Author Archives: dkrashb

Bubble Wrap

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I mentioned in yesterday’s post that we will be home for Christmas this year.  I didn’t mention why.  We’re moving.  It’s not the kind of move that makes my Nomadic heart sing, but it’s a move none-the-less.  We are moving to a quieter place not far away from where we are now.

I have moved many times in my adult life.  My moving truisms:  1)  move often, 2) take little, and 3) start packing early.  1 and 2 are intricately related.

Toward this end, I start cleaning out excess stuff and packing what we want to keep even though we are several weeks away from our move.  It’s a busy time of year at work and at home, so the earlier I get started, the less stressed I’ll be.

This means pulling out the empty boxes from our last move along with the bubble wrap and paper packing material, and packing away the decorative things that make us feel at home.  I start with the photos displayed on our walls, mostly by photographers far more talented that I.

It takes yards of bubble wrap to safely package the photos framed under glass.  I wrap each one lovingly, remembering the photographers whose works I display on my walls.

I am tempted to pop the bubbles in some of the wrap.  It’s hard to resist the popping noise bubble wrap makes when you jump on it.  But, it doesn’t make for good protection once it’s been popped.

When I’ve packed the photos and most of the non-essentials in the bedroom, there is still a stack of bubble wrap left on the floor, perfectly sized for wrapping glasses.  It’s too soon to pack glassware, something we most definitely use every day.

I hold a piece of bubble wrap up in the early afternoon light streaming through the windows and get an idea.  What if I were to shoot the view through the bubble wrap?

I imagine reflections of the city skyline in the bubbles like those commonly seen in water droplets.   Then, I imagine a distortion that makes the city look like it’s inside a snow globe.  I can’t wait to give it a try.

I tape a single square of bubble wrap to the window then press my lens close to the glass next to the bubble wrap and focus on the skyline in the distance.  I move my lens so I’m shooting through the bubble wrap and search for an image that might look like something.

Alas, there is so much distortion, most of the focus is lost.  There are no reflections in the air inside the bubbles like there would be in a water droplet.  The plastic creates flare, like when shooting into the sun, but it doesn’t really create a globe effect.

While I’m not fond of the resulting images (I like the macro shots of the bubble wrap better), at least I found a way to play with bubble wrap without destroying it.

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A Month Before Christmas

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Here we are, a month before Christmas, and I am realizing we are going to be home in Chattanooga for Christmas this year.  Having just returned from visiting family for Thanksgiving, I find myself feeling a bit nostalgic for the old days when family from both sides was within a 3 hour drive.

Combine that with the sudden nip in the air and I find myself wistfully wishing I had a few things to look forward to.

For one, gifts piled under a Christmas tree.  There was a time when I would put up a tree and wrap all the gifts early just because I liked the way they looked. I was known for taking ridiculous care in wrapping packages, always folding every crease, never leaving a cut edge exposed, and often hand making bows from interesting ribbons.

These days, I think more about using up leftover wrapping paper, recycling old paper or gift bags, or having things gift wrapped at the store.

As my nephews have gotten older, the things they want have gotten smaller and more expensive resulting in paltry stack that barely occupies the corner of a table, let alone fills the living room.  It’s a good thing they have also outgrown playing with boxes.

I gave up on having Christmas decorations, including a tree, many years ago.  I found not decorating for Christmas a relief.  The amount of work in exchange for a very small amount of time to enjoy the decorations (since we always went out of town) just didn’t seem worth the trade off.  Especially not in January when we kept procrastinating taking down the outdoor lights in the hope of warmer weather.

Now, I watch the cars driving in and out of the tree lot across the street and find myself tempted to get a tree.  But where would that lead?  Next there would be ornaments, garlands, lights, and icicles.  And it doesn’t stop there.  It’s like a gateway drug to hard-core decorating.  Before you know it, you’re putting snowflakes in the windows, lights on the windowsills, and looking for inflatable, lighted Christmas scenes for the balcony.

Instead of buying a tree, I peruse my old photos in search of Christmases past.  I am reminded of cookies, snow, and our wonderful dogs, past and present.

This will be our first Christmas at home in 21 years.  It will be only our second Christmas without my nephews in those 21 years.  The first time, we were camping in the Everglades.  This year, we will be home with no tree, no lights, no gifts, no family.

