better than drugs

I had an idea for a project tonight-- I stopped everything, wrote down everything, emptied my brain. it felt good, it felt right.

this is your reminder to stop everything when the idea comes. to ride the wave, give yourself over, let new blood rush in. my reminder is your reminder is my reminder. I still believe in projects and ideas.

collected

26th street fleamarket// new york city// may 2016

rose festival city fair photobooths// portland, oregon// june 2009

junk shop// decatur street// new orleans// september 2014

my bathroom mirror// portland, oregon// 11/11/11

madrona motor court inn// avenue of the giants highway 101// phillipsville, california// june 2014

bollywood theater// portland, oregon// october 2015

16 to savannah, georgia//september 2017

oregon state line// cross country move// march 2007

howard finster's paradise garden// summerville, georgia// march 2015

wigwam village motel// cave city, kentucky// august 2010

wigwam village motel// cave city, kentucky// june 2017

rasmussen farm// hood river, oregon// october 2009

flutter// mississippi street// portland, oregon// january 2010

99-W drive-in concession stand// newberg, oregon// september 2013

amy's bathroom mirror// portland, oregon// september 2010

victoria's bathroom mirror// san francisco// october 2010

26th street fleamarket// new york city// may 2016

union station// portland, oregon// january 2011

lakewood fleamarket// atlanta, georgia// september 2005

here I am

I'm here, I'm here, I'm here. I'm still here.

been silent for months but only because I've been saving it all up for nablopomo, aka national blog posting month whereupon I post one thing every day during the month of november.

okay, sorry. that's a lie. I haven't really been saving it up. I've just been stuck, I guess. writing things in my head, slowly making my way back here. I don't even know what this space is to me anymore but I keep coming back and that means something. that's got to mean something.

so, nablopomo after nearly four months of nothing? I say yeah.

I SAY HECK YEAH.

hi

the internet never stops and sometimes I don't know what I'm doing here.

it's an ocean of voices and ideas and sometimes it feels like the most beautiful place in the world and sometimes, the ugliest. turn your back on it for a second, lose sight of things for even one second and it will yank you by your ankles and pull you under. before you even know what is happening. isn't this what it feels like? the internet? sometimes? maybe all of the time.

but whenever I go through the thing where I question why I'm here, I come back to this: I like sharing the photographs and the stories. I really do. inevitably, the online landscape will change again and again but for me, it will always come down to this one very simple, basic idea.

I am not alone in this thinking. there are more of you out there, I know this. we are all still navigating the infinite, voices small but mostly steady, clear and true. the internet never stops but neither do we. and for this, I am thankful.

as seen by

me, through the eyes (and lens) of my brother. I'm forever thankful for it, don't even really have any words for it except I wish we could have seen into the future when we were kids. wish we could have seen who we are now, what we do, what we make. I wonder what we would have thought of all this. I like to think about things like that.

and then there's this:



I'm amazed by the work my brother makes. I really am. and I'm honored to see little bits and pieces of projects we've worked on together in this reel. I'm excited about the future. friends, if you want to fall down a beautiful, beautiful rabbit hole, head on over here. get lost in nate's work. it's easy to do.

p.s. if that first film has you jonesin for polaroid fun times, stay tuned. instant magic workshops (two!) are happening. announcements= right around the corner.

forty is the new forty

forty is not the new twenty. it's not even the new thirty. listen, forty is the new forty because forty is forty. forty is good, forty is great, forty doesn't need to pretend to be anything it isn't.

I did not always feel this way. what I mean is, I opened my arms to forty, or said I was going to, or something like that. I said I was ready, I said I wanted it but I didn't mean it, not really. I didn't want it, not for a second. I stood at forty's door, stared hopelessly through it and that cool woman I thought for sure I'd be, the one who'd embrace every wrinkle, every grey hair, every sagging, drooping bit, the one who'd unapologetically wear those imperfections like the aging champion she'd surely be, that woman was nowhere to be found. that woman was probably someone my twenty-something self foolishly invented back in the early nineties. and so I began to see myself in photographs and think, is that what I look like? what I really look like? and then, holy crap, am I actually that woman? who sees herself in photographs and asks questions like that?

