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AutobiographyMemories in old photographs
CONCEPT
As a kid I spent nearly every summer visiting my grandparentsin
Ireland. Here I am attempting to give the feeling of
reminiscingthrough old photographs. Using photos Ive taken on
recent visitsas backgrounds, the memories are represented as black
andwhite drawings running through the stills. The story is
acompilation of many different days and activities, adding up
toquite an adventure. Told with voice over, the video would not
onlyconvey nostalgia, but the beauty of the Irish landscape and
theexciting experiences of a city boy visiting the country
side.
THE STORY
Frame 1I wake up under the heaviest blanket. My parents are
asleep inthe bed on the other side of the room. My brother is
asleep in thecrib at the end of their bed. Ive been sleeping in
this bed sincebefore he was born. I crawl out from under the sheets
and slipinto my clothes, then quietly sneak towards the door so as
not towake anyone up.
Frame 2There is nothing I can do about the creaking stairs in my
grand-parents house, so I descend quickly.I enjoy being the rst one
up in the house, especially with eachroom packed with sleeping
people. Everyones come up to Gran-nys to see the Byrnes over from
New York. In a few hours thehouse will burst with energy, but as
for now, Ill get to watch some
Batman on TV and eat my bowl of corn akes in peace.
Frame 3As I open the door to the kitchen I realize Im not the
only oneawake. Grandpa is moving around the kitchen, a cup of tea
al-ready poured on the table. I help him get Grannys breakfast
andput it on a tray. Every morning he brings her breakfast while
shesstill in bed. I hold the door as he balances the tray and heads
up-stairs. I head over to the TV and pray that cartoons would be
onone of the three TV channels.
Frame 4As I take my rst spoonful of corn akes, Grandpa walks
back intothe kitchen and takes his seat at the head of the table.
He grabsthe Rice Krispies, pours in half a bowl, eyes the box of
corn akesand empties it on top of the Rice Krispies. Then he
scrapes outthe pot of porridge he had made for Granny, pours a
little milk,and spills a little sugar on the whole bowl. Thats
disgusting, Iblurt, as he takes a big soggy bite.
Frame 5
My favorite part of our long summer trips to Ireland:
walkinghelping Grandpa on his daily routine around the farm. The
sunis shining, the temperature is a lovely 17 degrees out and
ev-erything is soaking wet. We rst stop by the barn, open the
giadoorway only a crack, Oscar comes shooting out o f the dark
twelcome us a good morning. I love the dog, but he isnt a famy
cousins or me taking up Grandpas attention.
Frame 6I climb up and sit on top of the fence next to Grandpa to
checkthe cattle. I see twenty four, I say before he could ask me
homany I could count.Ive only got twenty three.I scan the herd
again, concentrating harder. I count only twenttwo, Yup,
twenty-three cows.After dinner, were going to move them down the
eld nearehouse, so they can get some fresh grass to eat, says
Grandpa,
but rst we have to feed the hens.
Frame 7Were in the hen house nearest the barn, the of ce area.
Grandpa leans over the counter, looks through his notebook lled
wichicken-scratch writing, mumbles some numbers underneath hbreath.
I crack open the door to the next room and a million cling voices
rise up in excitement. Oscar pokes at the back of mlegs. Hed give
anything for a peek inside, but I know better thto let him loose
among the ro ws of cages. With a whistle fromGrandpa, the dog backs
off and sits.
Frame 8Once inside, I collect the eggs in cardboard trays
starting on thfar end of the house. Im too small for the
spider-webs to bothme. My eyes watch the ground for the giant
drainage openingthe ends of the aisles. As I turn the corner, I
raise my head andgreeted by the cocked head of a curious chicken.
Theres onefree! I shout. And with a ba-cock the chicken is off down
thaisle trying as hard as any chickens tried, to y. Just as I
catchup with her, Grandpa grabs her by the head and tucks her
unde
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AutobiographyMemories in old photographs
neath his arm. He locates a cage and puts her back in. I
silentlythank God that I dont have to actually touch the
chicken.
