Beta, more

Been a really down day. I struggled terribly to get anything done...on the first full day I've been home on my own, no boys to pick up or tend to, for dang almost two weeks.

But the evening was a big improvement: cooped the chickens up early and went to Betamore to assist my fantastic JS mentor Tom in teaching his front end web dev class. I taught the last hour. And feel like a rejuvenated, renovated human project.

Right now I've been challenged by someone on Facebook to take a black and white photo of my life each day, no people, and tag someone else to do the same. Yesterday was the first day. The photo is the chicken on the kitchen counter with the slime glove. TOday's is the one up top, a grab shot at Betamore. I was thinking of making it more interesting by having a bit of a secret theme - hands. Will have to see how that progresses.

Hen, House

yes, tonight another chicken picture.  i probably need to get out more.  this is honchcrow, the calmest and most toteable of our hens. cole brought her into the kitchen for some reason known only to cole. the glove is also cole's doing. he took a latex glove -- a new and different one! -- and filled this one with a concoction of toothpaste and water in an attempt to make new and improved slime filled ant-headache glove.  or so he says. my theory is he's secretly planning to sneak it into jack's bed and scare the bejeezus out of him...

Skeletons, two ways

what happens when you leave the 14 year old in charge of putting out the halloween decorations. and the 14 year old himself, in a back to back height check; he's been growing like mad but not quite taller than his mama yet.  i've got puffier hair and was standing slightly uphill though...so it's any day now

Chix

Have I mentioned that Cole loves his chickens so much he will no eat chicken?

Cole in the remnants of the small garden patch I had planted in one part of the chicken yard. I had it fenced off for most of the summer, but allowed them in a couple of weeks ago since the basil and squash were pretty much done for, and the tomato plants so Jurassic by this point I figure they could stand some chicken nibbles.

Human 404

Yesterday, I just realized, I never made a photo. A nice slow Sunday around the house, I actually worked through the afternoon, we watched Blade Runner, and I just. Completely. Forgot. to make a photo.

And I *almost* forgot today!  But Coley and I were messing around in the chicken yard and it occurred to me, oh yeah, pictures.

So should I put a reminder in my phone? One of the residual side effects of having Lyme disease is cognitive issues, including focus, mental fog, and difficulty with short-term memory. I jokingly call my phone "my outsourced brain" because I have to put everything in there -- when to renew library books. Remember to take my contact lenses to my optometrist appointment. Etc.

This is important. I wanted it to be something that took on life and weight of its own, but instead I feel like it's slipping away.  So I just set up a daily reminder in my phone: 5:44 pm each day it will ask, did you make a picture yet?

Also I'm not exercising enough. So after the posting is done I'm going to go do the NYT Scientific Seven Minute work out. It's scientific so it has to be good, right? All I really feel capable of these days so it will need to suffice.

Got hand

Today Cole had a vision to fill a latex glove with slime -- that concoction of glue, borax and water that was such a fad hit with last year's 5th graders. He mixed it up himself and even, after a bit of reminding, cleaned up afterward. And has been carrying around the slime glove wherever he goes. He put it on his head because, he told me, it is very soothing. He proffered the slime glove for me to try. I put it on my head. He's right, it is indeed soothing to drape a slime glove across one's face.

Winging it

The view from seat 35A on the way from YVR to ORD at 6:38 am. I like this project because these days, when I see a scene that catches my eye, that tickles that particular visually-oriented fold of my cerebral cortex, instead of noting it and going on with my day I'm pausing to make a picture or two. Under no illusions that I'm creating great art, though that would be nice. It's still all about pushing back the negative thoughts and feelings of being overwhelmed by my current life parameters. About nurturing that small bit of breathing room. That precious, precarious, sacred space within me, that was lost for so long.

One step at a time

I just returned from a humbling experience at the Node.js Interactive conference, a global gathering of über fans of the open source JavaScript runtime. I am very much still a JS beginner, and being around people who are ninjas of this stuff made me feel...well, all kinds of really not-great things. Especially since I was there to write about this conference, covering sessions from some sort of presumed knowledge. I texted my best friend Heather that I felt qualified to be one of the people tidying up the coffee stations outside the lecture rooms rather than one of those sitting inside. But I got through, and had some good conversations and saw some great talks and am generally glad I went.

