The Gaze

During my morning commute to work on the upper east side, I walk down this street almost every day. It has two-way traffic with a sidewalk median separating the roads. I've always known someone feeds the birds on this block because I have noticed the aftermath before - a mass of pigeons swarming the concrete over little pellets of bird feed.

The day I took this photo, I finally saw her, the one feeding the birds. Here she was, leaning against her walker, slowly pouring bird feed out of her Duane Reade bag onto the sidewalk as the birds surrounded her.

I quickly grabbed my camera from my hip and tried to find a frame. She was peering down at her bag and hadn't noticed me. It was the perfect moment. I snapped a couple from directly behind her, with the few birds on the ledge in front of her. I didn't love them. Then I focused on just the birds piled on top of each other ... and I didn't love those either. I made my way around to her left, careful not to spook the birds. I got down on one knee and tried taking a couple from a low angle. She was facing away from me and it was not a very inviting frame. Again, I wasn't in love with any of them. Perhaps some from a higher angle?

I stood up a bit too quickly - enough to spook the few birds closest to me. The disruption caught her attention and she immediately turned toward me...and click! This photo perfectly captured the millisecond in time when she realized that I exist and what I was doing. "Don't scare my fucking pigeons!" She yelled. "I wasn't out to scare them." I replied. She mumbled some curses and then quickly turned her back to me once again. Her attention back to feeding her pigeons. The moment was over as quickly as it had come.