September 17, 2020

Things I Miss

Missed the county fair this year. That’s an annual tradition we look forward to every year.
I miss not feeling anxious every time one of the kids gets a cough or the sniffles.
I miss eating out at restaurants.
I miss a time when medical advice wasn’t automatically political.
I miss movie theaters.
I miss the kids not knowing the name of a particular virus, and begging for it to be over.
I miss a time when large wars killed this many people, not a pandemic, recklessness, and stupidity.
I miss jumping on a plane and going somewhere.
I miss not feeling anxious when I see people not wearing a mask in public places.
I miss in-person work conferences and connecting with people in my industry.
I miss concerts and live music.
I miss a time when America was a leader in the world for something good.

misc, photography 2020, coronavirus, summer

July 28, 2020

Grow

There’s too much death in our world right now. Here in my own country, 150,000 unexcusable, mostly preventable deaths.

Here in our yard, we’ve noticed a lot of life this summer: we have two new skunks roaming our bush edge, a couple of aggressive squirrels that eat our bird seed, and now a gangbuster garden.

My garden memories go as far back as my memory goes: digging potatoes with my grandpa as a toddler, eating fresh green beans my grandma would cook southern-style. As soon as I had a home of my own, I planted a small garden in the back lot.

When we moved, this house had three years of not-great gardens. For one, the neighbors’ mulberry tree shaded the plot too much. And for two, maybe the weather? It’s hard to say.

But this year, it’s the biggest, healthiest garden I’ve ever had. It’s so big, it’s creeping into the neighbors’ yard. I told them whatever grows on their side of the fence, they can keep.

So I grabbed the macro lens and captured the texture and tendrils of this banner-year garden – the fuzzy stems, the searching vines, and the green and light-thirsty leaves.

Growing a garden has its benefits, of course. It’s good to get your hands dirty. It’s great to eat healthily. And the convenience factor – it’s so great to pick fresh lettuce and make a salad for lunch.

Along with cider, the garden has been my escape from the pandemic. Growing a garden is mostly a passive activity. You just let the water and sunshine do their thing. But I do wander out back to check on its progress, make sure the bugs aren’t eating all the greens, and picking whatever is ripe and ready.

My other hope is that, someday, the kids will remember eating fresh veggies from the garden – much like I did as a kid – and then want to grow their own.

It’s not much, but as the plague and politics and craziness gets worse, it’s good to grow something for a change.

photography, projects 2020, coronavirus, garden, macro, photography

July 17, 2020

Adapt

When the coronavirus pandemic hit Michigan in March, it threw our situation – like everyone else’s – into chaos: no more office commute for me, no more in-person schooling for the kids, significant changes to my wife’s music therapy practice.

Those early days were a whirlwind. We had to develop new routines just as spring was warming up. We had to adapt to this new reality.

Along the way, I photographed our home and our lives as we lived it, and I have a selection of those photographs on display at Ella Sharp Museum’s new Adapt exhibition, exploring artistic responses to the pandemic. My series, “A Change of Seasons,” looks at our changing home life, changing routines, and changing light as March turned to April and winter turned to spring.

The exhibition is online for now and features great local artists with exciting work. Next week, starting July 21, I’ll have three photos on display at the physical museum when they open back up.

I always thought one of my community portrait projects would be my first chance to appear at Ella Sharp Museum, but the pandemic threw everything into the air, including my expectations. Still, I’m proud to be on display in the Adapt exhibition with so many other talented local artists.

art, photography 2020, coronavirus, ella sharp museum, exhibition, photography

June 4, 2020

Kids These Days

These days, it’s easy to appreciate whoever came up with, “Children should be seen and not heard.”

It’s barbaric, of course, especially now that we recognize children are miniature people. They have thoughts and feelings. They’re more than field workers or inconveniences.

Still, with every minute of every day spent with the kids, it’s an adjustment. Before, we worked all day, and we spent time with the kids in the evenings or on the weekends. Now it’s all day, every day.

Soon there will be no school work, no Zoom class meetings, no nothing. Just unstructured summertime. Luckily we’re in a nice time of year when staying outside and playing is a possibility.

Outside also means avoiding social media and the news. The kids don’t have any idea what’s going on in the world today. If they did, it’d be difficult to answer their questions. The virus? They know about that. They know its name. Everything else? Blissfully unaware.

