Sunrise

When I was in college, I went to a sunrise wedding on Sullivan's Island. It was dark when we arrived. The moon was still shining on the water. As the sky turned lighter blue, I could see shapes of people walking down the path over the dunes. Most of the guests were barefoot and carried coffee cups, still steaming. Some of them had sleepy, slowly blinking eyes, like dosing cats. The sun peaked up over the Atlantic turning the sand pink and yellow. The bride's sister handed her some flowers she had put together for her. Everyone whispered.

There were no cameras. That was the part that fascinates me. I thought about the Indigo Girls lyrics, "don't write it down. Don't take a picture. Remember this in your heart," and I have. But as I stood there as a 21-year-old watching this experience, all I could think about was the photographs that I wanted to take: how beautiful the bride looked, how proud the adult children looked and how her golden retriever napped at their feet during the vows. The ceremony lasted 10 minutes and I can think of 100 photographs that I wish I could have taken: photos that would have been nice for the couple to have and return to on hard days. It was so peaceful. At the time, I felt like taking a photograph might have taken something from that very quiet moment.

I think about the peace of that experience every time I see the sunrise, or carry my coffee cup to an early morning destination. I hope I can bring that kind of peace even when (especially when) I have the camera with me.

Heartbeats

I spent Saturday with a family celebrating their daughter's first birthday. They are the kind of people you wish lived next door so that you could hear them laughing and be waived over for a beer in the afternoon. They are lovely and the village of people they have collected to love this baby are welcomed like family.

We got to see Away We Go and I loved every word. I can't remember the last time I saw something so close to my own experience that I felt like it was just for me. A quiet gift. I'm so grateful for experiences like that. It's the kind of art that steadies me and keeps my heart going at 60 beats per minute.

I picked up the soundtrack and Vendela Vida's book Let The Northern Lights Erase Your Name. The soundtrack is great writing music. I am saving the book for a rainy day.

Your Summer Work Out Mix

Outrun the treadmill with this summer work-out mix that I put together now available through itunes. Warning: Contains explicit lyrics.

Check out Artists Who Blog

I recently stumbled upon a site Artists Who Blog. It's a great place to discover so many talented people and it is where I found the work and blog of Shelby Healey. Lovely.




Her etsy shop is here.

More Mary!

I am literally taking notes watching The Mary Tyler Moore show's first season on Hulu.
FREAK OUT!
First, it is beautifully done. Ted Knight. The Love Boat Captain. Ed Asner. You can't lose. The blocking and sets make you feel like you are watching live performance.
But Mary's clothes and the furniture in her house are just beyond. I can't get enough of it. I love every outfit she wears in the pilot. I wish I could find more still images to share with you. Here's a few.





What I couldn't find in photos are the super cute boots she wears, and the cool trousers worn with a crisp white shirt, heels and gold necklaces. The masculine cut in a feminine way. Very cool. The fashion is its own character, like in Breakfast at Tiff's or Sex And The City.
And to have a platform on the floor separating the room that doubles as a bookshelf? Eames chairs? The tulip tables?
So cute.

Photography Inspiration

I first noticed Roger Neve's work in these perfect ads for Isaac.


But his photos of Benjamin Bratt and Talisa Soto in this month's O Magazine will stop you mid page flip. They are timeless and romantic and the colors really pop. This one below is one that I scanned in, so it doesn't do the image justice. There are several pages of photos of them so be sure to check out the hard copy version.

I love stories and photos of married couples that are just as romantic as ones of brand new relationships. Love his work and he has me thinking about portrait sessions in a new way.


He is one to watch.

The Ever-Rising Tide

In reading about the writing process for Away We Go, I learned that the married screenwriters of the film {Dave Eggers & Vendela Vida) don't have internet at home.


Dave Eggers was quoted in this interview as saying, "For us, to be able to concentrate, we don't have internet at home, for example, because we had to put a levee up against that ever-rising tide. That's the way for us to control our intake. There's a lot of media really affected by all these changes, but what's funny is that the book world has kind of stayed constant. Sales are about what they always were, we've found."

Wow. I admire their discipline and it must be working based on their success and quality of their work. And it's not like he's a ludite or something. He hosts a website himself.

