor and the Visual Editor and the Market Editor and the Editor for Market Specials and the Editor for Special Projects and then of course there’s the photographer, who is just….

Can i get a HASHTAG DREAMBOAT.

STAY PROFESSIONAL.

I guess I never realized how important lighting was?

I mean, I’ve read Le Corbusier. I know that architecture is the masterful combination of form and shadows and light. You don’t get out of [redacted first-tier architecture school] without reading hella Corbusier, you know? Lol hella Corbusier. #heturnsinhisgrave

Where is his grave?

where is le corbusier’s grave  

where is

Wait what, Tamara Shopsin went to visit his grave?

Tamara Shopsin age

Tamara Shopsin famous parents

Tamara Shopsin net worth

Tamara Shopsin humble beginnings

Tamara Shopsin worked her way up

BREATHE. Compare and despair, right?

[begins tapping upper right temple, then below eye, then cheek, then collarbone, then…. you get it] Even if I am not yet published in the New York Times Opinionator section, I am worthwhile and lovable. Even if I am not yet published in the New York Times Opinionator section, I am worthwhile and lovable. Even if I am not yet published, even if I’ll never be published, even if my beautiful line of wood that I spent sixteen straight days on got turned into foamcore, it was all in service of the greater poetry of the building.

Ah fuck, GOAT needs me. Wait, GOAT NEEDS ME!  Is he gonna ask me to help delineate his materiality? Some reporter is talking to him. Why is there a reporter here? Why does she look like she is twelve?. How do you even send a reporter to a building? What is there to report on? I guess she’s asking him about something like “why did you do this like this” OH HE NEEDS ME TO EXPLAIN—I knew he’d read my Comment Box contributions to his theoretical underpinnings, I am so glad that I participated in the Friday Comment Box Theory Jam !!! 1!!!! !! !!!! !!!! Everything is going to change, he needs me he needs me he needs me!!!!!!!!! …..

…..to…. stand next to a column and perfectly align my body with the shadow that the column is throwing so that, as he said, “the shadow is as big as it can possibly be.”

Behind column, no one can see me.

Even if GOAT uses my body to make an “as big as possible shadow” I am worthwhile and lovable. Even if GOAT uses my body –

Oh, I need to move like even farther from the column. OK now I need to hold up a sheet of tinfoil bc the photographer’s assistant forgot the reflective thing.

Oh, I need to go BUY a sheet of tinfoil.

“We’ll reimburse you out of petty cash.”

Do they not know that $6.50 on a roll of tinfoil at the corner store is going to like … crush my dinner plans? SOME OF US CANNOT LIVE ON X-ACTO KNIVES ALONE, PALS.

These are not my pals.

My therapist always reminds me I need to differentiate between Pals, Potential Pals, and Work People. Work People are NOT pals.

BREATHE.

Returned from store with $6.50 in tinfoil; bought self Hint o’Mint water and put on same receipt, petty cash infusion of extra $2.75 will be mine, fuckers.

Oh no one said *anything* about photographers’ assistants not being Potential Pals.

I’M STILL HERE.

Seven hours later

“I think we got the shot. Let’s move onto the penumbra?”

life is a penumbra gif

Featured image via www.ncmodernist.org