Today we are farming houses in America and we are farming grass to put in the yards of our houses…..
and to put on our golf courses that surround our really fancy houses.
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This weekend I went to Atlanta to visit an old friend. While I was there I discovered, by chance, that there was an Annie Leibovitz exhibit at the High Museum of Art.
For a brief moment, I thought maybe I didn’t need to go, because I saw her talk last fall in Berkeley, California, and I have her book Annie Leibovitz: a Photographer’s Life which the images in the show come from….but I was in need of a good dose of inspiration, so that moment of doubt didn’t last very long. I went with Betsy, an old friend who is not a photography person at all, and I got exactly the inspiration I was looking for.
The show was well worth the $15 entry fee….for me, I don’t know about for Betsy. I enjoyed staring at the faces in the enlarged portraits and then to getting in close to her smaller intimate personal photographs, that I am so happy she included in this collection. My favorite part was a side room that was filled with hundreds of small photos grouped in chronological order to show her editing process for the book. It was wonderful to stand and get lost in the walls of that room. I could have spent at least two hours in that section, but I was with Betsy the non-photography friend and she looked ready to go, and I had promised I wouldn’t stay too long…….so although I left earlier than I would have liked, by going with Betsy I was able to hear the reaction from a photography civilian…..she admitted she had a hard time telling which photographs were supposed to be good….she admitted they are better than ones she could take, but she thought some of them looked like ones I could have taken……now I don’t know that I agree with that statement, at all, but the point that I took was that it is important to remember that not everyone is as trained to see the differences in photographs as we, photography nuts, are.
The other thing that I realized is: unless you are taking photographs of celebrities…no one really cares that much….so you can do whatever you want. And on my way out of Atlanta, with my new inspiration and my new liberation, I visited Summer and Michael and their new baby Camden….the photos of her have received more hits than any of my other summer work. Why? Not because they are amazing but because her family who lives on the other side of the country cares……so photography can have different purposes…..we take photos to make us happy and we take photos to make others happy……it is nice to be able to do both.
to see more click here
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Everyone in Reidville, South Carolina, will tell you the hub of the town is the fire department. So I spent a day there to see for myself.
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Did you know there is an Andy Griffith Rerun Watchers Club and that they get together and celebrate Mayberry Day every year? I didn’t either until I met Warren at the Sons of Confederate Veterans meeting in Anderson, SC.
Why am I going to Sons of Confederate Veterans meetings?
Well Christian Exodus, the organization I was hoping to document this summer, listed a SCV meeting as a good thing for new-comers to SC to go to….so I went. I went to see if this organization, that only accepts members who have relatives who were in the Confederate War, would be a good group for non-southerners to go to…..although I was born in SC, I was born to parents from Illinois, so unless there are some long lost relatives, I will probably never be eligible for joining Sons of Confederate Veterans as a Confederate Rose.
My discoveries: although I will not ever really belong (for many reasons)…. I have found it to be a very interesting way to learn more about the Confederate War and the ideology of many true Southerners.
However, I found going with my new friends Homer and Judi, established members and relatives of some important Confederate soldiers, to be much better experience than going with my father from Illinois. So for other non-southerners, I recommend finding a Confederate Veteran Son to go with you because it makes a world of difference. If you have an interest in history, like new experiences and real Southern cooking, that inevitably includes meat and is served on styrofoam plates, then you will have a good time.
Homer bought his Confederate hat on ebay, he says it is the envy of many SCV members because you can not find hats like that anymore. His banana pudding with vanilla wafers is also the envy so if you go through a meal line with Homer’s pudding at the end, make sure you get a healthy serving beforehand because there won’t be any left when the line has gone through.
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every year we say “this will probably be the last year”
the last year of putt-putt (miniature golf) with the dilapidated safari animals and smurf-blue water.
the last year of standing outside restaurants waiting hours for really bad fried seafood, which no one orders anyway since the majority of our group does not eat seafood (but we do regretfully eat the hush-puppies with honey butter by the dozens which inevitably gives us an overfull feeling as we drive out of the parking lot.)
the last year of my grandfather making at least one grocery trip a day to ensure that the kitchen is stocked with as much junk food and sodas as we can possibly consume.
the last year of at least one person playing solitaire at any given time
the last year of silently reading and rocking back and forth on the porch through thousands of words together
the last year of swimming in the ocean that on most days, feels like a lukewarm bath tub with waves that are almost too small to be called waves but are still too much work for my 83 year old grandparents, my grandparents who keep these 30 year old traditions alive, the traditions that we travel thousands of miles for and that we simultaneously complain about and secretly relish.
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So I have been trying to use Matteo’s medium format camera…..for many reasons (including: I like the slower more thoughtful portraits and the waist level view finder)……but I am not sure I am getting results that are good enough, and at first I was frustrated and disappointed in my washed-out, flared results, but then I have started to like the images and I have been justifying the way they look to myself, by saying that it is just my style…..I am a quick shooter, I don’t like to use flash, I don’t like other gadgets or gizmos (tripods)….I want natural lighting even if it is poor indoor florescent lighting….because that is the way life is…..but what if people tell me I am being lazy and actually the quality sucks….then what, then I have spent a lot of money and time on a project that fails…..so I need some help…..here is an example of basically the same photo on both film and digital…..guess which is which……and then tell me which is better……
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going to the NASCAR restaurant with my mom and brother was like going to the sons of the confederates’ meeting with my dad…..both very inappropriate and very funny. But when my mom replied in her most serious poker voice, “NASCAR,” when we asked where we should go eat, we had no choice but to go to NASCAR. While neither venue had much to offer vegetarians, I have to say the NASCAR restaurant was more annoying because of the sensory and noise overload. Every table has a tv in addition to the 3 or 4 huge tv screens and many more smaller ones on the wall. I asked our waiter how many tvs there were and he said he had no idea but at least more than thirty. He is a high school teacher and is not interested in NASCAR but he said it was a good enough summer job and he could change the channels on the tvs at his tables and watch other sports when he wanted to.
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Linda Fultz is the most wonderful human on the planet. Her positive, creative, giving and loving spirit draws you in and makes you feel lucky just to know her. So it is not surprising that her house is full every Sunday as everyone, who is lucky to be invited, eagerly comes to recharge their souls with vibrant conversation and a huge home cooked meal, a tradition that has become rare in our increasingly fast food nation.
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This is Jody with her favorite Birthday present, she is going into the third grade.
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This is Taylor. She just turned 10 and for her birthday she wanted to have a boy-girl dance party. Her favorite presents were a razor to shave her legs and a toothbrush with a picture of a new boy-band singer who sings when you brush your teeth. She is wearing her new favorite clothes she got for her birthday.
Unfortunately the party was not a huge success, because it seems 10 year old boys are not as into dance parties as 10 year old girls and so Taylor spent most of the time upset that her boyfriend was not acting the way she wanted. And by the end of the party there was a rumor that he was going to break up with her which made her upset because she really wanted to have a boyfriend for the fifth grade. Taylor’s mom (left) and step-mom (right) tried to make her feel better by giving her their relationship advice.
Moments later the grandmother’s ex-husband, who she is dating again, rough-housed with this dog until the dog bit his arm and made him bleed.
somewhere between a handshake and two kisses 