then, vanity became the least of my worries. things fell apart. my mom got sick and I watched her die. I watched her die slowly, painfully.  some other sad things happened and I got tired. I blamed forty. I thought, if this is what it means to be forty, I want no part of it. if it means things only get harder, that the hill before me tilts impossibly upward, no thank you. if it means I will care (more than I'd like) about the kinds of clothes I should or should not wear, what shade of lipstick is age appropriate, where that one wrinkle came from or why I look so tired all the time, if this is what forty means, I don't want it. if it means wallowing in a tepid pool of nostalgia for the rest of my days, then you can have it. more importantly, if it means watching the people I love die then I DON'T WANT IT, OKAY. I DON'T WANT YOU, FORTY. I REJECT YOU.

so I rejected forty, I refused it. but, as you know, it does not work this way. as it turns out, this is not exactly possible and when things finally quieted down, so did the crazy talk. I cannot tell you when things changed for me but they did. somewhere along the way, I softened. there was no lightbulb moment, no woo-woo life altering experience, I just gradually found myself in that place, that good place you sometimes hear people talk about, that place you've earned simply because you have lived. and you love the way you look but you don't love the way you look and somehow, these feelings now co-exist in a way you never thought possible. you lose people you love and the heartbreak changes you so profoundly you cannot help but see your time in the world with new eyes, you cannot help but live with just a little bit of a lump in your throat. the thing is, this is what makes the living good-- better, even. the fragile, teetering part, the knowing part, the one that finally acknowledges that time is not infinite and you are not actually immortal. and when you see things with these eyes, the world around you changes. when you see forty with these eyes, forty is beautiful. because you are alive and you know what that means, what that really means. you are both flawed and flawless, broken but completely intact, imperfectly perfect. you are in your own skin, your own God-given skin. finally. and it feels good, even if it is changing, it feels right.

which is when you realize forty is not the new twenty, it is not the new thirty, it is not the new anything. forty is forty because calling it anything else would be an insult to the decade you've worked so hard to find your way into. pretending it's anything else means you've missed the point entirely. forty is forty and what you know now in your bones is that you would not have it any other way.

seen

it's a beautiful thing when you give your daughter your SX-70 camera, tell her she can photograph anything she wants and she chooses you. she points the camera at you. it's a beautiful, beautiful thing.

this summer, I stood

 on the streets of san francisco's mission neighborhood

in stall after stall at the treasure island fleamarket

in jen and bob's sweet backyard, with the succulents and the nasturtiums and yesh, a few chickens

on rocks with ward at the edge of the water, san francisco off in the distance

in the bathroom of a stumptown coffee shop, downtown portland

with a few people I love at kruger's farm, sauvie island

on alix and greg's spectacular back patio, oakland, california

in booth after booth at the alameda fleamarket

with alix and jenny on the streets of san francisco's japantown

in the middle of an oregonian desert

at the edge of the swimming pool

in the shallows of short sands beach at the oregon coast

on the island of port townsend, washington (last adventure of the summer, very very last)

it's been a good summer, folks. I'm thankful for that. and I don't take one second for granted, not even one teeny tiny second. 

you totally will

written by a seven year-old ava five years ago as part of this secret mission, saved and promptly taped to the bathroom mirror. five years of looking at it while I wash my face and apply various fancy-like moisturizers. while I brush my teeth and pretend to floss. while I inspect my face for any and/or all flaws, notice new lines and imperfections. five years and still, it lifts my spirits. it helps me remember.

and on a somewhat related note: this made me happy.

photobooth friday

on a sunday, because that's how I'm rolling these days. this was my favorite birthday present, by the way. my absolute favorite.

11.11.11

(bathroom self portrait taken at 11:11 this morning and posted at 11:11 tonight)

photobooth friday

this weekend, I'll load up the canon FTb. I'll finish that thing I need to finish. I'll intentionally mismatch my socks. I'll ask my mother-in-law to teach me how to crochet. I'll get on my bike and I'll ride. I'll not steal halloween candy from you know who. I'll not complain about the rain.

you?

souvenirs

hello monday, hello friends. I'm over at shutter sisters with with a few words about souvenirs-- those little things you pick up in faraway places, those things you hope will always remind you of magic travels.

two things

firstly, clogs. just like the tan ones only red. red for summer.

secondly, instagram. I may or may not have fallen down a sizable instagram rabbit hole. this is hardly news since I've been on there since april but still. an intervention may be in order.

photobooth friday

sometimes photobooth frames capture exactly who we are in a particular moment. not always, but sometimes. I'll admit, when the booth first spit this strip out, I was a little disappointed. ezra did exactly what I told him not to do-- that is, move in close and make the crazy face. four whole frames of variations on the crazy face. but the more I look at this, the more I love it. because it's exactly who we are right now. ezra, all goofiness and loose teeth and straw-like bangs. ava, all smiling eyes and soft preteen edges and the kitty cat hat she won't take off. and me in the background-- loving them both so much I can hardly stand it, trying so hard to hold onto them like this but failing miserably. because you can't hold on, it doesn't work like that. so you grab them and put them in a photobooth every once in a while and when the strip comes sliding out, you silently celebrate your triumphant (albeit small) attempt to stop time.

