Back then

 Found another photo from the days when I was photographer and artist's model. I think the original of this one was shown in a gallery.

The pay was good, $100 an hour for nude posing like this. There was never anything graphic, just artsy stuff. I had an agent who dealt only with known professionals. It was definitely a step up from posing for amateurs or art school students, if rather tedious.  And paid a lot better, believe me. I was contacted by Playboy to be in one of their college girl pictorials, Girls of the PAC-10, after my agent sent them my portfolio, but nothing ever came of it. That would have earned me $500 -- not an hour, just a flat fee. So considering how much time that would have involved, no great loss.

I met a woman who did appear in one of those college pictorials in the 1990s, I forget which year or which college, probably NYU. Anyway, I think she said she got paid $200 or $250, something like that. She was an artist living in New York City. She's since had her paintings shown at Harper's Chelsea 534 and elsewhere, so she's doing all right in that field. 

Light 'em up, gurlfren!
Not my job. Just having
fun with the boys.

Why did I give up modeling? Well, it's just another thing I used to do that I don't do anymore.  That's a long list. Why didn't I keep it up? I just moved on with my life, that's all. It wasn't anything I was particularly interested in doing.  Around the same time I was writing for a magazine; I've talked about that on this blog. And I was also flying skydivers out of the local airport. Meat bombs we called them. Then in summers I flew Part 135 in Alaska, in and out of some pretty iffy airfields for chump change. I was also a waitress, a shooter girl, a ...; well, a lot of stuff. And, of course, I was going to university. Then Uncle Sam crooked a finger at me and beckoned....

 ********

 

I was digging around some old files from back in those days and ran across this photo. The pose is so similar to the one above -- but with clothes on -- that it caught my eye. I wonder what I was doing. 

I also ran across the item above it from some website or something. It gave me a chuckle but I have no idea what it is related to.  Oh, those good old day, huh.

Then I found some files from a message board for women working another job I had back then. Got lost browsing through it remembering a lot of stuff I had totally forgotten about. One thing was this:

 

What'd I say? What'd I say?!  And why was it censored?  Haha.

 Then, on a more serious note, discussing the job, there was this:

 

 That was one of the most memorable jobs I've ever had. I was like 18~19 years old, plunged into...oh, man.... But the women I worked with were just the best. Everybody helped everybody else, plenty of laughter and appreciation for each other and what we had to deal with. Wasn't a lot of money in it, but for most every dollar was a dollar dearly needed. I didn't last long, though. Like all the jobs in those days, a few months and I was gone.

Looking back from where I am now, a rather dull adult burdened with responsibilities and anxieties, cynical and tired and not really giving a GGD about anything, I can only recall those days as my wonder years, full of promise and excitement, each day sparking in radiant, glowing colors like a MySpace page, heh.  The future really was so bright I had to wear shades.