Election Night

 

On election night, we loaded up the car with lawn chairs and a picnic dinner and headed to a friend's house to watch the results roll in. The news broadcast was projected onto the side of the house and several computers were set up in the yard to track the results. At one point there were more than one hundred friends, neighbors, and passers by squeezed into the small front yard. The conversations were primarily of the political nature, from the smallest local propositions and bond initiatives to the house/senate races to the presidential election. This election-watching party was a family event to be sure. There were so many young children that night running around without a care in the world...children of loving straight couples, children of loving gay couples, children of loving single parents, children of loving affluent parents, children of loving parents struggling to get by. You hear a lot about voting as a civic duty, and I love and appreciate that our children are learning that the act of voting is truly an individual's chance to voice how they want their world to be. All the worry, all the hand wringing, all the emotional investment that bound us together that night represented the world we want for our children—a better, kinder world. A world that embraces the diversity around us and affirms that differences can deepen our understanding of one another instead of driving us apart.

Show us a better, kinder world today through your lens.

Images and words courtesy of Jote of Bless Her Heart.

Weekending by Kate Sutterfield

Kate Sutterfield shoots images like this with her Droid smart phone on instagram or Nikon D40 and spends her weekends soaking in the sun or moon on a patio somewhere or running lots of miles with her Lab.

Kate Sutterfield can be found on her blog, on instagram as @kates1 or on twitter as Mrs Sutterfield.

Share  your illuminating weekend images with us.

solstice

“Summer Solstice is one of the great turning points of the year, when the sun is at its peak and the days abound with the promise of life’s fullness. It is a serenely powerful time in which the beauty of the natural world can infuse our spirit, bring us alive to the present, and perhaps awaken a deeper sense of relatedness to the community of life, to the Earth, and to the cosmos.” - Paul Winter

Show us how you plan to spend your time today. This: sun standing still day. This: longest night of the year. Sunrise, sunflare, sunset, or starshine... lay it on me! Leave your images in the comments below, but most of all... enjoy this most beautiful solstice!

Public Service Announcement...With Hearts

I was walking down the street on my own, shuffling through my mixed bag of thoughts, reflecting on the events of the night. I was feeling kinda down, truth be told, and that's probably why my eyes were on the ground when I saw this in the photo above. I immediately stopped in my tracks. My initial reaction was, "Aw, how sweeet," (semi-sarcastic) until I saw the note scrawled beneath the stenciling ("No, no, I love you, I LOVE YOU"), and then I laughed out loud. This little exchange between anonymous street artist and anonymous passerby reminded me of a Facebook exchange I had with a dear friend that went along the lines of "You da BEST" "No, YOU da BEST!" "No, YOU!" and so on...That memory put a smile on my face.

Had I been walking with my head up and a spring in my step, I probably would have walked right over this little message from the universe. I'm not saying that just because I saw this note, I immediately felt embraced and loved by humankind. What it DID do was to remind me that just a block away was a taqueria where some beloved friends were waiting for me, and for the moment, that was more than enough.

Have you ever been surprised by an image that you normally would have missed had you not just happened to be looking in that direction? Has your heart been changed by paying attention to the details? Please share with us your images and stories.

show us your superpower

I've always had a particular fondness for night photography. It's only natural, considering I am nocturnal to the extreme. In fact, I consider this my superpower, being able to harness mere moonlight to create an image that looks like it was taken during the day.

What about you? What's your photographic superpower? Perhaps it's collecting dreamy flare. Or capturing little people in motion. Maybe you have extra creative post-processing skillz. Whatever it is, go ahead; don't be shy. Show us your superpower in action!

Update on Sunday, January 16, 2011 by Shutter Sisters

About the photo, that really was taken in moonlight by Dempster Street Beach in Evanston, a suburb just north of Chicago, where they do not have the bright orange street lights like in the city. I placed the camera on a park bench, put it on self-timer (to eliminate camera shake from pressing the shutter) and used a 6 second exposure at f/5.0 and ISO 400 to get that flare from the distant light source. Try it out the next time you're bathed in moonlight!