shooting against the odds

 

Despite my plans to execute our annual birthday cake baking ritual in the light of day (for optimum photos of course), some years it's more difficult than others to find the time. This year, I knew that baking at night (past our bedtime even) wouldn't offer a picture-perfect scenario. Luckily, I have long abandoned my expectation for perfect so I figured I'd give it a shot (or two) and tell this year's story as it really is. We're busy. And my daughter is growing up. And although life sometimes gets sticky, it's always sweet.

This shot will stand as an all-time favorite of mine. I should have remembered that when I surrender and give it my best attempt to cook up something wonderful something yummy happens.

Have you ever shot against all odds only to discover a sweet surprise in the end? Share your unlikely captures with us today.

landscapes of the season

We all know that as the seasons change so do our surroundings and our scenic landscapes. Although here in California the changes aren't always by the hand of Mother Nature and can be harder to find, I am still delighted by the visual signs of the season.

Show us how your landscapes are being transformed this time of year. What scenes are sweeping you off your feet?

Those Ladies

Odette tells the story of selling chickens and eggs as a child in order to care for the needs of herself and her friends in the refugee camps of Uganda.  By the time we finished, she likes to say.  We felt like those ladies from the big organizations who lend people money.

I always loved that part of the story--little girls feeling as powerful as grownups who were committed to making a change--but I didn't really know what she meant.  Until Tanzania.

In Tanzania, I met those ladies and immediately fell under their spell.  They are quiet, they are wise.  They are measured in their energy and fierce in their focus.  They are staring down poverty--its ravages, its sources, its brutal effects--and they know what to do.  They are executing their own particular brand of justice--passing over the one they are supposed to favor for that girl in the back with fire in her eyes.  They are placing their bets on that live wire, even as they readjust their enormous handbags and stamp the dust out of their fashionable shoes. 

They are believing the girls they choose can show the rest how to escape the bowels of hell. 

Meet Juliet, the program trainer for BEST (Business and Entrepreneurship Support Tanzania).  It is her job to teach the entrepreneurial skills the poorest of the poor need to enter the market.  I watched as she checked in on the women she serves, questioning them like your favorite aunt--the one who believes in you and at the same time won't mince words if you need to hear the truth.  She is tending them like a garden of possibility, one promising seedling at a time.

I don't always take a good picture, she told me. But I doubted it could possibly be true.  How could the camera not love this radiance?  How could the lens turn away from this bedrock determination that everything is going to be just fine?

point of origin

I am the youngest of three children, so we took turns holding the polaroid. Happiness was experiencing the magic that developed instantly.

Those memories planted themselves firmly in my subconscious. {How he smiled with his camera slung around his neck, a cigar hanging off his lip.} Looking at that polaroid camera will always make me his little girl again, eager to explore the magic of photography. {The story goes that when my brothers were young my dad walked into a pawn shop in San Diego and walked out with a polaroid camera.}

I spent most of my early adolescent years saving money to buy and develop film and annoy friends. {My brother calls it the curse of the photographer.} Later as I left for college I inherited his old Pentax. {You might know the one with the broken light meter.} My cameras always morphed into something new, something different over the years and many states I photographed. For me, somehow 'things' always turned into cameras. Follow the signs, my cameras always led me down this path marked  P A S S I O N.

And here I am.

So, hello. I'm fairly new here. My name is Meredith and {blush} I'm addicted to photography. It's so nice to meet all of you. {Hey, I see familiar smiling faces! Come here often? Want a cup of tea? I think we are sisters cut from the same cloth.}

What's your story? What do you see as the point of origin for your love of photography? Is there a moment, a person, or a camera of your childhood that stands out as the spark that lit your fire?

photo drive: help brighten the day of some sick kids

Some time ago, a year or two, maybe, I was talking to my friend Kelly on the phone.  She was having a bit of a rough time of it, so I spontaneously said, "Give me your address.  I want to send you something."  She gave it to me, and later that day,  I slid a photograph of a sunflower in an envelope with a note that said, "Hey -- a friend of mine once told me that she couldn't look at a sunflower without smiling.  Hopefully this will work for you, too."  Then I stuck a stamp on it, and put it in the mail.