The photo is from yesterday. Taking a shortcut back to the convention center after lunch (by which I mean 'quick nap in my hotel room' - my mental wellbeing at the conf was not helped by the jet lag) i liked how these stone steps converged, in a waterside park leading down to the harbor.I made others playing with the whole triangle/intersection thing but the one where my boots edged into the frame (on purpose) I like the best. Taking this as a reminder to just keep on keeping on. Even when discouraged. Just got to focus on that next step.

That's no moon

Vancouver Convention Center. Where I spent all day immersed in Node.js deep dives. Still, I noticed this coming in this morning and thought there had to be a photo there...

Ladies

I have long enjoyed the super-sized male/female icons denoting the bathrooms at BWI. I was delighted to see that the Toronto airport also utilizes giant gender cutouts for their rest rooms -- GIANT LADIES PEE HERE.  But was running too hard for my connecting flight for even a potty stop, much less a photo op.  Hopefully on the return trip.

Us chickens

working in the chicken yard in the late evening light, endeavoring to cover the top with netting to keep out the local hawks who keep coming by looking for a chicken dinner...

managed to both make photos and post them all in the same day!

Self

Snugging up the house for the night -- we have entered the time of year when days still hold the memory of summer heat, but nights are slouching toward winter, and windows are adjusted accordingly morn and eve.  Caught sight of my reflection in the glass, liked the tree line and twilight sky outside. I never have figured out how to take a self portrait that does not prominently feature my iphone du jour...

Grand Cru

Got to get righteous with the posting. I remembered to shoot a photo for yesterday, and though this happened pretty late in the evening it is a nice example of a visual situation I would have noticed, but most likely not photographed. Only one shot, and I like it better that I thought I would -- the detail of the other alumninum chairs outside through the framing of the door is pleasing.

Anyway, shot late last night, and by the time I was back near my computer it was after midnight anyway, and I was so exhausted I literally could not see straight.  So here it is, and another one from today to immediately follow.

A small goal for tomorrow: shoot another photo. Post it on the same calendar day.

A certain slant of sun

Made this photo yesterday, I promise. Late afternoon slant of sun and the skeleton of a leaf from the genteel-ly decrepit English walnut tree in the back yard. Then a busy evening and it utterly slipped my mind to post. But here it is.

The phone camera turned the image 180 degrees from how I had it oriented in the camera. I went to correct the rotation but realized I like it better this way. A simple photo. Clean. I like the texture of the concrete pad, the sideways slanting lines in the same orientation of the sun. I will endeavor to orient myself with the sun for a moment or two today.

Further Down the Trail

Cautious optimism about this daily photo habit I've quietly started. Re-started. Re-re-restarted. But one day at a time. Today was very stressful, all day at home dealing with my Apple id getting hacked. Boy does that have lengthy, complicated tendrils into all sorts of unexpected areas of a person's life. On multiple devices -- we are an iFamily, so there were three iPhones, two iPads, two MacBooks and one iMac involved in this fun little rodeo. So, yeah, the past 24 hours have been beyond stressful, and once things were dealt with to the point where everything is hopeful damage-controlled as possible (pause for a moment of intense gratitude for my brother Kevin, who spent hours on the phone with me figuring out exactly what happened, and then what to do about it).

Once things were more or less brought under control, it was late afternoon. I got a small bit of work done, but today feels at last like the first true day of autumn. What better way to release some stress and put myself in the way of some potential photographs than a hike along the Gunpowder?  This was a new trail for me, and I liked it a great deal.

I used to have a rule, in previous photo a day projects, where I could only post one image. This being a new undertaking, I'm thinking why not show multiple images if I like them or have something to say about making them. Like, the fairly un-interesting photo of the trees across the river wasn't working, but as I turned away from that view i happened to point the phone down, and caught sight of the sky and trees reflected at the water's edge -- an image I really like and nearly selected as "the" photo for today.

And the blaze -- the first photo I took upon commencing the hike. To remind myself of my quiet vow that I will hike the Appalachian Trail. Though of course that is the iconic white blaze, not this trail's flashy yellow. But in learning to meditate, which I've been doing recently, you think a great deal about mindfulness, being in the moment. So today's trail today. Om padme mani home.

Good Pluck Cart

I am not totally in love with this image, but I do love how it got made. As in, I was driving home, hustling to get there and start work work working, and saw this cheery yellow shopping cart in the middle of a vast swath of lawn adjoining an apartment complex.  Someone had apparently just rolled it down this hill to come to rest in the middle of this wide field. Unexpected Objects misplaced in the landscape have long been a photographic fascination of mine, and I stopped immediately.  And really tried to get a good shot, despite the terrible flat midday light. After one round of pictures I was hiking back to my car, feeling like I just had not at all gotten an image that captured the absurdity of this shopping cart. And I made myself turn around and try again. Still never really got the photo I feel is there to be made, but I'm happy that I saw this, stopped, tried. Happy that I remembered at all to make a photo today. Will try again tomorrow.