Frame 9After the eggs are collected and the hens are fed, we go
backinto the of ce so that the eggs could be counted. Each trays
got36, each stack has 12 trays, there are three stacks; thats
howmany eggs? I stare at Grandpa blankly. Thats 1,296 eggs.What
about these ones? I ask. Three eggs half the size of theothers sit
on the counter next to me.We cant sell those. You can have them.
Paint them when you goback to the house.
Frame 10My face splits with a grin. I feel l ike Ive won the
grand prize. Butimmediately the smooth shell of the eggs slips off
the others andfalls in an arc onto the concrete oor. Splat! Grandpa
turns andscolds me almost as quickly as Oscar jumps at the o
pportunityto lap up the mess.
Frame 11We walk out into the sunlight and across the farmyard. I
hurry
to keep up with his big steps, but the Wellies dont make
walk-ing easy. We come to a fork in the road. Grandpa turns
towardsthe hen house. Hes about to repeat the last hour of
collectingand counting eggs all over again. I dont think that I can
make itthrough all that clucking again and head down towards the
house.
Frame 12My cousins come pouring out the backdoor, my aunt
shoo-ingthem from behind. Dinners to be in half an hour, and were
not al-lowed inside until then. Theres Mathew, Katie, Sean, Claire,
and
my brother Rory.
Frame 13We walk around side of the house that looks out onto the
eld thecows would be moved to. Whats down there? asked Katie, ofthe
opening at the far end of the eld. It looked as if it just led
into
another eld.I dunno, Ive never been down there, I respond. Wanna
go ona march? We can explore the land!
Frame 14Everyone says yes in unison and we run and climb up and
overthe fence. As we drop, we sink a little bit into the muddy
grass.This poses no problems for me, but Im the only one with
Wellies!Never the less we start the march to the end of the eld,
single
le, trying to lift our legs high as we go, but the ground is
toomuddy. Theres just the suction cup noise of shoes being
pulledout of the ground and the plopping back down. Katie and
Clairereally want to sing a song, but none of us boys are in the
mood.They sing with out us.We make our way along the edge of the
eld, near the hedgewhere there are rocks and we jump from one to
the other to keepour feet from sticking to the mud. With my Wellies
I can walkanywhere, but as the leader of this march, I have to
watch out formy troops. We approach an opening in the ditch. We
hear shout-ing, and as a unit, we turn and look.
Frame 15 & 16Uncle Kieran is running down the eld towards us
waving for usto come back. Oh no! Theyre on to us. Quick! Katie
shouts andmakes a dash for the opening.My Uncle comes and grabs as
many little hands as he can t intohis own, scolds us of the dangers
of the eld and the mud andgetting stuck and drowning. It doesnt
really make any sense tobe shouting, were only marching.Uncle
Kieran scolds us some more as Katie rejoins the group,and then we
follow him back up to the house, single le.
Frame 17Whats this one goin on about, anyways? Sean whispers to
me.I shrug my shoulders and make a funny face.Theres another eld,
Katie whispers.
Frame 18They probably go on forever, always the rst with
somethinsay, Sean answers.
No, thats the last one.Oh.
Frame 20Its about an hour after dinner, its time to move the
cows. Evone has their Wellies on: Grandpa, my da, three uncles, and
mcousins, Matt and Sean. All the women, and my brother Rory,cause
hes so little, stay i nside. The new eld, and the eld cows are in,
are blocked off by a gate or my uncles holding huwalking sticks.
Matt. Sean and I have sticks as well, and werdeeply engaged in a
sword ght when we hear an eruption ofdisgruntled moooooooooos .The
cows come out of the rst at a trot, bumping into each other and
letting the world know unhappy they are that Grandpa is chasing
them out from theshadows of a tree. Oscar barks madly, but he keeps
his distancGranny told me he once got kicked by one of the cows for
becheeky.
Frame 21Theres one cow that manages to break free from the rest
ofcattle, and is trying his luck at safety somewhere else. That
ogetting away, I shout and grab my cousins by their shirts andstart
running towards it.
Frame 22We circle around front and jump up and down, waving and
baing our sticks. The cow, terribly frightened, jumps around andcar
runs up barking for the cow to get back in line. We give chuntil
the cow runs into the new eld.
Frame 23The three of us climb up to the top of the fence as the
rest of tcattle make their way into the eld, and all the gates are
clangshut.
