365 Photo Project - Day 222

Taken: August 10, 2010

Location: Healdsburg, CA

Late-afternoon August sunset off the porch of my house in Healdsburg. This is one image I didn't edit at all. I imported into Photoshop and played around with it but I kept going back to the original. I know it's far from perfect but I like it. 

365 Photo Project - Day 195

Taken: July 14, 2010

Location: Healdsburg, Ca

365 Photo Project - Day 171

Taken: June 20, 2010, sunset
Location: Healdsburg, Ca.

We're having a series of lovely, lovely sunsets. I might have more in the next few days. Sorry for the upload and run but like I said yesterday, I'm trying to get caught up.

365 Photo Project - Day 154

Taken: June 3, 2010, 7:30 p.m.
Location: Healdsburg, Ca

Some days I sit at my desk in my office and almost never get up for anything but a bathroom break. Because my office is on the second floor and has no windows, I often lose track of time. When I do finally get up to leave, the sun is gone and my picture-taking window has shrunken considerably.

That happened to me today. I realized time was running out on light and while I eventually got out to shoot some stuff in outside, it was overcast and rainy and nothing good came out of it. I was catching up on some TV shows I have to watch (being a TV writer and all) and thought I'd play around with lighting in my office. This was the result. I used a white background and my camera's internal flash and lit from overhead and behind the object with some halogen desk lamps.

Can anyone guess what this is?

365 Photo Project - Day 133

Taken: May 13, 2010, 11:30 a.m.
Location: Healdsburg, CA

No less than seven women that I know are expecting. Little Serafina above is the first of them to arrive - she's but seven days old in this photo. You might remember I snapped a photo of her mom Dawnelise very early in this project (Day 8).

I don't have children and I'm now at that age where considering it is fanciful. I don't know why the motherhood bug never hit me. I mean I used to think the idea of having a baby would one day be too overwhelming to ignore, but the feeling has never lasted longer than a passing moment and even then it's never felt very real.

I don't feel bad or guilty either. Some women are meant to be moms and I'm just not one of them.

I shudder that this makes me the crazy aunt, godmother -- the woman with the pugs. Ironically, I'm great with kids. I love my three nieces and my nephew and I'm close to a couple of my friends' kids. I love to share in their discoveries of the world. Maybe that's because I'm a big kid myself.

One day I suspect I'll find myself teaching somewhere, but until then I'll just live vicariously through my friends and siblings, doling out wisdom, advice and proper hitting technique to their little ones.

You know, "crazy aunt" doesn't sound that bad after all. Maybe I'll make that my next tattoo.

365 Photo Project - Day 126

Taken: May 6, 2010, 1 p.m.
Location: Healdsburg, Ca

Here's the bridge I used to have to cross every time I went into central Healdsburg, It spans the much more modest Dry Creek River north of town and is only narrow enough to let one car pass. I used a shot I took from this bridge earlier in this project but this is the first time I'm using one of it.

When my husband and I sold our house in Santa Monica and decided to move up to Healdsburg, it was me who was sent on the task of checking out the house we wanted to rent, meeting the landlord and such. When I drove out to the place and had to cross this bridge, I knew immediately this was the place for me. I grew up in a relatively small town but have lived 90 percent of my adult life in or near big cities so it came as a bit of surprise how quickly I fell in love with this place.

A lot of it started when I crossed Dry Creek here on a beautiful October afternoon, the expanse of the just-picked vineyards spreading out in every direction. I remember friends would ask me how long it took to get used to living in the country and there really was no adjustment, passed getting used to real darkness at night and a place where the sounds that dominate aren't car wheels on pavement and the buzz of phone lines.

To this day, as readers of this blog know well, I haven't grown tired of the view. It feels as much like home as it did the day I drove over this little bridge.

365 Photo Project - Day 80

Taken: March 21, 2010, approx. 3:30 p.m.
Location: Healdsburg, Ca

Pretty much everyone who knows me, knows I'm not a morning person. I usually rise between 10 and 11 a.m. and by the time I get my shit together and get out the door, it's at least noon. I usually don't get down to the nitty gritty of writing until after one, but I've always done my best writing late in the day. If I could stay up, writing all night long would be okay by me.

I usually knock off around seven; By the time I'm driving up my road it's nearly dark. The place we rent is at the end of a dead end road, which narrows and winds a short way up to end at a local vineyard. We're the last driveway on the left, just before the vineyard's wrought iron gate, and the last few hundred yards is a moderately bumpy up-hill paved single-lane, shaded by oak trees and lined by a wooden fence on one side and rich foliage on the other.

Just before I get to where the road narrows -- at a line of rural mailboxes at the bottom of the hill --  I usually pop my clutch into first for the ride up. For the last several weeks, just as I've started to downshift, a rabbit has appeared at the side of the road. It shows itself in the beam of my headlights, almost always on the right side, waits to make sure I'm not going to run it down and then hops across the road in front of my car, taking one last look in my direction before disappearing into my neighbor's vineyards.