While we are not good candidates to give up the internet, there is a larger message I can take from his point about how important it is to limit media consumption when you are trying to create. Everything I produce creatively as a photographer or writer or attorney is certainly affected by all of the media changes. For the most part, it has been a good thing. I am accustomed to creating with the short hand convenience of hyperlinking so that the reader can easily hear the song, see the film clip, read the case I am referencing, etc. But this sensory supplement does make it more difficult for me to make things quiet. Sometimes I wonder as a writer if it is lazy to just show the thing, whatever it is, rather than find a creative way to describe it.

Over the past couple of years, I have tried to quiet the house and streamline. I canceled the home phone, redirected email addresses to one in-box, cut off cable, canceled TiVo, unsubscribed to most newsletters and junk mailers, and yet, it still feels like a constant barrage of information: texts, emails, mail, voice mails, updates.

I will work on how to do more, just after I check my email.

How To Make A Paper Boat

I mention in my website bio that I made paper boats as a child with my grandpa, so I thought I would share this helpful demonstration. I sailed one in my daughter's bath the other night and she loved it.

How To Make A Paper Boat - Funny blooper videos are here

And, I just love this post from Zen Habits about pursuing dreams. What would will you do when you quiet the naysayers?

Let's pretend we are still at the beach with...

A vacation in a pot:

Poppytalk had a great post about making a Beach Garden in a pot from Sunset Magazine. Just lovely.



Beach Reading:
I am reading Shakespeare Wrote for Money, Nick Hornby's collection of columns for The Believer Magazine and sequel to The Polysyllabic Spree. I am always a little sad when I finish his books. He's the kind of guy you wish you could have over for dinner.

I'm only a few pages into Their Eyes Were Watching God and I'm already underlining beautiful passages. For example, the powerful first lines of the book:

"Ships at a distance have every man's wish on board. For some they come in with the tide. For others they sail forever on the horizon, never out of sight, never landing until the Watcher turns his eyes away in resignation, his dreams mocked to death by Time. That is the life of men."

My husband has peaked my interest in Kazuo Ishiguro's novels {Remains of the Day, Never Let Me Go, A Pale View of Hills etc.} I will let you know.

Pat Conroy's South of Broad comes out August 11th. I spent enough years in Charleston to recognize a character or two in his books, so it's worth a trip to the library to see the latest installment of elite life at the tip of the peninsula.

The new Victoria and Coastal Living Colors issues are beautiful eye candy. Also, this month's O has a great spread on books. Here's a link to their summer reading list. I've noticed several summer reading lists have included Dreaming in Hindi and Are You There Vodka, It's me Chelsey.

Beach House Style
When I go to yard sales, they hardly ever look like the "Tag Sales" where Martha Stewart finds cool beach glass and milk bottle vases. When frustrated by an unsuccessful attempt at finding cheap vintage, eye candy is always available at Farmhouse Wares.

I have been visiting this website for North Carolina's Cottage Chic Store for years.


It is great for window shopping.

What are you reading this summer? Any beach products you can't live without?

Cheers to you, Dads

I adore my father.
It's kind of ridiculous how much.
My daughter's father is an incredible human being, too. The bar was set high for my expectations for my child's father, and yet he always surprises me with all that he does for us.

My favorite thing is seeing the two of them together, my father and my husband, laughing hysterically, usually over a glass of red wine. So, this little column from Dottie & John about chilled reds for summer seemed appropriate today.



Cheers to you and to my father-in-law who has my love, too, as we laugh hysterically over cold Miller Lite.

**for more of Dottie & John, read their memoir Love By The Glass, one of my all-time favorite love stories.

Date Night!

I can't wait to see it. Is it on here? No. Will it ever be? Who knows. But I would love to see it.
The beautiful soundtrack by Alexi Murdoch is to be released this week. I love that the screenplay was written by a couple {Dave Eggers and Vendela Vida} who are both amazing writers.

Also coming out this week on June 23rd is Regina Spektor's new album, Far. It's gotten some less than favorable reviews, but I'm still interested. Speaking of which, I bought the new Dave Matthews and well...sadly, it's just not my thing.

However, the new Black Eyed Peas, The Energy Never Dies, completely delivers. It's hopeful. It's interesting, but it's still light enough to accompany you at a cook-out or on the treadmill.

