another year...

today is the eight year anniversary of my father passing.

i remember when my dad tended bar at western bowl. he was an avid bowler--three or four leagues a week. i think he did it to pay for all the bowling. after all, he and mom managed a bowling alley before i was born, and he went to the bowling alleys until they took the car keys away just before he died.

i guess i was 12 or 13 about the time of this memory. there was a band that played in the bowling alley bar called the now and thens. the drummer's name was fred and i had the biggest crush on him! he had awesome thick brown hair and a huge mustache. oh! i was so shy... but i loved to dance. i would drag my friend to the bowling alley every friday night.

my dad would give us kiddie cocktails and we'd sit at the bar like grown up ladies. we thought we were so cool-- all dressed up with our pink fizzy drinks with extra cherries. my dad thought this was hilarious, and he was brutal! oh, he'd tease me in front of fred about how i had this huge crush. i was mortified... until the guys started playing. then, i'd drag my friend to the dance floor and forget all about boys and kiddie cocktails.

when the band stopped playing and the lights went up, we'd help clean up the bar with dad. he'd tease me relentlessly until i'd be throwing olives and maraschino cherries at him. he'd be laughing so hard and i'd be teetering on the edge of despair or hysteria.

that was my dad, always keeping me real. never letting me forget to be a kid and have fun. it took years, but eventually those lessons helped me keep two feet on the ground and realize i didn't need to take myself so seriously.

western bowl is gone and fred is missouri state representative. but, i still love kiddie cocktails and dancing and men with big mustaches.

i'm trying to keep it real and have fun. but, it'd be a lot more fun if you were here, Dad.

alice is coming home...

life is just a series of seasons. today, i noticed the orange hue in the leaves.

things in my world have been a little me-centric lately. i didn't really notice until i started to crack apart the wall i'd built around myself this summer.

i'd rather not be that way, but i think for a while, it was okay. i had some healing to do. i needed to pick up all my pieces and remember who i was before i tumbled down the rabbit hole. more importantly, i needed to learn who i was coming out.

but, i no longer need that... it's okay that Humpty Dumpty had a great fall. that is the way it was supposed to be.

today, i thought of you. i thought for a long time and i tried putting on your shoes. they were too big and i made a great racket clomping around. but, i felt the uneven heal and worn toe of your habit.

how are you? won't you sit with me and have a cup of tea?

Jimmy #34...

IMG_2533_1 copy, originally uploaded by MisfitHue.

i shot a friend's son at his game last week. i had an absolute blast catching up with my friend. i hadn't seen her since junior year of high school. in fact, we chatted so much, sometimes i forgot why i was there!

the lesson? SHOOT IN RAW. OMG. i may not get nearly the number of shots, but the editing time was nearly nothing.

the quality of the shots? oh, even i, who am relentless and critical... i actually really like some of these.

another nice fall out to the lesson and reconnecting with a friend? interest from other parents. i'm thrilled to say the least.

Tales from the Sahara and me...

Lynn, originally uploaded by MisfitHue.

i went to a very good friend's studio recital/show a couple of few weeks ago. i took upwards of 1300 pictures and learned more valuable lessons.

first of all, just because you can get an ISO of 3200 does not mean that you should shoot at that high.

secondly, if you shoot in raw, you get better shots.

and lastly, it is possible i'm over doing it.

i'm horribly disappointed in the quality of my shots. i'm exhausted from the sheer volume and amount of effort it took to edit and SAVE shots.

am i any closer to "getting" it? i don't know. i just don't know. i have some great action in here, but when you take 1300 shots, you're bound to.

i need to change a few things. first of all, i need to get outside. move around. i've form-fitted to my chair and every limb is numb.

i wish i had something better for these girls. they worked their tails off and did a beautiful job of dancing.

more randomness...

discovered a fantastic photographer yesterday... Lou Lesko. i dig his work, but even more, his opinions on piracy and the internet intrigue me. apparently, he is rather controversial in the photography community because of this. i, however, think he is right. "the currency of the internet is the link through." and perhaps, as photographers who put our stuff on the internet, it is that thought which we should keep forefront and not great fears about someone stealing our stuff. if we put it on the net, as Lesko said, we lose control of it. but, not put it on the net? don't be archaic. if you want work, you'll get it out there. at least, that's the way i feel.

my computer has been whisked off to the land of the apple techs and i'm fit-to-be-tied about it. apparently, laptops from my era circa 2007 are prone to video cards fritzing out. that i can deal with, but what really yanks my chain is that it must be fedexed to the land of oz, and there is a very good likelihood that the techs will not only change the card, but also clear the whole BRAND NEW hard drive. there are photos on there that i hadn't backed up yet. thus the racing heart and red neck.

why? i asked.
in case they decide to check everything on the computer, said the genius who sounded an awful lot like a cali surfer that was half-baked at the end of a long weekend.
can we ask them not to? i cocked my head in that "aren't you cute? like a chicken who's neck i'm going to snap" way that i have about me. :)
no... we're remodeling the store. said surfer genius.

sometimes i give up to easily and say whatever. like on my birthday when the cop in his new spiffy american muscle car gave me a speeding ticket. this was just like that. WHATEVER.

