Rooms Through Windows

   Let's get all this started. So, I've had this blog space for months and months, now, and I've gotten disgusted with myself for not using it. My website (Agony a Go-Go) has been, with the exception of some tutorials I've written, stagnant for much longer than I think any fans of the site were willing to stay on the hook for. So, it comes to this blog; and easy way, I would think, to commit my thoughts to the web for anyone, or everyone, or no one, without the hassle of tending to the overwhelming overhaul of an outdated website.

   I thought I'd start this off by confessing that I have this strange passion for windows. Rather, looking into windows. Wait! Stay with me, here. Rather, looking at the rooms that can be seen through windows- but not up close. Nay, that would be spoiling it. If I can be up close to the glass and see right into the room inside, ignoring the window, why even have the window? It is essential that the window be somewhat distant, perhaps across a street, and the view to the inside be somewhat obscured, both by light and object. Most often, the window is above me, not at eye level.

   Rooms within rooms, that is, rooms that can be seen through an archway or down a hall from the room to which the viewing window is attached, are especially intriguing. Stairs leading to other spaces. Those are nice, too. Curious lamps. Colored lighting. The current room dark but with light emanating from a room far on the opposite wall or around a corner, hidden. These add to the effect.

   A voyeur, you say? Not really. I don't want to see people in the rooms. The spaces must be unoccupied. There is a mystery and a serenity to the still room. A place that I can only see in passing. A place I will never set foot in. It's like seeing a little bit of some other life. Someone had to put this room together, had to decide to place just that statue by the window. People use this room or these stairs or this hallway day to day.

   As far as looking through windows, it's not something I stand there and do. It's just something I see in passing, and then I hold the image in my head as I walk or drive along. In the photo below, which is a building on the corner of 19th Street and 6th Avenue, in New York, I love the massive staircase and how you can see another flight just beyond it. I don't normally photograph the windows, but needed some photos for this article.

   It's just something that I somewhat fancy. It's not like I obsess over looking at windows. I certainly don't go out of my way to do it. I just adore these little glimpses into that other world.