PHASE 1 HOOPLA

This week's been crazy. Our phase 1 final project is due and I've been driving myself nuts thinking about it. Besides trying to figure out how to successfully create these crazy ideas in my head, I've been posing for people every day.  Day's begin at 5 and end at 1..or 2..or 3AM. PLUS it's daylight savings time so by the time we're out of school...the sun's gone. haha. It's weird working in the dark. It's alright. I've printed two pictures that I'm really happy about and I have shoots lined up this weekend. It's all going to be over on Monday. I can't wait. It's going to feel soooo good to finally pass all 10 images in the morning. Anyway, I'm just home for a little bit.. and then it's back to school for me. I'm so glad the labs are open til 11pm!

Besides work.. here's a picture that I did last weekend. I loove the idea but it needs some fine tuning. Hopefully on Saturday I can reshoot it when the sun comes out. It's been cloudy alll day. 


Dakota under a Tree

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Thanks J. This made my stressful day bearable.

Wait 

by Galway Kinnell

Wait, for now.
Distrust everything, if you have to.
But trust the hours. Haven’t they
carried you everywhere, up to now?
Personal events will become interesting again.
Hair will become interesting.
Pain will become interesting.
Buds that open out of season will become lovely again.
Second-hand gloves will become lovely again,
their memories are what give them
the need for other hands. And the desolation
of lovers is the same: that enormous emptiness
carved out of such tiny beings as we are
asks to be filled; the need
for the new love is faithfulness to the old.

Wait.
Don’t go too early.
You’re tired. But everyone’s tired.
But no one is tired enough.
Only wait a while and listen.
Music of hair,
Music of pain,
music of looms weaving all our loves again.
Be there to hear it, it will be the only time,
most of all to hear,
the flute of your whole existence,
rehearsed by the sorrows, play itself into total exhaustion.

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It HAS to be a better day.

Morning Playlist
1. Heartbeats- Jose Gonzalez
2. Mad World- Gary Jules
3. November- Azure Ray
4. If you want me- Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova
5. Closer- Joshua Radin
6. Faded from the Winter- Iron and Wine
7. Say Yes- Elliot Smith
8. Outloud- Dispatch
9. Colorblind- Counting Crows
10. Brand New Day- Joshua Radin

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Something in Nothing.

We pass each other unknowingly, floating timelessly. The ocean is icy on my side and lukewarm on yours. It is impossible to hear you, only because our ears are filled with the sound of water. It muffles what we refuse to accept--that we need to live and die over and over again. To be honest, recycling does take its toll. It'll never be the same. Sometimes I don't know if I am recreating wave after troubled wave or if it extends beyond me and I am just a ripple on the surface of an existing current. Let's remain here, carried by a train of thought, for there is no need for translation in this state of movement and stillness. (Although silence can mean many things.) Arms stretched out, the years rush by between us and I forget to age. I am stranded reveling in your youth. I give up all my shapes and any form of desire to be tangible. I have no need for it to be part of this moment or these little deaths. It will always be a 'yes.' And nothing is lost, for now I am water--yielding water, that continues to crash and survive the shore. 

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Beth Reynolds and Documentary Photography

A lot of this work deals with courage. I'm not sure if I have that in me. And every day I find myself close to tears when I look at people's photographs. I've never been so moved by something. Every story is always more than it is simply because they compel me to be a better observer of the world. I am constantly astounded by the way captured human emotion surpasses the constraints of time and age--how I am able to share this feeling of depth and explosiveness within me with every person who has seen these pictures. These are the times when I feel like photography is not so much a thievery of souls but a preservation of it.

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Movie Night!

Aww maaan. It was depressing for me for some reason! A couple of parts were funny but most of it was just kind of almost there. It was so strange.

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Worrying.

I spoke too soon about sleep. I'm wide awake and it's 1 AM.

Grandma doesn't seem to be in good shape and that makes me very upset. I've never met such a strong, vivacious, and absolutely brilliant grandmother/woman in my whole life. At 80, she has preserved her sense of humor, which says a lot about her. I hope Tita C. can keep it together. I know she needs me. Age is taking her away from us, like termites eating away the finest oak. If things get worse, I'm definitely going back down to NJ this weekend.

I wish there was more time.

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For L.

I guess sometimes having your laptop in front of you isn't the best time to think and write. For me, it happens most in the car or on a train, something with it's own movement and I'm just there for the ride. Life fades into day and then into night--into sleepless tunnels and tunnels of shadow. I can't help but watch everybody move with it while I'm standing still...like I'm part of the world revolving around itself and I am carrying their weight on my palms.

It's terribly lonely watching people. Light flashes and for an instant I see clearly. Then it's darkness again. I can barely make out the shapes. Is it a yes or is it a no. I grip my camera tightly. It's all I know right now.

It seems like I'm getting more sleep these days but only because I'm tired and I don't want to acknowledge my thoughts constantly. I'm trying my best to keep things on a tight leash lest my thoughts and sanity run away from me. There's so much to look forward to in school and that's probably why these thoughts were born. Don't get me wrong. If you came up to me and asked me if I was happy, I'd truthfully answer 'yes.' And if you asked me, are you content? To be perfectly honest, (I regret to say this) I feel like I am. Not content with my work but content to do this for the rest of my life. Sadness comes and goes. I think the more appropriate term would be 'nostalgia.' I am nostalgic for what was and for what will never be.

What have I been thinking that I'd rather not? The future, I suppose. It's stressful--trying to orchestrate this great love story that needs to survive a mere 10 months. Nothing is happening to "us" but everything is happening to us. I don't want to fall into the widening cracks, into the spaces between words and sighs. My heart seems like it's in constant disrepair, forcing itself open to love something other than him.

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Useful wings.

There are so many other paths to self-discovery but I had to do it by leaving. I had to leave to live. From betrayal to betrayal, I choose to be true to myself.

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It's all about Soul.

If rain had a sound, it would sound like them.

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New York, I love you more.

My heart belongs to this city where imagination is kept alive on the streets.

Outside is the fire escape. We need escapes for everything, not only fire. Betrayal is constantly at our heels.

On land, these are your limitations, Sailor. Where is your boat? Let's leave first thing tomorrow and float for a century.

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New York, I love you.

This is C. Life draws itself around her and beyond her. But she doesn't know it yet. At 18, she's almost 25. She bridges our age gap with art and laughter. I think her laugh is one of the best that I've ever heard. 

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Pictures of The Floating World

A world where our simple lives

Bleed into simple lines,

Which knows

Neither sadness nor joy,

Neither denial nor fulfillment,

But knows beauty—

Knows only beauty.

-Reul S. De Vera






This is David Turner. Check out his work! It's because of people like him that people like me strive to become better every day.

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Rilke on Love and and Other Difficulties

If only we arrange our life according
to that principle which counsels us
that we must always hold to the difficult,
then that which now still seems to us
the most alien become what we
most trust and find most faithful.

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