Working as I do, each day at the kitchen table, I can watch them play in the backyard and live out their own adventures. They are little people, and as much as that old English saying makes me laugh, I don’t believe it. I didn’t get to hear it so much before. It’s good to hear them out there, playing and laughing and crying.

Inside, I can barely work because of my anxiety at the state of the world. Better for them to be outside.

photography 2020, coronavirus, family, home, kids, photography

April 29, 2020

Watching and Waiting

I may have gone a little far on the snark in my last blog post. It was born out of frustration, and the all-too-human need to correct those we think are wrong.

It’s not like me to do things like that, but then these are weird times, aren’t they?

I’m facing a summer’s worth of working from home, no school for the kids until the fall (maybe?), and dumb people doing dumb things with little concern for the safety of others.

To stay occupied, I’m trying to pick up my camera more and try little things: taking photos outside while we enjoy the fresh spring air, or grabbing some macro shots of the hyacinths and daffodils sitting on the kitchen table. It’s something.

Each new day is just a day. We watch and wait for some good news in the world, but we’re more often disappointed.

photography coronavirus, photography

April 24, 2020

So You’re Thinking About Protesting the Coronavirus

Friends, we as Americans have the right to protest and proclaim our rights. But if you’re thinking about protesting, I made this handy guide to thinking through your argument points…and make sure you’re REALLY prepared to protest!

MY RIGHTS ARE BEING TAKEN AWAY!
No, they are not. You can’t yell “fire” in a crowded theatre, and you can’t go boating right now. You can still buy seeds, plant your garden, buy food, get gas – you’re merely being inconvenienced for a short-term period.

If you’re such a big fat baby, maybe protesting isn’t for you?

IT’S MY RIGHT TO GET A HAIRCUT/GO BOATING/GO GOLFING!
Driving isn’t a right, it’s a privilege. You can get those privileges taken away if you’re a dumb shit. Same here: none of those activities are enshrined in either the federal or state constitution. You don’t have the right to go bowling.

Also, it’s spring. It snowed yesterday. Maybe build a snowman instead?

MICHIGAN’S GOVERNOR IS BEING DRACONIAN! SHE’S A NAZI!
Neat. The governor of Ohio – a male, white Republican – has perhaps more drastic measures in place. What is he?

The Nazis discriminated based on race and orientation, loaded people up in trains, and killed them en masse. They tried to take over the world. You can’t go *golfing.*

The last protest had a bunch of white dudes flying dipshit Confederate flags, holding guns, and wearing the same red Made-in-China hats. Who looks like a Nazi?

Maybe read a book instead of protesting?

THIS WHOLE THING IS AN OVERREACH BY OUR GOVERNMENT! IT’S GONE TOO FAR!
Okay. People were doing this during the 1918 Spanish flu. And the communities that isolated stayed alive.

Our government’s first job is to keep its citizens safe and healthy (and deliver the mail, but that’s another point). The evidence shows these measures work, and keep people safe and alive.

If your appendix is going to burst, do you want some politician, preacher, or news network talking head doing surgery on you? No. We listen to experts because they know what they’re talking about. They have experience. They can do the work.

Apart from government, businesses also see the need to close facilities and keep their employees safe. Are they wrong?

BUT THE ECONOMY!
Yep, it sucks. Makes you wonder why the federal government is giving loans to giant businesses who don’t need them instead of small businesses that do…

Maybe you should protest in Washington, DC instead!

THE CORONAVIRUS IS NO DIFFERENT THAN THE FLU! WHAT’S THE BIG DEAL?
Great! Let someone with COVID-19 sneeze in your face.

And isn’t it weird that a lot of those protestors were wearing masks. What’s the big deal?

LIBERATE VIRGINIA/MICHIGAN/MINNESOTA!
Go fuck yourself.

Hope this guide helps you block hospitals treating their patients with your “I NEED A HAIRCUT” sign and put more people in danger!

misc coronavirus, protest, sarcasm

March 30, 2020

City Without Seasons

Last week, to get out of the house, I did the uncool thing and headed downtown to see what it looked like with our governor’s shelter-in-place order.

As Florence sings, it was a city without seasons. March is the November of spring – the weird in-between one. No leaves on the trees, no flowers blooming just yet, and streets as empty as can be.

The truth is that downtown Jackson is pretty empty on weekday nights after 5 p.m. But last week it was extra desolate. I stopped a person or two wandering around downtown, just like me.

