Especially the guys who sold film.

It took four months before I got a good picture. Everything happened too fast. I would see something but before I could take a picture, it had gone. Eventually I learned to hot-wire the connection between heart, brain and camera so that as far as possible it bypassed the brain part. My heart beat a little faster and the camera fired. Oftentimes it wasn't until I looked at the negative that I found out what had provoked the finger to release the shutter. I was often surprised to discover I'd had time to focus without even knowing what I'd focused on.

I guess looking back that what I was really seeking was the flash of humanity, of connection. It's a fleeting thing. There were many days I would pound up and down the pavements and shoot roll after roll of meaningless pictures. I'd go home exhausted, disheartened. I'd give up.

Then there'd come along one of those other days, enchanted ones, everything was laid out for me "like a patient etherised on a table" as Eliot put it.

Almost all of the best pictures come from these magic rolls.

And yet the street is no different from day to day: it flows like a river.

So perhaps the real conclusion to be drawn from all this is that even (or perhaps especially) when are out with a camera on the most crowded of streets, you are only ever taking photographs of yourself.