Category Archives: Relationships

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Weekly Photo Challenge: One Shot, Two Ways

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This photo challenge is actually quite a useful meditation on perspective.  I had thought about my options in taking up this challenge, ranging from skipping it altogether because it’s not an obligation, to spreading it out over a whole week to give me time to find something I love dearly enough to photograph it on purpose.  I had thought about visiting the place where Steve & I had our first date, Glacial Park, while on my way to visit my kids back in Illinois.  That is a place dear to my heart, and closer to being worthy of Jeff Sinon’s incredible nature photos of New Hampshire (I’m a big fan and follower.  Do check him out!).  But it would mean not posting until at least a few days from now.  I browsed around the Internet for a while and lit upon a few threads that interested me.  What is it that catches my attention?  Perspective.  I read a bit about Marfan syndrome.  Ever meditate on how perspective changes quality of life and the level of fear you feel about something potentially life-threatening?  I read about an American couple jailed in Qatar under suspicion of murdering their adopted daughter.  The perspective on adoption is quite different in Muslim countries.  How you think and feel about something is altered dramatically based on where you stand.  I began to take that idea closer to home.

My partner, Steve, owns and operates an online book business.  I might consider Scholar & Poet Books to be the “other woman” in our relationship.  I don’t feel about her the same way that Steve does.  To him, she represents his autonomy; she is a huge financial asset, and endlessly fascinating.  To me, she is a dominating presence that crowds me out of closet space and Steve’s attention.  She is also somewhat boring to me, as she doesn’t touch or speak.  But I would like to make friends with her.  I would like a different perspective on her.  So I chose her for my subject. 

I don’t know if you feel you only get one shot at life, one shot at any given problem.  I do know that there are always at least two ways to take it on.  Perspective.  You can get a different one by moving just a little.  It’s well within your range of powers. 

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Wednesday Words: for Steve

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Your fragile skin is smooth and taut, a drum head.

Shadows surround your bones.

Your waning flesh a cry for mercy.

You dream 

a hermit’s life

of walking at a slower pace

unburdened.

Steve in profile

* Steve became a City Carrier Assistant for the US Postal Service in April.  His sister and his father have both had long careers in the P.O. Steve has left a lifestyle of self employment in the online bookselling business in order to make fast money with overtime and extended hours walking a city mail route.  This is a temporary solution designed to retire some debt.  At six foot two inches tall, he now weighs only 155 lbs – less than he weighed in high school.  In the sanctuary of his home office, surrounded by stacks and stacks of used books and melodies of Handel, Beethoven, Schubert and Mahler, he is a happier person.  Scholar & Poet Books is his personal work.  Walking the footpaths of Wisconsin is his preferred route.  He longs to return to this Walden by the time he turns 50 years old. *

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Weekly Photo Challenge: Masterpiece

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Creating a masterpiece…out of your life.  Making decisions, making meaning, making changes, making love, making sense, making it count, making the most of it.  I dedicate this post to my daughter, Susan, who made a big addition to her masterpiece on Sunday.  Congratulations!  I’m proud of you, dear!

masterpiece

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Wedding Sampler

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Just to show you a glimpse into why I haven’t been posting this weekend…with promises to update anon.  Also a link to the professional photographer’s sneak peek blog (what a wonderful couple…so funny and so talented!).

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Wordless Wednesday: My Father

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July 10th.  The anniversary of my father’s birth.  A man I was close to for 48 years, but whom I was just getting to know when he became wordless.  He wrote his memoirs just before developing Alzheimer’s disease. (see this post for a more complete story)

What I wouldn’t give for a few more words…..

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Comments accepted and appreciated: no verbal restrictions there!

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Weekly Photo Challenge: Companion

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I spent the last 8 hours in the delightful company of my firstborn child.  We spent the day making paper roses out of pages of an old copy of The Lord of the Rings for her wedding bouquet, trying out hair-dos for the wedding, and talking heart to heart. I am so grateful that the years we’ve spent together have produced two women who have grown to be great friends.  You can read all kinds of opinions about whether your children are supposed to be your friends, but in the final analysis, if you both live to be adults at the same time, you can have a friendship that is richer, deeper, closer than any you can imagine.  My daughter was born when I was 22, and in many ways, we grew up together.  We read together, learned together, laughed together, cried together, explored different roles and ages and stages in each others’ company and discovered that we really like each other.  We’ve always been very honest and good communicators.  So, I sincerely want to say,

“Susan, thank you for being my companion for 28 years (so far)!  I love you very much.”Companion

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Weekly Photo Challenge: The World Through Your Eyes

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This week’s photo challenge was a tough one for me.  The “assignment” was to show “a visual interpretation of one’s vision. A story, captured in a frame.”  This seems to me to be something close to photojournalism.  I think black and white.  I think action, or a reference to action.  I look through my portfolio, and most of what I have is nature portraiture and still life.  The world through my eyes would seem posed, maybe even inert.  Hmmm.  This IS a challenge.  In order to capture a story, I would have to show more of a scene, not just a subject.  The backdrop, the context.  That would probably mean I have to be more ready with my camera, “quicker on the draw”, so to speak.  I will keep that in mind.  Tomorrow, I go to my daughter’s Bridal Shower, and I intend to bring my camera.  Maybe I can practice this assignment in that setting.  For now, I will give you my best approximation at photojournalism, taken last October on our adventure to “Metaphorical Maine” (which actually turned out to be Kentucky, West Virginia and Ohio).  Here ’tis:

My vision