Nonagenarians

Last week's passing of Eve Arnold caused me to revisit the question of what it means to be 90 (in her case 99).

When you are closer to 90 than 30, it is more than an abstraction.  I was going to let it go until the passing of a friend of my own age (I will be 64 this month) on Wednesday.

Early in Precious Objects, when it was mostly friends and family, some of my subjects were their parents in their nineties. (To be honest, a lot were 89, but no need to get picky.)  By the time you reach that point in life, most have trimmed out the junk that bedevils most of us. It was not unusual for the "child" to deal with the question of what to bring.  One thing is certain, 90 year olds generally do not have much of a need to impress.

I loved photographing these subjects. Virtually everything they say has some value.