Following Matt Harding

I saw Matt Harding again. He announced on his blog that he’d be speaking at Wide World Books & Maps. This is a fascinating little store in Wallingford that I had never heard of before this announcement. They specialize in travel books, accessories, and all kinds of maps. I absolutely have to spend some quality time there before my next trip, whatever that may be.

Now, his story has been fascinating to me, I love the videos, I love his writing, I absorb everything he publishes one way or another. Honestly, I didn’t expect to hear anything new beyond my previous absorbances, but I nevertheless love hearing him speak about these things and enjoy his dry humor. To my surprise, there were numerous things that he spoke about that I hadn’t heard him cover. He passed around a couple of his passports. Yes, he has several. All filled up, all with extra pages, a couple were concurrent. This wasn’t done in a “hey, look how many stamps I have!” sort of way, it was to answer a question about needing extra pages. This led into another story about him getting stuck in Madagascaar (I believe) when he ran out of room for a stamp. It was quite the ordeal that Melissa had to get him out of. I did not get to see the passport with the Antarctica stamp either.

The evening was pretty good. I’d estimate 40+ people in attendance. He started off curious if everyone had seen “the video”. I think it’s funny how “the video” has been defined differently over the years. Now, it means video number three. I think a couple of people hadn’t seen it. Some had seen it only once. We watched it. The high def version is beautiful.

I don’t remember the question he was answering, but he asked if anyone had been at the gasworks filming. I raised my hand. I believe a couple other people behind me must have as well. He jokingly looked in our direction, waving, and said, “hi guys.” (Not really pretending to remember us.) It was kind of fun. Awhile later, someone asked if he had to get permission or releases for people in the video. He started in on explaining everything, and motioned in the general direction of those of us who were there, saying, “as these guys will remember,” then he paused, looked at me more carefully, and said, “I remember *you*… Kelly, is it?” I was floored. “Yes!” I then mentioned to him that he had used my photos for his blog about that day. He looked nervous, “did I give you credit?” “Yes, you did.” He then proceeded to actually answer the whole permission question that he had started.

There is really no reason he should have remembered me at all, much less my name. Seriously, only about 4 sentences were exchanged between us on the dancing day. I was mostly just hanging back, listening to the other conversations. There were 181 people there that danced, including a lot of family and friends he hadn’t seen in a long time. After I got home and uploaded the photos, I sent him an email with a link to the photos in case he wanted to use them. I gave him the quick “thank you” for doing what he does and sharing it with us. He responded with a couple sentences, thanking me for having pictures of him getting lifted up. That’s pretty much it. I have no idea how he would remember me three months later. Still, it’s pretty cool, even if it was a bizarre experience.

When asked if he’d thought of doing a book, he had some news in that department. He just signed a deal with a publisher a couple weeks ago (I think he said). He’s supposed to have a book out in May of next year, I believe. He was excited for the format. It will basically be stills from the videos and standalone stories from each. There will be no connecting narrative. That sounds like a nice thing to just be able to pick up here or there and read a random page or two.

Oh, and randomly, here’s a blog from a guy who was so excited to be there.