Shiny Gems

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Recently at an antique store, the sun's ray fell across a clear plastic box of tangled old jewelry. Inside the stones were alive with refracted colors. I wondered if I could make that effect. So I looked back in among my old neglected files for something I'd never printed and found this image. Taken some years ago before tort lawyer jackals forced Armstrong World Industries to close the gates on its production plant, the thing was mottled with primary hues baking in the summer sun.

So here's an attempt to capture the memory of a moment that spun off glimmering jobs for a lot of people. I like the flashy bike in the foreground and the way it announces the way employees could afford terrific toys. It's more a metaphor than a photograph... painted in the colors of those gems in their clear plastic box. And both the gems and this place are now memories of happier times, eh?