I'm getting used to seeing my rabbit. I always slow down and wait for him and so far, he hasn't failed to show. I don't know if he's on his own schedule or if he's waiting for me, or if he's got a watch in his pocket and a date with a hole in the ground and a girl named Alice. I don't know if it's a good sign or even a sign at all, but there's something about seeing him that comforts me.

My Mom had her own rabbit once. We have a modest summer place in New England and my folks spend summers there now. Like here, there's a short walk to the mailbox and one day one recent summer,  a rabbit appeared and followed her to the mailbox. The next day, he was there again. And the next day after that, until my Mom felt her daily walk for the mail wasn't complete without her rabbit.

I'm starting to feel the same way, that my drive home each evening isn't complete until my rabbit appears in my high-beams. I like having my rabbit. My buddy, shadow, my omen, my vestige.

Or maybe I'm his?

Spring is here and the Russian River is ready for the river rats with their canoes and kayaks.  There's a canoe rental place at the foot of my favorite local bridge (the one y'all now know so well) and they're getting everything ready. I didn't get out on the river last summer but I'm planning on going this year for sure. On my way home tonight, I stopped to shoot this stack of canoes. I used my K100D and edited it in Photoshop.

365 Photo Project - Day 64

Taken: March 5, 2010, approx. 1:15 p.m.
Location: Healdsburg, Ca

I did get out today but only to circle around the wrap-around porch which is to say I didn't get out, not really. I blame it on not getting enough sleep last night due to the onset of a nasty case of heartburn. I swear there's nothing like bad indigestion to turn your dreams into surreal dreamscapes.

The woman who owns this property made a conscious decision to keep the landscape wild, a kind of anti-vineyard view. Instead of acres of neatly-arranged grape vines we have wild grasses, moss-covered oaks, rolling hillside, metal gates and fire roads -- cattle grazing country. My husband fell in love with the view when he found this place last year and it's easy to see why. There is a wonderful sereneness to this place that makes you feel the need to whisper in its presence.

Such a nice change of scenery from the typical wine country landscape -- not that I'm knocking that. This was shot with my K100D and a 200m lens. I played around with it in Photoshop, trying for a dreamy quality in part because that's how I felt all day, walking around in my lack-of-sleep fog. Nothing a good eight hours of shut-eye won't cure.

Tomorrow's another day.

365 Photo Project - Day 48

Taken: February 17, 2010, approx. 2 p.m.

Location: Dry Creek Road, Healdsburg, CA

Today's my birthday. Anybody who knows me knows I love birthdays. And right now I'm in the middle of celebrating my day so this post is gonna be short and sweet.  I believe in making a big deal on your birthday. Hell, if you think about it, no matter how old you are, you've beaten some crazy odds to even being here. Getting older, like it or not, is the reward. Consider the opposite and you'll understand what I mean. So take it from me, live it like you mean it. In other words, follow your bliss y'all. 

Took another drive out Dry Creek Road today. It was such a beautiful day -- my temp gage in the car hit 77 degrees. Not bad for a non-tropical locale in the middle of February. 

I believe that's mustard seed growing in between the vines. I'm told it helps keep the ground fertile while the vines get everything they need to grow them there grapes when the time comes. 

Shot this with my K100 and edited in Photoshop. 

365 Photo Project - Day 47

Taken: February 16, 2010,  6 p.m.
Location: Westside Road, Healdsburg, Ca

Since I was a kid and spent hours in my Dad's cramped darkroom developing and manipulating black and white photographs, I've been trying to figure out the magic of taking pictures. I'm attracted to landscapes and architectural shapes (and in recent years pugs, I say with a smile), but I'm mostly fascinated by light, particularly fading light. Mostly, it's a struggle for me to figure out how to take a good photo in the absence of said light. I could study on it I suppose but I try not to forget that my job by day is to write and taking a class is a luxury I don't have right now.

I find lots of help online and in books, but the ins and outs of aperture and exposure, of lenses and focal points, well most of that is pretty much lost on me. I know the bigger the lens opening, the more light goes in and longer shutter times are better at night. But like I said, I'm still figuring it all out.

Had to do a bit of running around today and on the way back from having my beloved ride repaired (oh no, I'm gonna need an $800 radiator repair soon!) I drove some backroads, looking for a new vantage point for this project.

I stopped along Westside Road near a long, wide open stretch of vineyard, next to a barn I've always admired. It's rusty red roof and white clapboard siding speaks of days past to me. It's part of the appeal of wine country -- the old stuff isn't built to be old, it actually is old. Not that I have any idea when this barn was built. Still, it's faded side paint and lovely winding driveway are picturesque, especially when you consider where it's sitting - right at the tip of a wide expansive of vineyard, framed by mountains way in the distance. My shot is grainy and out of focus and underexposed and no amount of work in Photoshop gave me exactly the affect I wanted. But I'll have to live with the result.

You might ask then: if I don't have time for this photography thing, why do it at all? It's a question I get asked all the time these days. It's a lot of work making sure I get one good photo a day. But it's the journey that's fueling this project.