Sounds like it’s time to think of a new tradition for Christmas.  Maybe I’ll look into renting a snow making machine–a white Christmas in Chattanooga would truly be a Christmas miracle.

Tisen’s Turn

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I imagine our day from Tisen’s perspective.  If Tisen were writing this post, what would he say?

“Mom put antlers on my head.  I’m felt stupid, but Mom kept smiling, so I pretended I liked it.  As long as I had my fluffy bed and Jack, I really didn’t care about the antlers.

Mom also put a snug sweater on me.  It was warm and felt like a hug.  Daddy rolls his eyes when Mommy puts it on me, but I kind of like it.

They left me in the sunroom with my breakfast and a rabbit.  I gobbled down my breakfast before the rabbit could get out and steal it, but then I was in the sunroom all by myself with that rabbit.  It kept watching me.

Eventually, they came back and took me outside.  I got to sniff and pee on some of my favorite spots, and then, JOY!  They finally let me back in the van.  I love the van.  It takes me places with Mommy and Daddy.

We didn’t go very far before we stopped though.  Mommy and Daddy met up with Uncle Paul and Aunt Megan.  I watched them walk into a building.  It was so windy, Mommy’s hair flipped up like a toupee in the wind.

They were in there a long time.  I got worried.  I decided I’d better take shotgun position so I could keep a closer eye on the door.  It was getting cold in the car while I was sitting there.  Mommy left me a blanket on my fluffy bed, but I was determined not to take my eyes off the door, so I stayed put.

Eventually they returned.  Mommy got in the seat with me and let me sit on her lap while Daddy drove around for a little bit.  Mommy was so warm.  She pulled the blanket over my cold ears and paws and cuddled me while Daddy went somewhere.  When Daddy came back, I had to get in the back on my bed.  I didn’t want to leave Mommy, but she insisted.

Mommy covered me with my blanket and then we drove for a really long time.

I was getting too warm.  I had to get out from under my blanket.  Then, we stopped and Daddy took off my jacket and walked me around in some nice grass.

After that, I got to sleep in the back for a long time.  Mommy was sleeping in her seat, too.  I was a little worried about her because her head kept tipping over, but every time I checked on her, she was OK.

After a long time, we were in my very own parking lot and Mommy took me for a walk around my very own park.  Then, we went inside and I found Tiger, Blue Dog, Skunk, and Big Dog all waiting for me.  I told them all about my adventure, but I’m not sure they believed me.  Especially the part about the rabbit.

Giving Thanks

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Thanksgiving is the most important holiday of the year to me these days.  It’s a holiday that isn’t overloaded with expectations, can be celebrated with little effort (for those of us who don’t cook), and usually offers the opportunity to reflect on all that is good in life.

It’s the last part that makes this a special holiday.  It’s always easy to find something to complain about.  Yet complaining rarely makes me happy.  On the other hand, remembering what I have to be grateful for fills me with the sort of joy that both reminds me how good my life is and makes me sad that not everyone can find a long list of things to give thanks for.

In giving a little more thought since yesterday’s post to my gratitude list for Thanksgiving this year, here is what I came up with on my second attempt.  I am grateful for:

  1. Friends and family who accept and love me with all of my shortcomings, laugh with me when I laugh, laugh at me when I deserve to be laughed at, and remind me that the greatest joys in life often come in the smallest gestures when they’re least expected.
  2. A world so full of wonder that I could live a thousand lives and still not come close to exhausting the potential to be awed and amazed.
  3. The extraordinary number of people in the world who believe that kindness is more important than being right, justified, recognized, or fair.  Examples:  A friend of mine picks up other people’s dogs’ poop in the park.  A neighbor walked across the street with a trash bag one day and start picking up the trash left behind after a marathon.  A woman across the street stood on the corner asking passers-by if anyone recognized a puppy who had been hit and killed, wanting to inform the owners.  Every day there are people taking care of others in ways that often go unnoticed.  I am grateful to be surrounded by inspiring people.
  4. The abundance of food that makes it possible for me to have to watch my weight.  I am sometimes ashamed that not everyone in the world has the same access to basic resources like food.  But for today, Thanksgiving Day, when we Americans traditionally feast until we burst, I set aside my guilt and simply feel incredibly grateful to have had the fortune of being born in a part of the world where food is plentiful and affordable.
  5. Finally, technology.  It gives me the opportunity to experiment with forms of personal expression like blogging and digital photography, the ability to make a living, and access to information from anywhere I have a cell signal.  More importantly, technology connects me to people all over the world I would have never known about otherwise.