tomorrow, i will check my status on line and call the support folks. i will see if there is anyway to save my hard drive from the vixens of cleaning.

in the meantime, i'm going to be camping out at work. i'm traveling everywhere with my external hard drive and eyeballing every computer without a body attached to within a 30 mile radius, so watch out. i'm going through some intense and violent withdrawals.

a king, a knight and the queen...

this song is stalking me. it's haunting and driving me up the keep walls.

i feel like i've been swimming the english channel, and just when i think i've crossed and i'm william the conqueror, i hear this and realize i'm don quixote.

in the end, i suppose i strive to be more like queen elizabeth... going solo on principle.

just focus on the affairs of the state, allow for distractions till the calluses are thick, and one day, i'll forget it even happened.

Kings of Leon

random note on inspiration...

some days i am not sure if the day is going to be a handful of bitters or perk up like a bouquet of spring tulips.

i wish i could count on it like i can count on the fact that thursday follows wednesday, but i cannot. inspiration has a mind of its own.

i looked in the mirror a few hours ago and i thought, "if you want things to change, you have to do something."

i walked back to my desk and did a few busy work things that were very helpful to my boss. (things that i normally get a little cranky about.) then i sat down and sent out a few emails about photography. particularly, i emailed someone that i should have emailed four months ago to ask for help. that led to another email which landed me an opportunity. that led to a conversation which led me to even more help.

then, i started looking at professional photographers for serious inspiration... with a critical eye as opposed to cowering and withering and feeling unworthy. i started a list of things that i feel i need to accomplish and would like to accomplish to be prepared for this wedding.

it's only lunch time and i've already changed so much--but i'm not even close to finished! i've got a lovely bunch of tulips in my hand, and i intend enjoy them and appreciated them until the last pedal falls.

addendum to the maple leaf...

i'm shooting a very good friends wedding the first weekend of october and i'm terrified. i've been working very hard to prepare, but i don't think nearly hard enough. i know that there have been hours, days... of missed opportunities to prepare and the anxiety is building. but, that is a completely different blog post...

the point: after the wedding, i've decided to splurge and give a gift to myself.... a 10 day extravaganza to Maine and Nova Scotia.

OMG, OMG, OMG (this is where i squeal)

i was looking at average temp charts and mapping out drive times compared to taking the CAT. if you've ever seen me get ready to travel, you know that these are sure signs that the kindling has caught and a full out forest fire is imminent. this is about to get dangerous. :)

OMG, OMG, OMG (this gets annoying, even for me)

i'm doing it. i'm really doing it and i'm going alone. i've never done anything like this alone.

i'm so excited, i just got all teary-eyed. i've wanted do this since.... since.... i think maybe.... forever.

so.... i fly to Portland on the 10th... take the CAT to Yarmouth... then drive to Halifax... seems best to do Halifax first... other places on the island? or .... hmmmmmmmmmmm..... and the OCD kicks in.

the maple leaf and me...

for the last year, Canada has been tugging at my coattails.

until just a minute ago, i suspected it was about a guy. but, maybe it's got nothing to do with him at all. maybe he was just one more of the insane number of coincidences and Hindenburg-sized hints.

as we all know, i've got a good healthy fantasy built around the northern portion of the continent. within mere weeks of meeting above mentioned gentleman, i was in a fierce struggle over whether to take a vacation in Bar Harbor, Maine or Halifax, Nova Scotia? struggle... mull... indecision.

then, like Zeus dropping gifts from Mt Olympus, a Canadian bought me a beer.... and i became distracted. well... he was charming, kind and armed with a wit that was only rivaled by his intellect. so, you can imagine how this might've become an easy detour.

nonetheless, Canada is all around me. in fact, it has come up so much and so often that i barely note it anymore. i just assume... it's from there, about there, going there, coming from there. for pete's sake, somehow, it's bound to be Canadian. the universe, my karma, God... whomever or whatever you subscribe to... is flashing Las Vegas-sized directional signs.

so, please, Powers That Be... be aware that i've heard you. i'm going, i'm going.

now, can i please get some good old-fashioned Midwestern peace?

emotions in a bucket...

a friend of mine told me a story about a man who became a woman. he told her that when they started giving him hormones, he learned very quickly what the real difference was between men and women.

according to her, when she was a man, his emotions were almost separate... like they were in a bucket next to him and he could pull out whatever emotion he wanted, whenever he wanted. OR NOT. that point is central here.

when he started getting hormones to be a woman, she couldn't separate them... they were all on her at once, and they were intense.

oh sweet heaven above what i wouldn't give to be able to deposit my emotions into a bucket and drop kick it into the other room. i've never been a player or a game player for that matter. i've always been a girl with her emotions right there on her sleeve--and oh yeah, they're often intense.

but sometimes, girls like me have an incident that changes us. we start being a little less compassionate and a little reckless. we learn to take that soft, lovely part of ourselves that makes us the "gem", the girl that anyone would be lucky to have and pack that shit up and send it to the Philippines. this is a defense mechanism and that is a jacked up Disney fantasy.

i'm going to remember that little bit about the bucket.