Yesterday an Angel greeted me.....

Yesterday, while working on a variation of my Lakewood Project, I came upon an angel. Just as I got out of my truck to make a photograph an adorable long hared, cross and green eyed Calico greeted me. She was meowing away; she said: hi!, how are you?, what's your name?, will you please pet me?, I'm lonely so lonely, would you happen to have any Fancy Feast with you? I bent down to greet and per her atop of her head and rub under her chin, and her purr engine roared. She sensed my residual grief, her purring ceased, and she whispered to me, "I am sorry about Buzz, but don't worry he is in a very good place now." I thanked her, wished her a very pleasant day, and promised her that I would come visit her again. She welcomed me back anytime and said good-bye. I went in the other direction and made my photograph.

How do I remain sane?

OK, after a two year sabbatical I have fully returned and am committed to being a photographer. And now I am overwhelmed. I am crazy busy and I have not even begun to promote myself--the most important part of being a photographer. I have taken on Final Cut Express, which is a 1/5 the cost of Final Cut Pro, yet the learning curve is nearly as steep. I purchased FCE rather than FCP, figuring you don't buy a Porsche if you don't know how to drive. Yet FCE does not handle the Canon 5D Mark II media at 24 fps. More about that in future posts. I have spent at least thirty hours on it, and I have yet to cut a video. Simultaneously I am trying to learn Aperture 3, which I won as a door prize at Palm Springs Photo Festival. I spent 3 hours trying to make a damn contact sheet-see above. Yet, recently I have my doubts, because Joan Paul Capionigro told me at a ASMP workshop he did with R. Mac Holbert, that I should sell Aperture 3 and buy Lightroom 3. Yikes. Then yesterday, Amanda Friedman, another very talented photographer, told me Capture 1 is the bomb. Yikes again.

So yesterday I fell upon Emily Shur's blog, and it inspired me to write more about my experiences returning to photography. Besides being a very talented photographer she is a damn good writer. Now I must learn how she links every one and everything she writes about without writing out the entire URL. Digital, has not made photography easier. Oh yea, it has made it easier to make an interesting photograph, but to stay on top of what is happening it has made being a photographer much more complicated, time consuming, and expensive. Yesterday evening, after a day in front of the computer, which is where I spend most of my days, I was exhausted. Yet sleep was light last night because I was haunted by nightmares self-doubt. Oh, and I have decided to post to my blog first thing in the morning rather than at night. It's much too difficult for me to write anything sensical when I am exhausted. Cheers for now, but I promise to be consistent, and write what I daily learn.

This is the contact sheet I was working on yesterday. It's part of my Lakewood project....

Buzz Continued

I continue to ride the highs and lows of my cat Buzz. He has been pretty sick for the last few days, and I am beginning to prepare myself for the awful eventual day that I must make to let him go. The Vetinary Cancer clinic called me today to inform me that his blood tests from yesterday indicated his white blood count to be low. And that he needed to be placed on anti-biotics immediately to quell what might be a possible infection. This could have been the cause for his listlessness this last week. I gave him his first dose this afternoon, and although it's to early to know for sure, he seems to be improving. The vet also told me that if he doesn't improve by Sunday, it maybe time. I pray that it is not. Lord I don't think I am ready to let him go. When it is please give me a loud and clear signal.

Edit, Edit, Edit

I am taking a basic color class from Neil France at LBCC. It is a beginning class, and almost every student in the class is a novice except for me. I question my enrollment sometimes, but for $78 what the hell. I'm still learning. Neil told us something about projects a couple of classes ago that made a lot of sense and stuck with me. He said constantly edit your work, and don't add fillers. Wow! I knew there was something not right with my Lakewood project. As a body it wasn't working. It needed to be edited. So I removed all the photographs that were not in sync with my project statement. Then I realized my project statement was vague-good but vague. Today I edited out the the still lives and the landscapes from the portraits, and there was the project. Portraits of Lakewood's residents. That I can nail in 20 photographs, and it will be much easier to compose for a project statement. Oh, I'll still create images without people. I love doing that. But the project holds water with just portraits of folks from Lakewood.