I do sort of like this one. A feeling almost of the shopping cart setting off resolutely to seek its fortune in the great big world. Good luck, plucky little shopping cart!

Pidgey and the Chick

My son Cole adores his chickens. This is his bantam hen, Pidgey, sitting protectively on her two week old chick, Murkrow, in our hay-filled chicken coop. There was another chick, Hummer, who we lost last week in an especially sad and awful way, and it wrenches my heart that I hadn't taken photos of her adorable yellow fuzzball-ness in the short time we were able to enjoy having her with us. So when it occurred to me late this afternoon that I had yet to make a photo today, the thought arose to have a mama hen and chick photo shoot. Because they grow up so fast, as all mamas know.

Hammerman: Summer Persists

It was ninety degrees today, summer persisting deep into September, and the instant school let out for the day the boys and I high-tailed it to Hammerman Beach. This is the point where the Big Gunpowder Falls empties into the Chesapeake Bay, and we have been swimming there since Jack was a baby.  In recent years we'd evolved the tradition of celebrating the last day of school with a trip to Hammerman, but in the disruption of this particularly chaotic summer we missed our last day of school date with the murky waters there.

Happy to have made it there today. Happy to have made some pictures I really like. Tomorrow is another day and I aspire to make another photo and post it here. One day at a time.

The image above was actually one of the very last I made during our several hours lingering in the waves. We had gotten out of the water, dried off, eaten snacks, fed seagulls, and were getting ready to go when the boys begged suddenly to get back in the water. "Please, mam, it's the last day of summer," Jack pleaded. Go, go. When summer calls, go.

The boys spent the majority of the time not exactly swimming...it was more like nonstop wrestling in the water, punctuated by the throwing of fistfuls of silty sand from the bay bottom.

Backyard Wishing

Hello. It's been awhile.

Many things have happened.

Hard things, sad things. Also many many good things. But life has been lived in crisis mode for far too long and I am tired, and -- too often these days -- I do not lift my head, or even my eyes, from the path in front of me. The path of earning a living, keeping body and soul together for me and my boys,  while still chipping away at learning my new profession. The path I fear to lose if my attention wanders even for an instant, because my attention is always needed somewhere to be doing something, working studying tending cooking cleaning driving....

The same life as yours. Obligation and duty and work.

We are lucky to have all of these. But we are also made with a pinch of stardust. I didn't name this blog "Signs and Wonders" for nothing, long ago as that was. I still believe.

Recently I have been feeling the pressing of my load a bit less. A small sliver of space, a blessed bit of existential breathing room, has opened up. I want to put something good there, to hold the space and keep it open within me. So here I am back again, doing something I know how to do -- use my eyes, make pictures -- though I don't often do it these days.

Early this morning I was tromping back from opening up the chicken coop and scattering some cracked corn for the ladies when I saw this dandelion, somehow missed by our assiduous lawn service dudes. I had noticed the flower earlier this week, winking happy and yellow from the summer green grass even as the first autumn leaves began dropping from the pecan tree above.

The light was amazing. I scurried back to the house to retrieve my camera and tried to make the picture that resonated in my heart. The close-mown grass, the slender miracle of this dandelion puff rising above. The golden side-slant first morning sunlight quickly turned hearty and clear and the magic passed, but not before i'd spent time flat on my belly in the dew-wet grass, trying to make the feelingthoughts in my head and heart turn into a photo.

I don't think I got it. This shot, the one I like the best, is actually from my phone. But the thing is, I did it. I tried. For a long time now I haven't had that little bit of grace in me to to spare for something like this. Today I did. Tomorrow I will try again. I hesitate to peg any kind of number here, because I have never completed any 365 project I ever noisily, publicly committed to. Maybe this time we start small. I'll do it again tomorrow.

That is my simple wish on this dandelion: tomorrow. I left it standing there, by the way. Didn't puff on the puff to scatter its seeds to the wind, though that is the traditional dandelion wish technique. Instead I just said thank you, and went into the house to make breakfast.

Thank you, Lord, for this good life, and forgive us if sometimes we do not love it enough.  Making pictures is my way of remembering to pause and be grateful.