Sunday, November 16, 2008

The Door

The door stood open, inviting her to go in. She was unsure; she had the key. Why was the door open?

Her hand grasped the doorknob. It was warm from the desert sun. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath as she pushed open the door. She stepped forward slowly and felt the old boards buckle beneath her feet.

Then she saw it, standing before her in the middle of the room and in an instant her entire world changed.

Sunday, October 19, 2008

broken room


She laid on the bed waiting patiently for them to arrive. If you look close enough, you can still see her there waiting, looking expectantly at the two chairs. She arranged them perfectly so they would be able to see her sleep. Time meant nothing to her. As long as she stayed there, always in one place, she knew they would come.

Tuesday, October 14, 2008

How to hold things together

There are many different ways in which we are connected to each other. Sometimes the bonds are strong, like superglue. Sometimes they are just being held on by a thread. Some bonds are stronger than others. Some are meant to survive. Others are made to be temporary. Your guess is as good as mine as to which ones will last.

I was thinking about how your first best friend can be a result of something as simple as a seating chart in Kindergarten based on alphabetical order. India's best friend is Isis. Part of me really hopes we stay in Sultan so I can watch this group of kids grow up and see who they all become. I may be the "weird" parent, but I am fascinated by the development of all these new personalities and how they are learning to form bonds.

Sunday, October 12, 2008

Accept or Overcome?


I firmly believe each of us has a purpose for being here. We are all students and teachers. For the past few years I have believed my mission in life is to overcome fear. I mentioned this at my last meeting with the wise Scotsman. He brought up an important piece of information. Fear is not something to overcome. Fear in and of itself is not the problem. The problem lies in how it is dealt with.

Fear teaches us to keep safe and protect ourselves. It can also prevent us from stepping out of our boundaries endangering our security. That is what it comes down to in the end for me. I want to feel secure in a world which is by nature insecure.

I am open to suggestions.

Friday, October 10, 2008

ISO 100 Shutter 46 Seconds

There has always been something intriguing to me about night photography. Our eyes are amazing instruments which take bits of light, send electronic impulses to our brain and translate into something intelligible. For the most part a camera is blind without light. Most people have never experienced true dark. Most humans avoid the depths required to find pure lack of light.

Light and photography are inseparable.

Sunday, October 5, 2008

The past becoming the present...




I take these photographs along US highway 2 of abandoned farmsteads; Some appear to have been lived in recently. This makes me think of the bursting of the housing bubble. What is going to happen to all of the foreclosed homes if there is not one to buy them. Will they become worse off than their predecessors? In ten to twenty years will the middle class suburbs of today become another example of societal decay.
What do you do when your dreams go bad?

You build a better dream.

This is the wisdom I learned today from The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl. Yes, a campy kid movie made me tear up. Our dreams don't always work out the way they are supposed to. There is a wonderful quote by Edgar Allen Poe, "Those who dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who dream only by night." I used to have a bookmark with this engraved on it. I think it is still in the pages of The Return of the King where it was left when I finished reading it.

R and I had a good talk today in the car after dinner with A and his wife. I mentioned how I wanted to travel and go have adventures and fill up my life with more stories and experience and how I felt I needed to do this on my own. R replied he would like to do this with me. Something clicked. It was like we were on the same page. At this point in our life R has to follow a certain set of rules to keep his job. Someday, we will reach a point where he can lead a life less guarded.

In the meantime, he has realized I am not about to go off the deep end and the friends I have made over the past year or two are trustworthy and will take care of me. They are really friends; the kind who will smack me over the head with a clue-by-four when I am going to do something stupid. The kind of friends who stick with you when your pie karma is running low.

The past year has been shaky between R and myself. It is funny how a fifteen minute conversation can put you back on level ground. I believe the ideas were always there, we just didn't have the right words to communicate them.

Tuesday, September 23, 2008

Hello my name is...

I am passive-aggressive. This is something I have recently realized about myself. I am not particularly fond of the idea, but there it is. It is really amazing what a change in perspective can do. Now I am trying to break out of the patterns dictated by my super-ego. The first step is admitting there is a problem.

So, instead of getting angry and putting things off in an attempt to avoid failure and disappointment, I am going to just move forward. I am going to take the emotion away from my job. It is what it is. I have a list of things which have to get done and getting mad or putting them off isn't going to make them go away. Ultimately, I would just be setting myself up for a failure of epic proportions.

Anxiety is almost a tangible thing for me. Finding security in an insecure world is a losing battle. I think I am finally getting pointed in the right direction.

Friday, March 21, 2008

fly the white flag of war...

Today my daughter and spent two hours on a bus to retrieve the prince. More often than not I am put in a position where I have to rescue him. He doesn't really know how to take care of himself. He thinks he does, but experience has proven otherwise.

We arrived at the bus stop just in time to catch the 2:40 to Everett. The young princess chose one of the elevated seats towards the back so she could oversee her subjects while in transit. She insisted on bringing her doll with her against my better judgment. Before the first leg of our journey was halfway through she had exhausted the entertainment value of her doll. She placed her doll in her seat and pranced to the seat on the opposite side of the aisle where she sat and stared at the teenage girl behind her meticulously applying make-up in preparation for some Friday night adventure.

Upon arriving at the Everett bus station the young princess insisted on the need for a snack. Snacks are the central preoccupation of the young princess's life. Missing snack results in hours of torment. We speedily obtained some Cheet-os and apple juice and scurried onto the 510 to Seattle.

For this leg of our journey, the young princess decided on a seat by the coachman. This choice of seat enabled her to lay down, take a quick nap and ensure I was as uncomfortable as humanly possible for the duration of our trip.

We rescued the prince from his tower in Seattle and after a brief interlude to play in a toy store, we piled into our personal coach to head back to the castle. On the return trip my head started to hurt.

This wasn't your normal run of the mill head hurt. This was a migraine. It started as a churning in the pit of my stomach and worked its way up to my left temple. As we headed home it progressively worsened. This put the prince in a very bad mood. The prince has little tolerance for weakness in his princesses...

the beginning...

Once upon a time there was a thirty one year old princess living in the Cascade foothills of Western Washington. Her kingdom was an overcrowded castle where she coexisted with her prince, young daughter and canine protector. While living in this castle she began to question the route her life had taken. To this day, she continues to seek an answer.

Once upon a time...