happy mother's day, y'all.

san francisco on film

more of that san francisco trip, more from that camera.

but what I really want to talk about are the clogs. people, the clogs. the hand-painted clogs. you must understand, I have been walking around in a sad, nearly soleless pair of boots. this is because I wear things down to the nubs. shoes, socks, blouses, jeans, leggings, skirts, bras, tights, dresses. I find something I love and I wear it to death. I wear it until it cannot, should not be worn again. and then I just keep on wearing it, hoping no one will notice. sadly, I'd come to the end of the road with my favorite pair of brown boots-- boots in such horrible condition I might as well have been walking around barefoot. also, I was in serious denial. so on my last day in san francisco, my friend leslie said I AM TAKING YOU TO THE SHOE SHOP AND YOU ARE BUYING NEW SHOES. and I hemmed and I hawed but we ended up at the shoe shop anyway.

first, I poo-pooed all the boots. then I tried on about a million pair of practical-looking brownish blackish clogs. I nearly had myself talked into a pair. I thought, yes. this is what I need. cushy comfy practical brownish blackish. however, the section of hand-painted clogs kept calling out to me and leslie kept saying JUST TRY THEM ON ALREADY. she had to push a little because well, I was in practical mom mode. I am a hard nut to crack when I am in practical mom mode. I broke and tried on a pair (many pairs, actually). according the sales clerk, a swedish woman comes into the shop once a month to paint them and she paints each pair differently. each pair is one of a kind. I don't know but that sort of sold me. well, that and leslie's gentle pushing. because, you know. sometimes you just need a little push in the right direction.

and so I am happily wearing said hand-painted clogs. happily, down to the nubs. and every time I look down, I smile. because of that little bright-colored crown of flowers, yes, but also because they make me think of san francisco and my sweet friend and how good it feels to laugh in the face of practicality.

photobooth friday

something like a year ago, I received an email from the assistant of a french author who asked if I might like to be part of a photobooth book. there was to be no financial compensation but might I be interested? well, yes. a french photobooth book? YES. ABSOLUTELY YES. the very thought of my photobooth frames appearing on the pages of a french photobooth book had me over the moon, pay or no pay. I mean, even if never saw the finished product, never got to hold the book with my own two hands. the very thought.

in the months that followed, there was a little back and forth regarding which photobooth frames would be used in the book and could I write a little something about my experience with photobooths? yes, of course I could and then, I don't know. I just sort of forgot about the whole thing. in december, I received an email informing me the book was finished and could I please send my mailing address so they could send me a copy? again, over the moon at the prospect but the craziness of december set in and again, I forgot all about it.



until january 27th, that is. which is when I found myself in san francisco at the moma (henri cartier bresson show= part of that belated 40th birthday adventure). more specifically, I found myself standing in the gift shop in front of an enormous book display. which is when I spied a new photobooth book. which, of course, I promptly picked up and thumbed through. wow, I thought. wow. this is great, this is fantastic. pages and pages of terrific photobooth frames and the work of so many amazing photobooth artists. daniel minnick (a long time favorite of mine) and so many others. the work of lovely fellow polaroid photographer jena ardell and my good friend and fellow photographer cori kindred. wow, I thought. why couldn't I have been part of a book like this? I WOULD KILL TO BE PART OF A BOOK LIKE THIS. friends, at that exact moment, the book fell open to the spread with my photobooth frames, my words, my name across the top. at once, I remembered. the french photobooth book! this is that french photobooth book! except this one was in english and it was here, in my hands. here, in the middle of the moma gift shop downtown san francisco. it was a moment, I tell you. an extraordinary little moment. and almost five years to the date of when I first started the photobooth friday project. fancy that.



one week later, I received the french version of the book in the mail. that night, I stuffed that beautiful little photomaton book in my bag and made my way down to the nearest photobooth. but of course, my friends. but of course.

the necessary linkage:

photobooth: the art of the automatic portrait (in english)
photomaton (in french)
photobooth friday (five years! my little flickr group is all growns up)
cori kindred and her awesome post on the book

also, many many thanks to author raynal pellicer. 'tis an honor to be a part of such a book.