Armed with Shaving Cream, Silly String and Adolescence

Looking down at my photo request, I read, "A little bit of mischief-- Halloween event for kids at the ice rink, snap 3 to 4 shots of kids in costumes." No problem. Pictures of kids in costumes is like shooting fish in a barrel. You just know that parents picking up the paper will love seeing their kids dressed up as a Disney character.

This is not particularly an assignment that appeals to my own sense of storytelling, but I can appreciate putting that photo in. You cannot devalue that appreciation, even if it is just of a kid dressed as Peter Pan.

But this assignment was all wrong. All wrong. I arrived and there were no costumes. I looked over the ice rink and witnessed a scene of chaos. There wasn't even any ice. 250 kids armed with shaving cream, silly string and adolescence ran without inhibition or restraint. They slapped, shot and creamed anything in their way, utterly destroying their surroundings.

Fuck.

I began trying to get some photos outside the rink, but no angles seemed to work. I knew I had to get in there for a photo. With a bit of foresight I might have brought some plastic to wrap my camera in, or maybe worn some old sweatpants. But I decided to none the less try and braved the pre-pubescent elements and try to get the shot.

Five minutes out amongst these lords of the flies, and they attack. One boy smacks my back with a handful of shaving cream, someone else slaps the side of head. One girl in particular thinks it is funny to demoralize a low paid intern, and takes two hands piled with shaving cream and hits my camera as hard as she can. White, foamy cream smears across my lens, my dials, my poor Canon. All my gear smells like Old Spice from the 1940s.



I'm irate. So I leave. Kids continue to smear shaving cream all over me. Even some parents spray silly string over me as I try to find place to exit.

I ask myself, "Is this why want to be a photojournalist?"