All-in-all, I am grateful I have the opportunity to live my life, to find my own path.  I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday.

Going Classic

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On our moonlight walk last night, I also spent some time shooting what could be called “classic” scenes from the Chattanooga waterfront.  I call them this because you can find similar shots hanging in just about any restaurant, office, gallery, or photographer’s booth at a holiday market.  It seems we are all attracted to the waterfront, particularly at night.

I discover several problems with shooting in the dark:

  1. I can’t see what’s in the frame and what’s out until after I shoot and review the shot.
  2. With a very dark foreground, it’s impossible to get autofocus to work in the part of the shot I want to focus in to get the greatest depth of field.
  3. I cannot see well enough in dim light to focus manually.
  4. Focusing on spots of light reflected in moving water is next to impossible.
  5. The magnifying loop is a life saver.

That said, in the spirit of Thanksgiving, I am grateful, too:

  1. I have this fabulous view within a 5 minutes walk
  2. It’s warm enough to be out shooting in November without having to wear a parka
  3. I have a supportive and patient husband who’s willing to walk the park with me while I shoot at 9:00PM at night
  4. I am able to make time for my hobby
  5. I have made life choices that freed up money for photography and other things I enoy
  6. The aquarium lights are on.

Perhaps I will have a more philosophical list tomorrow.  For now, It’s late, I’m tired, and what I’m most grateful for at the moment is having a comfortable bed waiting for me.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Walkin’ in the Moonlight

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At the end of the day, I find myself with no new photos, nothing to write about, and a dog that needs to go for a walk.

I decide it’s been too long since I shot down at the riverfront at night.  I have shot the riverfront from the roof and balcony many times, but I can’t remember the last time I actually carried my camera down to the river after dark.

Having gone small yesterday, it seemed reasonable that today I would go wide, so I put my 16-35mm lens on my camera, grabbed my loupe and tripod, and talked my husband into coming with me and bringing the dog.

Walking Renaissance Park at night is always an interesting experience.  The meadow voles who live on the hillside at the park entrance seem to be mostly daytime critters–no rustles are heard in the leaves as we walk by, unlike earlier in the day when something scurried away every few steps.  Ironically, if they would hold still, we would never know they were there.

But as we head down the walkway past the wetland, leaves crunch loudly in the woods to our right.  A little too loudly.  We glance at each other and then peer into the darkness of the woods wondering what might be lurking there big enough to make that much noise.  I remind myself how loud even a mouse can be in fall leaves and we keep moving without any boogie men jumping out at us.

I pause to shoot the reflected trees in the wetland water.  It’s not the most stunning reflection, but I like the bright trees at the top of the hill and the dark sky streaked with clouds.

Tisen drops Snake (one of his newest family members), leaving the red and green toy (doesn’t every family have a Christmas snake?) laying in the shadows along the sidewalk while he investigates a smell.  Whoever was here before him left behind an interesting story–I finish shooting long before he’s done sniffing.

The night is cool, but I am warm enough with a sweater and light jacket.  The frogs and cicadas have disappeared and the only noises we hear besides the occasional rustle of leaves is the voices of other couples walking in the moonlight.

I think how romantic this walk might be if I weren’t carrying a tripod and stopping to shoot for long intervals.  My husband patiently keeps Tisen entertained while I shoot.  Maybe that’s it’s own kind of romance?

As we work our way around the same path we have walked hundreds of times in the past 15 months, I look at the scene anew.  Shooting causes an interesting shift in perspective–I look at the moon, the clouds, the lights, the converging lines, and the sculptures from different angles and look for new ways to combine them in my frame.

I realize the same old scene is actually never the same twice.

Bowl Games

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Many moons ago, I taught an Essay and Research class.  One of the things I taught my students was to narrow their focus.

