When the new year started my family and I talked about where we wanted to go as a family in 2023. Both Arann and Ally said New Orleans. I remembered Fibershed, a nonprofit I have photographed for since 2010, has an affiliate program in Louisiana, so I reached out to see if I could document the affiliate program during our spring break.
Luckily Fibershed said ‘yes’ and so we made our plans. These are the photos of our family adventure on either side of the work portion of the trip. I am very excited to share the photos and stories from the affiliate trip in a later post.
For now here are film photos of our family adventure in New Orleans and Cajun country. I love photographing film for our family adventures. It means I am limited how much I can photograph, so I get to be present in the moment instead of photographing, and I don’t spend time on the trip looking at and sharing photos. When the film is eventually developed it feels like a gift to travel back to our adventure and see what photos made and which didn’t. Which photos will live on to tell the story of our lives.
I did the Top Nine photo generator on Instagram, but I didn’t agree with the photos it chose, so I picked my own.
These Top Nine (plus one) aren’t photos that other people “liked” best.
They are not photos that an algorithm deemed worthy enough to show other people.
They are not photos that I was hired to take, or that will help get me new jobs.
They are photos from my life that I like best.
They are photos that remind me to slow down and make time for my own life.
They are photos that remind me that life is short and I only have one chance to live it.
They are all photos taken on film with cameras that quite likely will not give me results that I expected, but they almost always give me photos that I love.
So here is to a slow new year, ignoring algorithms, being present in our own lives and having experiences that will likely not be what we expect, but will almost always be what we love.
somewhere between a handshake and two kisses 