Man in a Fedora, Farmers Market | Mark Lindsay
Sunday’s farmers market during the summer is always packed. It’s that way in the summer. No one can resist the fresh corn or the plump, red tomatoes. And the peach guy has about twenty samples on which some people gorge for about twenty minutes. They look like overgrown chipmunks, cheeks full of peach slices and the juice dripping off their chins. The long days attract mothers and their strollers and fathers and their sons. Mixed among the seasonal hoards are the regulars who I see week in and week out, even in the lean months of January when broccoli seems to be the only star of the market.
In August it’s a carnival. If you don’t get there early you can’t park. And when you pack up your trunk there are four cars waiting impatiently for your spot. “Are you leaving?” they yell out their windows. And if I’m not they drive around the lot four or five times until someone is.
Yesterday I brought my camera again after about a month’s hiatus. Crowds constantly bump into the lens so I sometimes leave it home during the summer. But, I got an itch and had to make some photos. I’m glad I did.
Moments come and go in a flash at the summer market. A man walked up and stared at a produce stand like he was Gary Cooper—an older version of Gary Cooper, but Gary Cooper just the same. There he stood. He looked at the tomatoes as if they needed to be driven out of town. He wore a felt fedora and watched and watched as the masses grabbed the zucchini. He watched while they squeezed the peaches. And he stood there and scowled while the manhandled the tomatoes.
Gary Cooper at our very own farmer’s market. Click. After I photographed him from the back he then moseyed on down the way—a moment now gone forever.