Every time a student was stuck, it was because they were overwhelmed by a big subject and didn’t know where to go with it.  Creating a more current, hypothetical example, a student writing about the economic crisis of 2008 would get as far as “it was awful”  and then not know what else to say.  If they wrote about what caused the economic crisis, they would have something to go research.  But, since none of them were interested in writing a dissertation, that would also lead to writer’s block.  If they wrote about one cause, they would get further, but were usually bored.  But if they wrote about one family and what happened to them, suddenly, they would not be able to stop writing.  As you narrow the scope of what you write about, you often find a nugget of inspiration.

Taking a lesson from my own class (although, I shouldn’t take credit–there was probably a teacher I’ve forgotten who shared this wisdom with me), as I look for photographic inspiration, I switch from thinking about every possibility in the world to giving myself a highly constrained assignment:  shoot one bowl in one place as many ways as possible in about an hour.

As I clear off the largest surface I have available to work on, creating a space about 2 feet by 2 feet (how I miss having a big table), and place a weathered copper bowl under a light, my husband watches me.

“Do you know what you’re going to write about?” He asks.

I ignore him because I, in fact, have not a clue what I’m going to write about.  I am only worried about what I’m going to shoot; the story will come.

He watches me spend my hour on about 40 shots of this poor, beaten bowl.  I start with my 24-70mm lens on a tripod with a simple light bulb behind the bowl.  Then, I try it with my flash with an 1/8” grid strapped on top.  Not satisfied with the spread of the light, I try it with a softbox attachment.  This ruins the contrasting shadows.  I try with a snoot (I still love that word!) and hold the snoot in various positions to create a spotlight effect on different parts of the bowl.

Finally, I ditch my flash and switch to my 100mm macro lens.  I get up close and try to get as much depth of field as possible (not much) across the gleaming rim of the bowl.

“Have you decided what you’re going to write about?” my husband asks again.

I give him a look.

He says, “Well, you’re over there taking all these pictures of that bowl, I assume you know what you’re going to write about.”

I still haven’t told him.

Cow Tipping and Sky Scrapers

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As the holidays approach kick-off, I find myself searching through old photos more frequently.  I’m thankful for old photos–they remind me of where I’ve come from and refresh the memories I’ve taken with me.

These images are from a photography workshop I went to back in Columbus, Ohio (I have to add “Ohio” now because when you live in Chattanooga, they usually assume you mean Columbus, TN or Columbus, GA).

As I review the images and look at the metadata, I realize just how many mistakes I made.  That, too, is a reminder of where I’ve come from.  Sometimes it’s nice to realize I am learning even if the process seems slow.

I ponder why these images all seem to have been shot with a wide open aperture, resulting in out-of-focus foregrounds and/or backgrounds.  These days, I like to see the entire scene in focus in most landscape shots.  The difference between having lots of depth of field and the images in the gallery probably comes down to the want of a tripod and low light conditions.

But what jumps out at me as I peruse these photos is that in over 40 years of living there, I had never really seen downtown Columbus before this day.

I had walked the streets more times than I can count.  I’d been to theaters, restaurants, shops, meetings, museums, and even two courthouses.

But I walked the streets with purpose, my mind busy with the reason I was there or the things I needed to do, focused on what was ahead or behind and not on what was around me.

I wonder if I returned to my home town how I would see it differently.  I think back to vague memories of the Columbus skyline from my childhood.  There was one sky scraper then, the Lincoln LeVeque Tower.  It remains the most interesting of the tall buildings in the Columbus skyline even though its height has been eclipsed for many decades by its neighbor, the Rhodes State Office Tower.

As I look at these images and see blocks and blocks of big-city buildings, I realize how much the town and I grew up together.

My family arrived in 1970 when Columbus was still called Cow Town.  In fact, even when we left, there were still cows grazing on the OSU Agriculture campus pastures well within the city limits.  It would be hard to grow up in Columbus without knowing what cow-tipping was.

At the same time, Columbus invested in revitalizing some of its worst neighborhoods, developing its downtown riverfront, creating an awesome metro park system, and attracting large businesses that built up the Columbus skyline.  In retrospect, I realize that Columbus grew up without me noticing.  It turned into a real city with real attractions.

None of that makes me regret our decision to move to Chattanooga, however.  Perhaps a mid-western metropolitan lifestyle is less important to me than views of Lookout Mountain.

