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Mama!
Wordless Wednesday
Category Archives: Uncategorized
Cee’s Black & White Photo Challenge: Lights
Ann Arbor’s Michigan Theater is home to the Ann Arbor Symphony.
Saturday I noticed these two chandeliers, reflected into infinity in mirrored walls, lighting up the ornate ceiling. I couldn’t resist the capture.
I think I have letters to write
Years ago my Dad said he could tell where he was in the life cycle by the tone of the family Christmas letters we received. Back in the early days people were starting out and talked about new babies, new jobs. Then suddenly kids were graduating and getting married and starting jobs themselves. Grandchildren began arriving. Eventually his friends started retiring, traveling, dealing with health issues. News of death was beginning to appear in holiday letters the last years of his life.
I think about that a lot as I see it reflected in the Christmas cards I receive each year. People I went to school with are grandparents now. And more and more hints that life doesn’t last forever are popping up in those yearly letters.
But it’s more than the annual holiday letter that provide clues about mortality. Social media, Facebook, Twitter and all the rest keep us up to date with people we might never have stayed connected with prior to the internet. We hear about life events almost instantly. We offer congratulations and condolences and support from a keyboard. And while I appreciate the connections I feel an old fashioned responsibility to send something more, especially when condolences are required.
So I have letters to write.
Today is the funeral of a blogger friend’s dad. Early next week a friend from high school will be burying her own dad. The two men died on the same day; I learned of their deaths while on the internet. At Christmas I learned that a coworker died last year. I hadn’t known he was sick and I want to write his widow who I never met. And last week I read online that the father of kids I used to babysit has died. His widow still lives in the house down the street from my old home. Though the children are grown, probably with kids of their own, I feel a need to let them know I’m thinking of them.
Somehow it doesn’t seem enough to just say ‘sorry for your loss’ in a Facebook post. Yet I’ve done it that way too. A friend from the dog training community lost both her parents in September last year, and all my communication was in the form of emails and Facebook posts and private messaging. Is that enough? Does that provide a more immediate support? Has the world moved on from handwritten letters that arrive with a stamp?
Or do I have letters to write?
WordPress Photo Challenge: Weight(less)
Sandhill cranes, though large birds, fly as though they weigh nothing at all…
Weightless cranes
…way up against the puffy, weightless clouds in the beautiful blue sky.
You can see other interpretations of weight(less) at the original WP post. Or check out a few of my favorites here, here and here.
OK…here’s another favorite from my archives:
Let’s go fly a kite.
Taken last spring on a blustery day, this couple stood on top of the sledding hill flying their kite.
For me it was easier to think about this challenge from the weightless side. But I wonder what I have in my archives that would represent weight.
I bet there’s something.
I had to forgive her
Katie here.
I suppose you’ve all been enjoying my mama’s photos from her trip way up north. Might I remind you that she was gone for two weeks and she left me and my daddy behind! I don’t know what she was thinking.
This is my back yard!
And do you know what is worse? When she came home she smelled like another animal! Not me! Something smaller and…dare I say it…more like a….a…squirrel! Whatever it was it had been all over her!
When she first came home I was all excited. I couldn’t control my wriggle-butt, it just kept moving! Then I smelled the evil on her. I still couldn’t keep my tail from wagging…and I had to give her a couple of kisses. But then it hit me….she had cheated on me!
This is my park!
Well, I backed right up and sat down and barked at her! And you know what she did then? She laughed at me! How could she!?
I thought about it long and hard, (OK…for about 3 minutes) and decided I was going to have to be the bigger doggie and forgive her. After all, she took me to my park the very next day.
And she’s been giving me tummy and ear rubs. And she feeds me. And gets up in the middle of the night to take me outside if I ask.
I couldn’t stop smiling!
So I guess I should let it go, right? I shouldn’t feel all jealous and cranky. I mean she did come home to me and daddy. I don’t know where she went or who she hung out with, but she came home to me. And that’s what matters.
That and treats. Of course.
Cee’s Black & White Photo Challenge: Buildings
You know my favorite buildings to photograph are barns. So when Cee sent out a challenge for black and white photos of buildings I knew I needed to look at my barn archive. Especially since I have recent barn photos that you haven’t seen.
While I was up north I spent a day driving through the orchards and farmlands in the center of the peninsula. There were a lot of great barns, and someday I’ll do a post about them and show you more, but for right now enjoy this one. Tucked into the hill it was home to several cows that viewed me suspiciously when I stopped to take a photo.
Cow house.
And you might get a kick out of this barn which is located closer to where I live. There’s an organization here that is trying to preserve old barns. And Kid Rock does live around here. So I guess they were hoping for a donation.
Kid’s house?