Things really got interesting when a guy noticed me taking pictures. “Hey, want to take photos inside the theatre?” This is Jackson’s Michigan Theatre, the city’s lone operational classic theatre. The man was wearing a protective mask. I’m not sure what his role was at the theatre, but he had the whole place to himself. I got the sense, as I was taking photos inside, that the guy was simply lonely. Or he wanted to show off the place. I had to excuse myself after 10 minutes, or else the man would’ve given me the full tour of the place.

So I headed back outside, into the sunshine, to photograph our empty downtown.

With spring coming, and with more light, it’s nice to have the option to get outside and walk around.

Fresh air may be the best hope we all have of staying sane.

photography coronavirus, downtown, jackson, michigan, photography

March 26, 2020

Week Two

We have our routine down pretty well now. Wake up, eat, check-in, watch some TV, do live stream music with mom, go outside, lunch, quiet time, back outside, dinner, play, bed. Repeat.

Work is definitely challenging these days. The kids are feeling cooped up. It’s hard not to chat with the neighbors, except from a distance. And the streets are so quiet.

Every day we’re a little more anxious about everything: our health, our families, the economy, the Executive Branch’s dipshit handling of the whole situation. We feel phantom symptoms and worry. We’re trying to make the groceries we bought two weeks ago last a bit longer.

I did start a new batch of cider. I took a photo field trip that I hope to share later. The weather is warming up, so I’m sitting on the front porch listening in on conference calls while the kids dig their bikes out of the garage.

Every little thing helps us not think about every big thing.

photography 2020, coronavirus, home, photography

March 20, 2020

Quarantine

Everything’s weird. From the power continuing the flicker, to the quiet streets, to the strange sense of calm – inside the house, you wouldn’t know the world is working its way through a pandemic crisis.

I’m working from home most days. I one of the lucky ones whose work sits on a laptop, mostly. Though I did travel in today (a Friday) just to get some fresh air and get out of the house for a bit. The parking lot is nearly empty.

We hear about the air quality improving, and dolphins swimming in European canals. Can we keep some of the unintended consequences of this outbreak?

At home, the kids don’t know any better. For them, it’s a longer spring break, and – strange for them – more time with dad at home. I did my best to set up a new routine that includes fresh air, some form of learning exercise (disguised as art projects), and some pick-up at the end of the day.

We’re as prepared as we can be for the long haul.

[All photos shot on my iPhone SE and edited in Filmborn.]

photography 2020, coronavirus, home, photography

March 12, 2020

Stuck Inside

Now that the whole world is under quarantine, what’s a photographer to do? Especially if you’re stuck at home? I think this is a great time to work on a few photography projects, and here are a few ideas to help keep your mind off the outside world.

Photograph Your Surroundings

This time of year, the light is changing dramatically. Photograph your home, your yard, your neighborhood, and pay special attention to how the light transforms. I’ve made this a hobby inside a hobby. It’s how I explore spaces and get to know a place.

Photograph Your Family/Friends

Take advantage of being closer to the people in your life, now that most public events are canceled or on hold. Sit your significant other down next to a window and take their portrait. Photograph your kids, now home from school, at play. Invite friends over for drinks (nothing celebrates global chaos like booze) and make it a project.

Tidy Up Your Camera Gear

Now’s a great time to dust off your old gear, wipe down your lenses, empty out your memory cards, and clean out your camera bag. I know my Canon 5D has a notoriously dirty sensor. My batteries probably need a good recharge. Grab your gear, turn on some music, and get to work.

Take Care of Your Photo Files

My Lightroom catalog has folders and folders full of unedited photos. My iPhone photos could use a backup. My whole photo collection could use an external hard drive backup. It’s a great time to take care of organizing your photos, updating your metadata, and caring for the digital side of your photography.

Print Your Photos

Whether it’s individual prints or a book, now that you’ve organized your photo collection, you can put those beautiful pictures on paper for safe-keeping. Snapfish sends me an email every day talking about their photobook sales. Why not take an album full of your 2019 photos and make a photobook? You can even do it on your mobile device.

Get Online

Edit your photography website. Pre-write a bunch of blog posts with idea starters. Update your social profiles. Do some digital housecleaning.

Try a New Thing

Always wanted to try out film photography? Or take a stab at still life? Now’s the time to try something new – or, more accurately, it’s always a great time to try something new.

What are you doing to keep yourself busy?

photography, projects coronavirus, covid, photography, projects