A Little Whimsy

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I’m in the mood for some whimsy.  And what better place to find the whimsical than Key West, Florida?  I am not there.  But, I have photos from the last time I was.

We went to Key West the long way.  We drove from Columbus, Ohio through Shenandoah National Park over the Blue Ridge Parkway to Congaree National Park in South Carolina, to Everglades City, to Key West.

I am not one of those people who goes to a city and immediately wants to know where all the art museums and galleries are.  Don’t get me wrong.  I enjoy art.  But I’m easily overwhelmed.  Even more so when the art is violent and bloody.  There are entire eras of art that I prefer not to know about.

The Custom House in Key West might be the only art gallery I’ve ever gone to where I managed to walk through the whole thing and still felt so fascinated, I peeked in at an upcoming exhibit that wasn’t open yet.

What kept me interested was whimsy.  If ever there were going to be a place with an art and historical museum full of whimsical wonders, Key West would be the place.  Even before we made it inside, we were amused by the life-like sculptures outside performing day-to-day tasks ranging from sweeping trash to taking pictures.  We kept getting confused as to who was real and who was art.  I guess that means we were all art.

Inside, we found more life-like sculptures, all by Seward Johnson, of scenes from some of the most famous photos ever.  Like the WWII guy kissing the girl at the end of the war.  Or Marilyn Monroe with her white dress over an air duct in the Seven Year Itch.  Can you tell who doesn’t belong in that image?

There were also several sculptures based on famous art.  The girl with the pearl earring was there (not pictured) along with The Landlady (based on L’Arlesienne by Van Gogh) who was hanging out on the porch of the Custom House.  She was even more amusing because of the plastic outdoor chair positioned on the porch next to her, implying that she had just been visiting with someone.

But, above all, my favorite sculpture was called “Day Dream.”  This was a bigger-than-life sculpture of the Matisse painting called “Dance” but with the addition of an adolescent boy laying on the ground as the naked ladies dance in a circle above him.  At first, I thought the boy was real, perhaps because there were real people going in and out of the sculpture as well.  I thought it was rather bold of a guy to lay on the ground in the middle of a sculpture of dancing naked women.  Turns out being bold was what the artist had in mind all along.

Hot Spots

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Sometimes love hurts.  When I was young, the pain associated with love came in adolescent dramas mostly created by massive fluctuations in hormones.  These days, it comes with loving a creature who depends on me for protection.  When he hurts, I hurt.

This, of course, is my dog, Tisen.

I like to think we provide the perfect home for him.  We buy him special food.  We feed him more vitamins than we feed ourselves.  We walk him at least 2 miles every day.  I work from home–he is rarely left home alone more than a few hours a week. We take him to doggie daycare twice a week just so he gets to socialize with other dogs.

We take him to dinner with us when weather and patios permit.  We socialize with friends who invite him to come along.  We drive him places.  Sometimes, we put him in our van and drive about 100 feet away to our favorite breakfast joint and let him hang out in the van while we eat just so he doesn’t feel like he was left behind.

We also provide gentle training and positively reinforce that he is not at the top of the hierarchy in our house.  He does not seem confused on this point.

Although, he does still get quite upset when I leave, he’s handling it much better.  When we go out without him, we put his portable bed by the door so he has a comfy place to lay and when we come back, he’s still laying there, right next to the door.

We take him hiking and backpacking too, when we go.

I can’t imagine life for a dog gets a whole lot better than life with us.  I guess he could long for a fenced yard to run in.  But, I recently learned that when I drop him off at doggy daycare so he can run free and play with other dogs, he finds a hiding place where he can curl up and take a nap.

Yet, in spite of all these things, Tisen is chewing on himself.  It starts with licking.  Then, the hair starts to dissolve.  Next, the skin becomes a bright red, raw sore against his white fur.  That’s when he starts chewing.

I cannot help but get upset when I see pink irritation in his skin or when he wakes me up scratching in the middle of the night.  I don’t know what more to do about his allergies.  We’re waiting for his latest test to come back.  This one will hopefully tell us what he’s allergic to.

In the meantime, I decide to make a video.  Ever since I made the jump to my 5D Mark III, I’ve been spent my time on still images.  I literally forget sometimes that it even has the capability to shoot videos.  Tisen is perplexed by me constantly pointing the camera at him, but at least it distracts him from the itching for a while.