Over this past summer, I saw Kelly at the BlogHer conference, and at one point she mentioned that she still had the photograph, placed in a location where she could see it.  "It works," she said.  "I smile when I look at it."

I was so touched that she told me this, and it made me realize that photographs can be so powerful, you know?  I mean, words are definitely meaningful, but you send someone an email, often it eventually gets deleted.  Letters are better, but even those get tucked away in a drawer or a shoebox, to be looked at only occasionally.  But images, man, they get displayed.  They're constant little reminders of memories, or sweet sentiments.

So then I started thinking:  if photographs are so powerful, maybe I can do something with them, you know?  It's getting to be holiday time, and while we tend to do things for the needy (donate old clothes or cans of food, that sort of thing), I was thinking that it would be cool to do something more tangible this year.  So I came up with this idea:

What if we just sent photos (or handmade postcards) to people at hospitals who won't be able to go home for the holidays, and who could use a little brightening up around their beds?  I thought to start with, we could send photographs for the kids at Texas Children's Hospital -- photographs (or art cards), with perhaps a little sentence on the backs of them that will help lift spirits, and our names (or aliases) and our hometowns, so they know someone is thinking of them from far away?  That way they can have the image next to their beds at all times ...

... who's with me?

If this sounds cool to you, here's how it would work:

1.  Print a favourite photo of yours -- one you're proud of, one that is meaningful for you, whatever.  Please, no smaller than 4"x6", and no larger than 8"x10".  It can be of anything -- your favourite pet, a flower, a sunset, whatever.  You can print one or more, or lots of prints of one image, or lots of prints of lots of images.  Whatever.  It's up to you.  And seriously:  this doesn't have to be professional quality -- just pick a photo you've taken that you love.  If it means something to you, trust me, it will mean something to the person who receives it.

2.  On the back of the image(s), say something sweet.  It could be the story behind the picture, or just a short, lovely sentiment, or whatever.  I spoke with the Volunteer Services officer at Texas Children's Hospital, and she had some advice:

• nothing religious in nature (like "Merry Christmas!" or "Happy Hannukah!" or whatever, since we don't know the religious backgrounds of the kids who will be receiving the phtoographs or cards)
• nothing that says "Get well soon!" because well, frankly, some of the kids won't be getting well
• restrict your notes say the kinds of things that a kid would love to hear.  You know, things like "You're amazing!" or "You rock!" or "Dream big dreams!" or "Sending you warm thoughts!"  You get the idea.

3.  Also on the back of the image(s), sign your name (or alias, if that makes you more comfortable), and the city/country you're writing from.  Because I'm thinking that the kids would be tickled pink to receive photographs from far away places like "Fargo, North Dakota," let alone "Auckland, New Zealand."

4.  Send your photo(s) to me postmarked no later than November 30th, 2009, to the following address:

Karen Walrond -- Chookooloonks

650 W. Bough, Suite 150-108

Houston, Texas  77024

United States of America

and I'll be sure to get your image(s) to the hospital.

So, are you in?  I hope so.  Just think of the karmic cool points you'll get from doing this.

If, instead, you'd like to organize your own photo drive in your community, by all means, go for it!  Before you do, however, here's a couple of pieces of advice you might find helpful:

1) Be sure to contact the organization's volunteer department to get some guidance, so that you make sure you can avoid anything that might inadvertently run afoul of their policies.  It would be a pity to collect lots of cards or photos, only to learn that for some obscure reason, the organization won't accept them.

2) Find out how late the organization will accept the photos, and adjust your deadline accordingly. You want to make sure that any international participants will have enough time to get their photographs to you, so you can include them in the package you deliver to your organization.

On that note, go forward and make merry.  I can't wait to see the photographs you share with these kids.

(Crossposted at Chookooloonks)