Buzz

I write this post with my cat and best friend Buzz sitting right next to me by my keyboard. He is actually waiting for me to vacate his favorite chair. A month ago Buzz was diagnosed with abdominal cancer; he was very sick, and I thought he was a goner. I have never been closer to another animal, so I took him to the cancer clinic in Tustin. There our luck began to change. I think in large part due to we drew Dr. Rosenberg the head of the clinic. I was heartbroken. When she walked into the room where I was waiting with Buzz, I was already crying. Four days prior I had to rush Buzz to the vet because he had thrown up so much he was low on electrolytes and needed to be placed on an IV. Dr. Rosenberg was with an intern, and she asked the young girl to fetch some Kleenix for me. I gave her Buzz's history. Talking to her calmed me. I immediately knew this woman knew her stuff. She is big league. She physically examined him and felt the tumor verifying the ultrasound Buzz had two days before. She kept him for a couple of hours to do another ultrasound and attempt to take a needle into the tumor to aspirate a biopsy. I can't say why, but I remember leaving the clinic to grab some lunch feeling better. I wouldn't say Dr. Rosenberg gave me hope, yet her manner and knowledge comforted me. I sensed that Buzz could not be in better hands. The ride home was long, but Buzz who normally bitches the entire ride, having been drugged for the tests, was calm. My boy sat in my lap the entire ride home. The next day I spoke with Dr. Rosenberg and she told me that the aspiration didn't tell her anything, and that she believed the tumor was not lymphoma, but worse a sarcoma. She told me to bring Buzz to the clinic the next day, and overnight she would meditate and come up with a strategy. By then, I was beginning to accept the fact that Buzz was no going to be around much longer. I hadn't given up hope, however I was preparing myself for the worst. Because Buzz was weak and not a young cat Dr. Rosenberg decided against doing anything evasive to assay the tumor. Rather she decided to go on her experience and gut to treat Buzz. The next day I brought him in, and she gave him his first chemo treatment. She advised me that he could suffer nausea the first 72 hours, or 7-10 days after the treatment. I did not notice anything different except Buzz's appetite had increased. He wanted to eat all the time, and he wasn't throwing up. The 7 to 10 period passed without incident, and Buzz kept on eating. Two weeks after his treatment I came home from shooting and noticed there was throw-up on the drive way, and I thought oh, the nausea is getting to him. So I got some of the medication that Dr. Rosenberg had given me and coaked it down Buzz's throat. On the bed where he was laying I noticed drops of blood. Then he shook his head, and a spray of blood flew off him. My first thought was Oh No, he is so bad he's coughing up blood. Then I saw a nasty gash on his ear. I tried to examine it, but he resisted. He was wounded, and then I realized he must have gotten into a fight with another cat. It freaked me out, because chemo takes its toll on the white blood cells and I was terrified he was going to get an infection. I examined for any other wounds and to his aggravation I cleaned out the gash with peroxide and Neosporin. He seemed to be OK....... My neighbor Peggy saw the fight, and she couldn't believe Buzz was involved. She had seen him the week before when he was sick and weak. Peggy told me the other cat was the aggressor, but that Buzz held his own. This was weird. My sick cat had the strength to battle. It was true, other than the wounded ear, Buzz was looking much happy and healthier. The stuff was working. What gave me the most satisfaction was watching Buzz sleep. I saw him sprawled out when he napped. He no longer looked uncomfortable. My God, my dear boy was not in pain. That made me so happy, but also sad knowing he had suffered so long without my knowledge. I was looking forward to bring Buzz back to Dr. Rosenberg to share my observations. My Buzz was back.

I have been moving along quite nicely back on "Lakewood." I was walking the suburb Tuesday evening. I walked the sidewalks of Pennswood and Whitewood streets on each side of the major street, South Street. I walked as far north as Hungerford Street, and as far south to Michelson Street. My best photographs were taken on Whitewood, north of South Street. There I took some interesting group portraits. It amazes me sometimes, that I, a very she person, can walk up to group of strangers and ask them if they will allow me to take their portrait. Often their reply is negative, however, surprisingly I get more "Why nots," than one would suspect. I suppose they grasp my passion and interest, and just maybe they appreciate the attention. Forward I move on.

Not Getting Overwhelmed

So many photos, ideas, websites, it all overwhelms me. I seem to lose footing. If I don't write a list of what I need to do each day, I wander and become distracted. I have decided to become proficient at Photoshop; however, I don't want to derail myself from taking the photograph. All the other stuff, the environment, health care, Obama, surfing: if I am to succeed, they all must become secondary. I would love to be a man of renaissance, but a DeVinci mind I do not possess. Hence I must focus and work harder. What did I learn today. It seems that so much of knowledge is the continuous incremental building upon more knowledge. And that passivity teaches me nothing. It's the constant work and the attempt to make art that makes me better.