essays and images from a storyteller

Pagoda dog sleeping by stone dragon on a hot afternoon. Chùa Liên Trì, Đà Lạt, Việt Nam. Fujifilm X-T1 in Classic Chrome. image:  ©Brian Beeler Vietnam gets hot, really hot in Summer even in the mountain town of Đà Lạt. Once a place of rest and recreation for French officers before and during the American War this town still carries a French vibe to it which can be seen in its food and architecture. As usual I was spending my time wandering around the country and this town and walked up a steep hill to find a small Buddhist pagoda. Looking for a cool place to sit I came across these two creatures keeping an eye over the main Buddha hall.

Most of my gear on a plastic table. Đà Nẵng, Việt Nam. Don't buy this. image: ©Brian Beeler I started working as a photojournalist at 16, loved it and was good at it. It's not that I'm an excellent writer because I'm not. It's not because I'm an excellent photographer because I'm not. I'm not the guy you send out because you're an editor looking for someone to bring home the next, great moving story that will rock the world. I'm the guy you send out with an idea for a story and need about 1,200 words and three photos; establishing, context and close-up, in 72 hours without fail . Many years ago there was a photo editor at National Geographic that had a sign on his desk that read "At National Geographic we print photos, not excuses." While there are many better than me I was a photojournalist that would never fail no matter what; I always brought back a story and to me that's what makes for a good photojournalist. Part of b...

The rules of grammar are of critical importance because breaking them can shock the reader but sometimes that's exactly what you want to do. A good story can be like a ride on a calm river. You watch the story unfold before you but that view can breed passivity and keep the reader from really feeling part of it. Below is an excerpt from my novel "The Beauty of Aqua" where the protagonist, Upton, is invited to a friend's home for a family meal. As you read it you'll see a shift in tense from past to present and a shift in pronouns from Upton's view to the reader's view. I used this shift to jar the reader and make them really feel like they are part of the meal. As the old adage goes "rules are meant to be broken." Many of my favorite meals have been enjoyed at Thủy's home. While street food offered a singular and spectacular dish a family meal followed a different path. A typical meal would start earlier in the day with chị Lan, som...

Image: © Art Institute of Chicago, Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Daniel Saidenberg, © Estate of Pablo Picasso Pablo Picasso had a mystery that wasn't solved until years after his death: how did he create his paints? Tradition for centuries was that a trusted student was given the formulas to his master's paints so he could recreate them. These were heavily guarded secrets to help foil counterfeiters but Pablo Picasso's color palette was quite different from his teachers'. They were unique to the world of art and became his signature. It wasn't until physicists at the Argonne National Laboratory in Lemont, Ill. inspected one of his paintings with their hard x-ray nanoprobe did they find the answer: he had used common house paints most likely purchased from a local hardware store. Did the use of these common paints somehow cheapen his work? Of course not. But why did he do this? He used the paints that worked for him and took advantage of the technology of his tim...

Marmalade (2000-2019) in Fujifilm Astia Cats are amazing creatures. Don't get me wrong, I love dogs too but cats in their own right are also special. Where the human trains a dog what to do a cat trains a human how to listen to them. Only when you learn how to listen to your cat can you have a meaningful relationship with them. Certainly some cats are better with humans than others and mine was one of them. To me he was the best. Back in July 2000 I was thinking about getting a second cat. My first one, a Persian named Puff, whom I had adopted when she was about four years old and had been living with me for about two years, was at an age where she'd still be accepting of another cat living with us. I loved Puff but I wanted my first kitten so I went to the local animal shelter just to look and see what they had with no intentions of bringing one home. Well, that changed when I saw Marmalade for the first time. He was loud. Really loud and when I first laid eyes...

To those that believe in Christianity and the teachings of Islam and to a lesser degree Mahayana Buddhism they believe in a place after we shed this mortal coil that is without pain and only filled with joy and pleasure. A place without sadness or hunger. To me this heavenly place sounds like hell. From "The Beauty of Aqua": We were about halfway up Sơn Trà Mountain when we stopped at a small Buddhist pagoda on a hill with a stunning view of the East Vietnamese Sea. The pagoda was old with its walls painted in the traditional yellow-orange scheme found in similar places and a dog quietly slept on the steps leading to the Buddha hall. We dismounted and sat on a large, cool stone bench out front. Thủy spoke. “When I was young my mother brought me here and we were taught about a place called the ‘pure land.’ They said it was a place of happiness where there was no sadness or hunger but I did not understand.” “Understand what?” I asked. “How can there be happiness witho...