Well, this was Heid's theme and I have to say when I got I was not so enthusiastic - but I felt better when even Heid's said she thought it was a kak theme although I wouldn't have gone that far. She said she had hopes of dragging her girls down to the harbour and taking pics of oil tankers and the big lift trucks and the containers and the workers, but they had a hideous wind storm for the last week and have pretty much stayed couped up indoors. So she improvised and captured her new "work" .. so that has been the inspiration behind her pic.
I like it! Nice job - through the lens, through the eyes, eyes are windows to the soul, photography is a soulful past time . . .
I just couldn't bring myself to photograph more of my work than I already do for my South Shore Organics facebook page, so I had to find inspiration elsewhere and this week I went looking for it. Sort of. Remember I told you about our swan? Who is sitting on a nest making cygnets and earning jewellery? Well, here she is:
Not the best photo, but I didn't want to get too close and it was misty and raining and WINDY too (not just in New Zealand Heid's, did you see the news about our tornado's? 187 of them in one day thank you very much! Poor Alabama, Tennessee, Georgia - in fact, the southern half of the eastern seaboard seems to have been hard hit). Back to my picture. I chose her because she has not budged since she laid the eggs, you can go past her any time night or day and she is ALWAYS there. That's WORK if you ask me, but then, ask any mother and she will tell you that children are hard work - there is no down time, no 'off duty' sign you can put up like a cab driver (although, that's not a bad idea!). Regardless of how tired you are, you will still get up to answer the whimpers of a sick child, or wake up early to finish a science project . . . and here is this beautiful lady, sitting on hard round eggs for WEEKS for her progeny. Is this mother nature or a nurturing mother? I think raising young can only be a labor of love, so the answer to that old question is nurture for sure! Sorry, what did you say? Where is the expectant dad? I am happy to report he is not out drinking with the boys, but rather hovering and foraging . . . isn't he a handsome fellow? You can see how she got into this mess, I mean, nest.
And speaking of dad's, one of my other ideas for this week was to catch Mark hard at work:
Our first barbie/bbq/braai for the season! The weather finally broke - YIPPEE! And last photo for this blog, just so that you can see that I do actually work for a living, here is our van loaded up to go:
This was not taken this week, it is from a few weeks ago (there is still snow on the ground) but I attended a women's business network breakfast this morning, and a motivation speaker gave us permission to break the rules! Since I didn't author the rule book and I don't know the person who did (do you?) I have decided she is right, that I should work on my own rule book, and who knows, maybe I'll get published!
I chose the topic - this week, again, all these visions of a super-wrinkly person National Geographic like photo filled my mind, or, or, or - an age old tree! Gasp, OLD SHOES! Old buildings, old cars, old hands, old clothes, old farm tools - and listen, I live in a 300-400 year old city, I am surrounded by old! Of course, all of these ideas actually required me to dedicate something very precious: time. HA! That was never going to happen! My sister did a great job, she said: "The topic pushed me to look into our local history of Taranaki, and it was actually quite interesting. But like any other place the world over the prominent story is one of war and violence ... ! I went to St Mary's Cathedral which homes the graveyard for fallen hero's of Taranaki, so lots of memorial stones, there was even one honouring Taranaki's fallen troopers in the South African war (as it reads) but the one that sparks my curiosity the most is the one in the pic, in amongst all these gravestones outlining the plight of the individuals is this weathered old cross, no engravings, nothing. I can't help but wonder who it belongs to and if anyone knows and why doesn't he or she have their name mentioned. How sad it makes me feel." Here is her pic . . .
We have quite a few really old graveyards in Boston and in the surrounding towns. I used to spend my lunch break when I worked in Boston visiting some of them, I used to love reading the inscriptions - they gave me more of a sense of what life was like, how long people lived, how many kids they had (and whether they had a sense of humor) than anything else since I have arrived. One guy is buried next to his mistress while his wife lies on the other side of the graveyard - another gentlemen paid for all his servants and their families to be buried in the same graveyard as the rest of his family - a graveyard of stature. There are headstones for children who died of what are considered curable diseases today, and the average life expectancy seems to be around 40 years. Graveyards tell stories, and sometimes they give you the opportunity to create your own.
I did pretty well I think, as usual, I was on the run this week and so I brought my camera with me and had to snap at whatever I could, no time to go searching for old hands or trees that's for sure, but I still achieved my target - here I got an old man and an old car at the same time!:
And here is an old building:
This is a three storey building in Boston, they dug out earth floor basements or cellars and lined the walls with stone and concrete, then built brick on top. The actual building looks like it is only JUST standing, I will take a photo of the whole thing sometime, I just liked the red, brick, black, grey and green. Then, I got a picture of an old road - this is especially for you South Africans who think you are the only ones with potholes and patches on the patches! I counted eight different colors of tar . . . (yes I know, I am counting tar colors, I can't be normal!)