I'm tightening up all of my photography business materials with a blue-teal-white color palette. Maybe that's what reminded me of this old album cover from Madonna's Ray of Light which I picked up used at CD Central for 6 bucks this week.


It is perfectly sunkissed for summer.

A Postcard

My parents are celebrating 100 years of marriage this month. Not really, but it has been a long time. As Cliff says, "a little romantic inspiration," for your anniversary.

Cosby Show sing Night Time Is The Right Time by Ray Charles
Uploaded by ecureuilvolant.

and just for you, a link to your song.

Tempo

My husband took this while I was trying to {quite precariously} set up the mast head photo. It's an out-take of course that I would normally delete, just like every other photo that I happen to find myself in. When I pass by this one in the iphoto library, I see the tea that I was spilling, the weight that won't go away, the bra strap. The problems.
I see the problems.
This is something I am working on.

The night before my daughter's 1st birthday party, I worked on her cake until 2 in the morning. My first attempt at a pink cake in the shape of a number 1 came out looking very much like .... well....boy parts.
One boy part really. So I had to start over.

I worked so hard on everything to make it a pretty party to celebrate both her birthday and getting through what had been a very tough year: a year where I went back to work full time 9 weeks after she was born... a year when we had been through Rotavirus, RSV, Hand-Foot-Mouth, ear infections, and vomiting blood. A year when my husband had to take a master's exam after being up all night bailing water out of the basement. A year of contentious cases and deadlines and the beginning of my sleeplessness. A year that was just as challenging for us as it is for anyone else who has had a baby.

I just wanted it to be a nice day. I wanted my daughter to have photos from the day that she could look back on and think, "I was really loved."

One guest, who doesn't really know me very well, said without smiling and to no one in particular, "well, everything is just perfect, isn't it. As usual." Back-handed is the perfect description of that kind of compliment.

I guess she didn't see the black circles under my eyes, the cake in the trash can, the weeds in the garden, the years I'd spent hoping for a child.

That kind of comment or ones like it (it's easy for you, it's perfect for you) are meant to put you on a raft and cast you out to sea while everyone else turns their backs and goes back to the beach bonfire of common experience. You can't relate. It's perfect for you. You're not one of us. You're on your own.

About a month ago, I got the same kind of comment about this space which has sort of made me not want to post here since because I want to make sure that I'm not sending the very dangerous message (particularly for mothers) that being a parent, or anything really, is easy or perfect.

Like most people, cropped outside the margins of my work, somewhere in the periphery of each image or essay are enormous personal heartbreaks that I may never, ever find a way to fill. And, as it is my goal as a writer to do no harm, I don't feel it is appropriate to write here about tragedies that don't just involve me. None of us live or work in a vacuum. But I try to leave the good stuff here as the focal point: the things I am grateful for and want to return to when the day is cold or the night is long. When I sit down with anyone for very long, I find that all of us have had a rough go at one time or another, especially in these times.

There's a moment at the end of The Royal Tenenbaums when Ben Stiller's character turns to his father and admits, "It's been a really tough year, Dad." That scene always makes me cry. It has been hasn't it? For all of us.

There is no one form of expression that can encapsulate human experience. This place is just my metronome, a lightly tapping foot to remind me to slow down, be thankful, notice beauty. I hope it is for you, too.

------

In the good energy department, Katy, the beautiful new PhD had her second amazing son Owen this month and also the brilliant soon-to-be PhD Grims introduces her beautiful Nuala Jane.
Two new babies of super moms who stop by here from time to time. You are the luckiest little babies! I'm honored to know your moms.

A New Day

I launched a new website this week for my photography business, Paper Boat. Until now, I was hosting through blogger. I'm still doing some tweaking, but it's great to see a dot com sailing.

Teaworthy will now be the landing page for the photography blog site, so there will be posts here from time to time about photo shoots. I'm excited to streamline content and have more frequent posts here.

It's an exciting step for me that has taken years to evolve. Like Will.i.am sings, it's a new day.

Sand In My Shoes

As wonderful as it is to finally be home, I've been thinking about this song while sorting out the laundry and wondering how to keep the kind of peace I find in these colors after the sand has been washed out, when the air is not as welcoming.

Every weekend should begin and end with salt water, warmth and moonglow.