A New Leash on Life

May 10, 2016  •  14 Comments

Jeep DogJeep DogSubject is closer than he appears, so is fun, it's just around the corner.

Remember that sweet John Denver song, "Sunshine on My Shoulders?" Having been a member of his fan club when I was 8, I do. I know every verse, every note of not only that song, but most of his. And, go figure, I end up making my life in the Rocky Mountain State. Yeah, now you've got "Rocky Mountain High" stuck in your head, you can sing it out loud, but don't try to hit that high note unless you're all alone.

Springtime in Colorado comes along right about now, second week in May. Donning the year's first tank top, I hook up Cutter's leash and out the door we go for a long walk.

I'm so grateful, not just for the sunshine and warmth, but for Cutter's new lease on life. He is getting up there in years, 14 or 15 is a pretty accurate guess. I don't know for sure because he was "mature" when I sprang him from the pen up in Divide, which is right next door to the county jail, appropriately enough. Right at the top of the hill, a good place to put errant people and dogs, I guess. We've been together for almost six years now. Not nearly long enough.

Arthritis was hitting him hard, slowing him down, taking his Border Collie edge away. He ignored balls rolled his way, choosing sleep over play. I took him to a holistic vet who prescribed massage, acupuncture and muscle relaxants, which sounds like a good prescription for anyone for anything, anytime. We tried three weeks of that and as he worsened, I took him back to his old vet, a horse doctor who put him on some real deal arthritis medication, better living through better chemistry.

He's a new dog, or rather, he's my old dog made new again. The doc rolled Cutter's clock back five years.

I don't know how long I'll have him, but I know I appreciate every minute that I do. While I'm having grateful thoughts, I'm so grateful to be back in business! The new gallery is proving to be a good home for my work and me. My new darkroom is a gem, very functional (translation: I've got some new silver prints to show, come see.)

So, spring moves into summer quickly here, short growing season, even shorter tourist season. If you're headed to Colorado again this summer, be sure to stop in and see the new place, the new work, the old dog. And, on a sunny day, if you see a gal in a tank top being led by a border collie with a bounce in his step, wave, it's probably me and Cutter with John Denver ringing in our ears.


Perspective

September 24, 2015  •  4 Comments

Perspective in photography refers to the dimension of objects and the spatial relationship between them. This definition of perspective leads me to the topic of nerd camp.

It was Summer School for the Gifted Child, nerd camp. That's where I met my oldest friend. We were eight years old, summer after 3rd grade. Sonji and I hit it off right away. We shared a love of Cheetos and Dr. Pepper, it was Texas, after all and until you're old enough to drink beer, you drink Dr. Pepper or iced tea, unsweetened of course. We were both shy nerds, only we were too young to know it, the nerd part, that is.

Nerd camp was fun! Well, relatively speaking, it was way more fun than the previous summer's Vacation Bible School where I learned to make Christian art with dried pasta and bird seed. I made a rooster. It was a Baptist Rhode Island Red. I defended my choice of subject matter to the babysitter/teacher saying there must have been a rooster present Easter morning to wake everyone up to see that Jesus had risen earlier than they had.

At nerd camp, we learned how to keep a checkbook. We wrote pretend checks paying pretend bills, subtracting them from the balance, watched the account dwindle. You know, all the fun stuff we lucky adults get to do all the time. We even learned how to reconcile the checking account to the pretend bank statement, something I should have paid more attention to, I suppose.

Sonji paid attention. I'm sure she can still balance her checkbook and keeps it reconciled monthly, not just when taxes are due. I didn't see her again until we started junior high school, we picked up where we had left off that summer four years previous. She's a sharp one, that Sonji. I learned to hang with smart people at a young age, hoping some of it would rub off. Whoever was in charge, put me in accelerated courses, English, Science and, egads! Math. "I'm the one that can't balance my checkbook," I wanted to yell, but I was still shy, so I screamed it inside my head and struggled with Algebra I and II and then Geometry, which I would not have made it through if it weren't for Sonji's help. Calculus was lurking around the corner and my fear of it forced me to speak up and tell the counselor that I simply did not belong in accelerated math, not then, not now, not ever.

Sonji's been in my thoughts a lot lately. We don't see each other often, she still lives in our hometown, Amarillo, but when we do, it's like it was that first day of school in 7th grade, we pick up right where we left off. She's still the same Sonji, brilliant, fun loving with the biggest heart and grin to match. But this time I visited her, she had some bad news. She's been diagnosed with Huntington's Chorea Disease. It's an inherited disease that causes the breakdown of the brain's nerve cells. Her dad died from it a few years ago at the age of 63. She knows what to expect.

What I expect is that she, like most of us who are not battling some rotten disease, will continue to struggle daily to stay alive. However, my brother, my only sibling, decided August 7, 2015 to cut his life short, he stopped struggling. 

His action spurred me to go home to my parents, then on to visit my nephew and his family in Arizona. I hadn't seen him in eight years, he has three children I had not yet met. My visit with Sonji rounded out the important trip. I've been wondering why it's taking me so long to find the perfect location to reopen my gallery and I just figured it out. 

I think to myself, if I thought math was hard, figuring out life is the ultimate mind twister. I can't get my head around the death of my brother, or why Sonji has to be stricken with this disease. I am learning to change my perspective in life and realize the importance of depth and dimension in friendships and the spatial relationships between them and family and me, perspective is what makes a great photograph and an equally great life.


And the hostess says....

June 18, 2015  •  5 Comments
Room for FourRoom for FourFowler Stockyards
Fowler, Colorado
Have a seat, the auction's not started yet. Catch up on the news with your neighbor. Auction day at the stockyards brings in ranchers from all over to sell and socialize one day a week.

"Take a seat," says the hostess, "I'll let you know when your table is ready."

"How long," you ask.

"Oh, I'd say 20 minutes," she says with a straight face.

When I closed my gallery in Old Colorado City, I thought I'd have another building within, oh, say 20  minutes. My "20 minutes" has turned into 3 months now. I've taken a serious look at 5 different locations, each with their own attributes and downsides. 

I've decided to be Goldilocks about this, I want the location to be Juuuuust Right. So, I have a list of requirements: must be attractive, solid, big, well-built, visible and memorable. Sounds like I'm writing a personals ad for the perfect man, but the perfect building is what I'm in the market for right now.

In the meantime, I'm being creative. I've completely redesigned my website, added new images, retired some. And I'm a lean, mean developing machine, processing dozens of old black and white rolls of film. It's like Christmas.

Which means, when I do find a location for my gallery that's Goldilocks perfect, I will have all kinds of new work to show and new stories to write. Oh boy!

I'll let you know when your table is ready.

 
     
     

 

Come On OverCome On OverHatch, Utah
This fella was really curious about me and my camera. In fact, he invited me to come on over to his house to visit a while. The barbed wire stood in my way, so we exchanged pleasantries over the fence, like old neighbors.

Mamiya 645 120mm
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