.016 day 6

not quite a spa, but close enough.

i am most at peace when driving, even more so when i have no purpose. it's where i listen to nirvana and wu tang clan at high volumes and unabashedly sing off-key to random ballads. where i people watch and pretend i'm in a music video. where i flirt with fellow drivers, knowing full well i'm turning off the road if/when they call me on my bluff. 

on the road, in my jeep (back then it was a blue, gmc jimmy, a gift from my father) is where i use to blow smoke and vibe on long highway rides...

driving these days, i reminisce about my life pre-motherhood. (pre) car seats and baby toys and music at low volumes. i cherish the solo trips i have, when going to the market or to a shoot or to "the store" just to get some air. my day 6 photo is a simple self-portrait of me in my happy place. it's like a spa on wheels. there is something quite calming about being everywhere and nowhere...at the exact same time.   

.015 day 5

toots at play. 

i still marvel at every little stride, none smaller than the rest, as she moves farther from being my baby, and closer to being who she is to become. we had a mini birthday party, her father, my mother and I, when she was just one week old. lit the same cake candle we used at one week, when she turned one, vowing to light it every year until she is grown (or the candle burns out). i am lovingly addicted to her. cheering at any and all she learns and leaps and giggles for. these days, she can finally jump with both feet off the ground, knows where all her body parts are and can stack her circles in size order. that's right. insert balloons and blowy things here (smile).

.014 day 4

the stuffier the event, the better the wine.

full spectrum: prints from the brandywine workshop

 (click here for more info)

.013 day 3

meet...b.

b loves nail polish.

meet b's toes.

b's toes wear nail polish.

the end.

.012 day 2

it was gloomy when i left the house. 

dark skies, damp air. 

pulling my "i'm not about to lug my baby and this camera in the rain" card would have worked perfectly but i'm saving that for an emergency  (i.e: hangover). and true to my innate inability to follow "rules", no matter how trivial, i took more than one photo. what can i say? a broom stick, my jeep handle and a gate just did it for me today.

i's a simple gyal.

(i'm still using my old camera)

.011 josh & dana

josh and dana johnson's wedding, beautifully serene, yet, silently solemn...

their special day, full of eternal promise, and ease, started out with so much chaos, that if one believed in omens, then one would have felt it's presence looming over the entire ceremony.  everything that could go wrong, tried: a storm the night before, caused a power outage. dinner was by barely there candlelight. the day, moist with suffocating humidity, clung to necks and shortened breaths, the grass, stale, wet, and sticking to shoes, and bottoms of feet and ankles, the only place not cluttered with utility trucks and fallen lines, became our only backdrop. the groom was late. the bride cried. my brand new camera malfunctioned. (elmeka, like a photo warrior, bought me hers to use)

so they prevailed. and i prevailed. while the grooms mother (also the pastor of the ceremony) barked orders bitterly to anyone who would take them and 50 year old men licked lips anytime i dabbed sweat off my skin and damn near orgasm'd if i didn't.

...

there are times, when editing, that i vividly recall the mood of the shoot and its energy seeps into my process. though periodically chaotic, there did, however, exist a peaceful calm that surrounded josh, dana, and their two children. they've been together since high school, loving each other through loss, babies, growth and proclaiming marriage well beyond and before this ceremony. 

i envy them. 

when i see two people who are so in tune that they're simply one tune, i realize that i've simply lost the faith to believe in such a melody...

.010 day 1

i decided to join my friend (elmeka)'s 365 personal photo challenge. i'm excited. it puts photography back in a place of cherishing the presence of moment. same place that gets lost between clients and shoots and deadlines of "fast food" photography. 

there are no themes (as it's a personal challenge). it's simple goal is to consistently 'be' in your art regularly. 

my day 1 picture has no real significance. outside of the fact that, while i await the replacement charger for my newest camera, i had to sulk and use an older one. and par, me not actually starting this on the 1st, and my love|hate relationship with procrastination, this was a last minute shot, my deliciously horrible late-night snack. i threw in toot's baby spoon simply because it matched and i love color.

.09 the religion of raindrops

one night, long ago, as the sky cried, wind whispered, i stayed up through the wee hours of the night/morning listening to raindrops bouncing off of concrete with my closet friend at the time: an atheist with a heart so beautifully open he redefined my perception of god and spirituality. i was most at peace listening to him rant and rave about life's illogical guidelines while giggling about yet another one of his foiled murder attempts.

i remember that night simply from the silence. we barely spoke at all. the sky was weeping and he, so unnaturally quiet, the patter of raindrops and feet slosh and treading tires on wet ground the only sounds between us. i asked him what lay on his mind, asked him what could possibly be there to render him mute. 

he was so serene...

he spoke about how calming the rain was for him. said that it was the only time he felt he could exist in this realm of the world, the only time that it ever felt truly clean. when it rained, he said, life carried all the bullshit, the crime, the filth down random sewer drains. that criminals were less apt to commit crimes in downpours. and that it was the only time he felt the world to be an honest place. 

if he was the type of being to 'beam', he would have been glowing...

he said that if he could, he'd trail all of the rainstorms around the world, exist in a constant purge, and only then he'd be a peace, only then would he call me from here, or there, just to tell me that he finally found god, and would i believe, she existed in the raindrops all along?

(soft sigh)...because of him...i have never looked at rain quite the same. every drop, like a blessing, or a prayer that had been answered...and that moment, the closet moment, to ever truly touching heaven...

.08 clarity

i salute those who shoot high fashion, models and commercial photography...but for me, the art within reality will always hold a settle thrill. 

.07 pumped

i need to get back into all my shoes and clothes, like, pronto. i can't take it anymore. while i believe you are beautiful at whatever weight you are, i believe even more that you're at your most beautiful when you are comfortable in your skin...and my skin is used to being at least 50 pounds lighter. i wish to say goodbye to my newly found "womanly" curves and hello to the slender me i used to be just a year ago. taylor is nearing 10 months and due to withdrawal (weed, cigarettes, wine, etc.) recovery (brain surgery), family emergencies (financial crisis) and basic stress, my diet detour has gone on long enough. i long for the sexy feeling i used to get being naked. i was 4 months pregnant when i took this photo and it was the last time that i have worn heels, the last time i lay on my back, toes in the air, completely naked and felt completely delicious in my own skin.

this winter, i am bringing sexy all the way back.

.06 as it was written

sooo...this month was national novel writing month and i tried unsuccessfully to take part in it. i had good intentions, wrote about 1000 words within the first hour of the race. but as time went on, life got harder, and time to write became one big mock at my initial attempt. (sigh) but i suppose all is not lost. i, at least, am on my path to finishing my novel (that i also started solely for the competition) so i guess, on some level, nanowrimo did exactly what it was supposed to do: push me.

i want the next great literary novel that oprah raves about to be my work. i want the type of book that gets worn from over-reading, that you take to the bathroom with you, that you sneak pages in while at work, or school, or church. the type of book you take a picture of even though no one else can actually see the words...

yeah, i need for my book to be that good.

  

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