I went to the faire

Decided to challenge myself this year and only take pictures with a cell phone camera.  One guy kidded me and said I needed to buy a bigger camera! 

People took less notice of me with a ell phone in my hand than with my regular camera.  I felt safer and  invisible.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Relationships with my children

Funny that it was not until recently that I started thinking about and examining how relationships are built.  I find it hard to have strong lasting relationships.  My personality has sharp edges.  Sooner rather than later I am probably going to just piss you off.  I don't intend to be edgy and difficult.  I just am.  Post-menopause certainly doesn't help my lack of a warm and fuzzy disposition.  One thing I have come to understand is that in order to have good relationships with others, I have to work at it since it doesn't come naturally for me. 

One of my sons just returned home from New Zealand after serving as an expatriate for three years.  Our family chatter is currently revolving around his relationships.  It is this talk about his relationships that has prodded me to take a stark look at my own relationships and especially  with my children.  Since my three sons were born in 1979 and 1980, I have made it my quest to try and have good relationships with them.  I was great when they were little.  I sucked when they were teenagers and I am trying hard with them as adults.  I like them and I enjoy spending time around them.  I want them to feel welcome and want to come home now and then. It is important to me that they know they have a mom who loves and accepts them as they are at this moment in time.

They are all great story tellers since they have been out to see the world and have lived to come back and tell about it.  They have good souls and are kind and generous.  All three have their trials and tribulations and struggle with life in different ways.  They are good men and I am proud to be their mother.

We kid a lot about them taking care of me when I get old and unable to care for myself.  I make them promise to give me ice cream.  I've thought about this since I was little. My mother was cruel, unkind and unfeeling toward me.  I remember as a small child telling her that she would regret being so mean spirited when she grew old.  We were not on speaking terms when she died.  She had burned her mother card many years before she grew feeble.  I didn't have much training on how to be a good mother so I've had to improvise along the way with my own children.  I've stumbled many times and I've had to apologize and ask for forgiveness along the way.  I wish I could have guided them better.  I wish I had more words of wisdom to offer them.  I've found that I am not all that wise.  I don't have any money to offer to make their lives easier and more comfortable.  I am not rich. I often have to stand by and watch as they suffer in life with little help to offer except I am there if they need me.  I hope it is enough.

I have found that with each conversation we have, our understanding of one another is a little richer for having taken the time to talk and to listen.  I've noticed that when I offer my hand to help them in whatever way that I can, the trust between us is a little stronger.  When I respect them as human beings and accept them as they are that they seem to reflect back that respect to me.  I am a true believer that respect is not given but earned and it takes a whole heck of a lot of work to earn it.  Respect is when you have a deep admiration for someone.  How can a child have a deep admiration for a parent if that parent is always unkind to them, if that parent takes every opportunity to tear them down or is always wanting the child to be something different?  If the parent doesn't respect and admire the child, how can the child respect and admire the parent?  It is a path that has to go both ways. 

They are in their 30's and I'm in my 50's.  I still look at them and wonder how they will be as they grow older and if all will be OK.  I trust it will.

 

Yesterday, David and I piled into the car and headed north with no idea where we were going. David thought it might be fun to have one last trip before school started. Through twists and turns we ended up at Crater of Diamonds State Park in Murfreesboro, Arkansas.  I think it is the only place in the world that is open to the public to mine diamonds.

We spent a wonderful afternoon playing in the dirt and hoping to hit the jack pot and come home diamond millionaires.  We didn't find a diamond but we did come home with a bag of wet dirt.
I don't think I've had as much fun playing in the sand and picking out rocks since I was five.  Turns out, David had a great idea.  We came home with our shoes filled with sand, happy hearts and slightly sun-kissed faces.

 

 

 

 Note to self:  Next time put a hat in the car just in case and remember your glasses if you are looking for tiny pieces of diamonds in a huge field of dirt.

Playing with Instagram

 

 

 

 

 

 

Instagram is a fun little app that can yield some suprising results from a camera phone.  I've not played with it very much.  I've also downloaded Pixlromatic and Oggl but I haven't played with them at all yet.  Seems as if learning new programs and apps is a never ending challenge. 

A few more landscapes from the West

Ranch off Allred Road in Yoakum County

Cemetery in Plains, Yoakum County, Texas

 

Old house just outside Lubbock, Texas

 

 

 

 

 

Taken with my iPhone

Let's face it.  Photographers are snobs about their cameras.  If you can rattle off lens apertures and names like Hasselblad, Canon and Nikon you can join the cool club.  Although I am not a formal member of the club, I can speak the language. But what about the iPhone?  I'll admit I was skeptical at first of photographs taken with a camera phone.  However, I think I am now going over to the dark side.

I've had a blast learning how to use the iPhone.  I have a long way to go before I have it mastered but I'm having a lot of fun learning.

 

Balloon over Snowmass

While I was in Snowmass Village I got up before dawn to see what I could find to photograph.  This was a much more difficult task than I anticipated due to so much development in the area.  A ballon loaded with sight seers came right over my head.  Everyone waved and said good morning.  What a nice suprise.  If I ever get to go back, I think that riding a hot air balloon would be the way to go and see the sights.

 

Dog Days of July

Our group of photographers at the workshop in Aspen fanned out among the crowd on the 4th of July to take pictures of our choice.  Guess being from a small town, I had never seen so many people with their dogs and so many different types of dogs.  My choice was to do informal portraits of the dogs.  I think I identified most with them.  It was hot.  I didn't want to be in the hot sun at noon and I was tired.  Actually, the dogs paid more attention to me than the people.

This little guy had an attitude.

In ecstasy with the scratching.

Where was his beer?

 

Some dogs showed me their best side!