My love of photography aside, I'm doing this for another reason. I want to look up, to pay attention to the world around me. That's why I didn't want to get caught up searching for shots -- if I concentrate on just getting what's near me, then most of the time I'm going to have to try to see the same things in a different way each day. I was hoping it would translate into my writing but I had no idea that it would be so pervasive.  The observations I'm making in my physical world is seeping into my fictional one. I'm looking around the edges more, going deeper, investigating avenues I didn't know (or remember) were even there. Scary and fun all at the same time.

Like I said yesterday, you can be writing when you're not actually putting words on paper. I don't see how you can separate the creative process from the creator -- for your work to be authentic, it has to come from the whole you, even the places you don't necessarily want to go.  Often, those are those are exactly where you mine the most interesting things. So my project, my attempt to see more of my world is helping me find more of myself as a writer. Whether it's making me better at my craft, well only the results will tell. I'd be lying if I said it wasn't kinda fun figuring it all out.

Taken with my K100D, using a tripod and manual setting. Edited with Photoshop.

365 Photo Project - Day 45

Taken: February 14, 2010, approx. 5:30 p.m.
Location: Healdsburg, CA

I know,  I know. That damned bridge again. But come on. Look at that reflection. I had to shoot it. And hell, I did find a whole new spot to catch it from, so it's not as if I'm going back to the same old places. And anyway, it just seemed the right sort of image for a day devoted to matters of the heart.

I don't like to admit it, but I'm a total sap. One of those people that gets all teary-eyed at the end of great love stories. Not all love stories, mind you. Large-scale epic stories of love and lost and found again often bore me to tears. I know it's sacrilege but I'll take "Americanization of Emily" or "Love Actually" over "Love Story" and "Gone With the Wind" any day. It's not that matters of the heart are a joke, far from it. But I do think we tend to take love way too seriously.

I like the idea that there's only one person for everybody but I don't believe it. I mean come on.  Say you're born in the Bronx and your perfect match is some bushman in the Australian outback. Not likely you're going to be finding each other on Spring Break in Tampa.

The shrinks of this world put their kids through college trying to answer the great questions of love, why we make the choices we make and all the pride and heartache and emotional baggage that goes along with it. I think most people get it right on some level. The older you get, the more at peace you are with the choices you make and the life you end up living. No shame in that. Not at all.

But many others take it too damn personally. Love is heartless really. And you're not going to be spared. Not unless you hole up in a cabin like the Unabomber and rail against the world and everyone in it. Nobody knows why we fall at all or how we can fall in and out of love with the same person, some more than once. There's no real science to the vagaries of the heart, no instruction manual, no universal truths except that it's as unpredictable and crazy as it is wonderful and fulfilling. Nobody knows nothing and anybody who thinks they understand it is a snake oil salesman looking to make a buck off your heart.

I think we spend way too much time finding faults in our partners than looking inward. Love begins in your own heart and your own you. I mean it's impossible to commit to another person if you don't love yourself.  The more comfortable you are with yourself, the easier it is to forgive someone else's faults, to walk in their shoes, to be compassionate and forgiving. After all, we are all imperfect, all capable of making big-ass mistakes, of being stupid and hurtful. It's learning from our imperfections that make us better people and I think, easier to live with.

I don't mean to imply I have the answers. God knows my relationship isn't smooth sailing. But here's what I do know: you can't apply logic to love. It's never going to make sense, even when it works, especially when it works. And if you ever think you've figured it all out, take a deep breath and remind yourself you don't have a freaking clue.

Shot this with my K100D and edited in Photoshop.

365 Photo Project - Day Four

Taken: January 4, 2010, approx. 4:20 p.m.
Location: Healdsburg, Ca
I have made a rare New Year's Resolution. Oh sure I make one every year but they're usually nebulously philosophical. Like, "this year I'm going to be a better person." Funny, how that one almost never works. Ah, but this year, I decided to make a real resolution: it's time to improve my general health and wellness. I'm a few pounds too heavy, a few years older and nothing quite works the way it used to. And anyway, I really want to go back to Mets Fantasy Camp  on my next important yet not-to-be-named birthday. I have a few years to get myself back into shape so what the hell - I'm diving right in.

My diet is slowly  being overhauled and I'll talk somewhat about that in the coming weeks. But getting in shape means getting back out on the work-out circuit. Since I live in such a beautiful place, I decided to get out on my bike and ride around a few days a week. See if it changes my perspective -- both internally and externally.

I realize too that it's an excellent way to view the world around me -- what could be better in a year when I'm taking a photo a day? So with "my maps and my faith in the distance," I got out on the road today -- a 40-minute circuit around town -- nothing too heavy -- stopping twice (air in my tire) and to catch up with my friend, Dawnelise, who was working on her garden, this being our first really nice day in weeks. Well she ended up as my victim for today's photo. Dawnelise is one of two dear friends having babies this year -- and I'm really looking forward to living the whole thing vicariously through them.

This was taken with my trusty Pentax D100 on a bright sunny day. I had only one chance to get this shot as my batteries were running dead (ugh) and so I set it on auto. There was great light all day today -- maybe a little harsh and I played with this a bit in Photoshop. I even tried a photo filter but in the end, I'm going with the original -- I like the spur-of-the-moment quality of it. One cool note: Dawnelise is wearing the overalls her mother wore when she was pregnant with her.  How cool is that?