This is a road in Quincy that I have to bounce down, not drive down, to deliver a veggie basket, I have to go slooooowwwwwlllyyyyyyy lest I bruise my plums! And finally, this one is for Ryan who loved the 'wall art' in the bottom left corner - and yes, it is on an old building so it qualifies . . .
After that, there is nothing left for me to say. I bid ye farewell, goode tidings and goode night. Tag Heids, you're it! Theme for next week please . . .
My blessed sister, who is up at the crack of dawn each morning - literally - captured a 'new day' in her photo:
The lucky lady has this view every morning from just about every window in the house. She says she goes about prioritizing her day as the sun peeks over the horizon and calls all the roosters to crow and the people to rise, adding NEW things to her to-do list and carrying over old ones. It is a nice sentiment - I start most of my days half way around the world with a list as well . . .
My photo this week is of my birthday present, a NEW bicycle. I have wanted a bike for a while now but really wasn't fussed about what bicycle I got, looking for something second hand that no longer served any purpose with its previous owner - that was, until I saw this baby. Isn't she beautiful? Her name is Sunshine, and I do love her so:
Of course, we all know I am OCD and can't add just one photo to this blog, the point is to share right? So I took my new bicycle around the pond and thought I would snap at anything I see that's new and include it too - I was hoping the swan sitting on her eggs would have some cygnets to show for her work (no, not gemstones, baby swans!!! although she deserves jewelry, she has been sitting there forever! Rain, sleet, sun - it matters not, what a good mom!). Baby swans are new. Alas, she is still earning her jewelry, no babies yet. I did find this sign of spring, sorry it's blurry but it turns out it's kinda hard to take photos and ride a bike at the same time:
I also found this and it's new - I guess he didn't want the woodsmen to come hack up his tree. As my mom can testify, we are surrounded by hundreds of acres of natural forest and wood companies send teams out to retrieve fallen trees after the winter to cut up and dry for sale the next winter for people to heat their homes. It is a great service because it reduces the fire hazard in the forests, but I guess they can be a nuisance if you are tree territorial:
I also met a new neighbor who was out gardening and watching curiously as a woman cycling by on a yellow and blue bicycle stopped to photograph a fallen tree. Her name is Penny, she seems very sweet but I couldn't photograph her, somehow 'can I take a photo of you for the internet' doesn't seem to be a good neighborly introduction so I restrained myself. I know! Can you believe it? I must be growing up!
When I returned to our house, I saw our daffodils have emerged as well - another sign of spring. Most signs of spring seem to be yellow - anyone ever notice that?
Aren't they pretty? So that is my 'new' this week. It was fun! I choose the theme for next week and by then, this post will be old news!
I chose the theme for this week - play. It's funny that every week since we started I chose a theme with some specific ideas and not once has it translated yet into the actual photo I publish! Heid's seemed to get it right - this was her idea and voila: photo of the international symbol for play. I like it, its a good translation of the topic and it's original.
I wanted to do something musical. I have a friend who is an incredibly talented pianist and I took a bunch of photos for her last year for her website - you can visit her here to see the pics and hear her beautiful soulful music http://tammyemersonreid.com/. I also had an idea from a movie I watched and I took the photo and realized that the interpretation was a stretch so didn't pick it for my choice for the week. The movie, As It Was In Heaven, is an international movie with subtitles about an incredibly talented conductor who is diagnosed with a heart problem and retires back to his rink-a-dink home town where he is roped into conducting the local choir. I love the movie, it is one of my favorites and the opening scene is of the conductor as a young boy in a wheat field listening to the wind moving through the grass and playing a violin and he speaks about inspiration being all around us, and how he tries to translate what he hears and feels by 'taking the music down' onto paper. So here is my grass photo - you can see why it didn't make the cut!
Here is one of the songs from the sound track for the movie titled 'Winter Landscape', it is so gentle don't you think?
Finally, here is my photo for the week - as you can see, my inspiration was entirely musical and the result? Not a note insight! But I was meeting a farmer coming in from Western Mass to pick up produce (he is very committed to providing less advantaged communities with access to nutritious organic produce and so runs a delivery program in this very densely populated area using a local bicycle service - it's great initiative!) and I saw this sign and snapped away. It is very sad that these kids really do live in a concrete jungle, just to the right of the sign is a parking lot and there is not a blade of grass in sight - anywhere. It makes me realize how fortunate our children are to have access to a big big garden, a pond accross the way, and a big forrest behind them. Without even crossing country borders it is incredible to think how diverse your upbringing could be if you lived 30 miles apart.
That's it from me this week - still waiting on Heids for next weeks topic so can't give you any clues this time round . . . you will just have to check in next Thursday (or Friday if you live in New Zealand and are 16 hours ahead of us)!