Just down the road is this relatively small horse barn. I always look over at it as I head into town. There are three really big horses that live here, and I look to see if they are out and about. The other day all three were lined up in front of their barn and today I was hoping they’d be doing that again. Not so lucky today. Still, it’s a cute little barn and at least a couple of the residents hung out for me long enough to snap this.
Horse house.
You can see other people’s interpretations of “buildings” over at Cee’s original post.
I think another fun way to approach this challenge would be to head into the city. There are some interesting buildings there, but time is fleeting and I don’t think I’ll get down there soon enough. What buildings do you have around you that would convert to black and white and retain their interest? Share them with us!
Thanks Cee!
A place
Sun sets on another magical day.
What is it about a place? What is it that imprints a place on your heart? What makes a place feel like home whenever you’re there, even if it isn’t?
Sand ripples in rose light.
Are there places that put a magic spell over you? That cling to you when it’s time to leave, begging you not to go?
Wide expanse of beautiful.
Can you only have one special place like this? Or can a person have these feelings in more than one? Does everyone have such a place, perhaps hidden in their heart?
Happy little wave.
And who among us is lucky enough to live in that place that tugs at their heart? For a few months or even full time?
Orchards resting until spring.
I’ve spent two weeks in one of my special places, way up in the tip of Michigan’s little finger.
Used to be a working farm.
But I feel the same sense of belonging, the same tug on my heart when I’m in the Keweenaw Peninsula way way up north. So I know I can love more than one place at a time.
Maybe it’s the peninsula thing. Being on a spit of land surrounded by huge bodies of water. Maybe it’s being far away from a city and city lights.
Celebrating magical places.
Maybe it’s the crisp air, the huge vistas, the wind in the trees and the splash of waves on the beach.
In the shadow of Sleeping Bear.
Maybe it’s just magic. Maybe it doesn’t have to be understood.
Mountains of fun.
Maybe it just is.
The magic begins in nature.
Night Light
Heather’s photography always makes me smile. Sometimes gasp. And I’ve been especially intrigued by her night photography. Some of you have seen her work. If you haven’t hop over to her website. I think you will be amazed.
I don’t know anything about pointing my camera into the night sky. But I’ve been up north for awhile, away from the city lights, and I’ve been waiting to experiment. Two weeks I’ve been waiting.
Monday night, my last night here, I took the garbage can out to the road and glanced up. I stopped in my tracks. There were stars up there. Finally a clear night!
Low dunes, clouds on the horizon and maybe a plane. Oh..and stars.
I read a few articles while I was at the lake, sorting out manual settings on the camera, though I still have a lot of things to learn about how to choose shutter speed, ISO and apertures. Monday evening, once I realized I had one night to try this, I watched a short video about camera settings and star shooting. Sitting in the warm living room I adjusted the settings on my camera and then took it and the tripod down the dark snow covered stairs to the beach.
I left the lights on in the house, hoping I could play around with a house shot, stars above. I haven’t figured it all out yet, and there was too much light. I got an odd sort of image, but in the process I learned a lot. I especially learned I should have brought a flashlight down with me. Using my cell phone to light up buttons on a camera works, but it’s not great.
I messed around with trying to do the house for awhile. Then I pointed the camera straight up at the night sky. Another thing I learned is it would have been a lot warmer to practice what all the tripod levers and knobs did while I was in the house rather than out on the beach. Live and learn. Right?
I think this is the milky way. It was obvious to me looking up at the sky…not so obvious in the shot.
Maybe the milky way. Maybe just a bunch of stars.
I had the ISO up as high as it would go, and the aperture open as far as it would go, and the shutter speed at 30 seconds. I think that’s as wide open as I can get this camera. But I’ll read more and see.
These shots aren’t anything that I really like, but I learned a ton. Now I have to learn how to get rid of the red cast. And oh so much more.
And even though it was only 9 degrees out there I was never cold, protected as I was behind a low dune, with no wind, and the sound of gentle waves lapping at the beach below me. In fact it was sort of pleasant.
Two chairs on the beach. One of my favorite subjects to shoot.
Maybe I wasn’t cold because I was busy doing something that fascinates me, something that I love, something that I plan on learning a whole lot more about.
Next time you’re somewhere in the dark take a venture outside, regardless of the temperature. It’s pretty amazing. Even if you don’t end up with fine art, it’s pretty amazing.
Orion’s belt is caught in the tree branches.
Like a shark
Up out of the warm darkness that is sleep you reluctantly emerge. One eye cracked open you see the triangle of an ear on the other side of a pile of pillows. It’s slowly moving toward you. The music of “Jaws” begins to waft through your sleep deprived brain.
The soft weight of the resident shark settles on your chest and then sneezes into your face.
Feed me.
Good morning Lydia.
Change Is Hard 