4.15.25: The Collection

Julian stared at the empty shelves, once packed tight with vintage cameras—decades of collecting, hunting, obsessing. Each lens had a story. The Leica from Berlin. The broken Polaroid he found in Tokyo. Gone now. Sold in one sweep to a nameless buyer online. He told friends it was time to "declutter," but the truth was quieter: he hadn’t picked one up in years. They’d become relics of a version of himself he no longer recognized. As the shelves gathered dust, he didn’t feel regret. Just space. Space for something new, even if he didn’t yet know what it was.