I finally got all my grades turned in and got on the road for my Christmas vacation sojourn. I’m sitting at Port City Java in Wilmington checking e-mail and updating the Blog. Going to deliver some of my latest home brew “Andei’s Irish Red Ale” to Ross and his buddies. Plan on crashing in his RV tonight after we hit a few of my favorite pubs downtown Wilmington.
Tomorrow I’m driving to Asheville to visit my brother and then Sunday head north to Virginia to see an old college buddy Joe Champagne. I need a break! Next semester is going to be nuts with lots of new online courses that I am setting up to teach for colleges across the state. Ok…my battery is about dead – will update with some photos tomorrow.
Man its good to be off work and on vacation! Beer time! cheers
I haven’t had any time for posting the past 2 weeks due to all my photo and art courses wrapping up. Today is my final photography lecture and then I’ll get the rest of my grades submitted and finally get some down time. Plan on driving to Ashville, NC to visit my brother Dennis this coming weekend. Andei is flying to Rome and then Sicily for the Christmas break and I’m going to travel to visit friends and family for a good part of the Christmas break. She will be taking a tour of the American University in Rome – the college she hopes to be accepted to for next Fall 2010.
From Ashville I’ll be driving to Bristol Va. to visit my good buddy Joe Champagne and then head north to New York to spend Christmas with the folks and hopefully get a day in the city to roam the MET Museum.
More later….oh yea – the beer I made last month tastes awesome! Irish Red Ale. Yea Ha! Lots of Christmas presents in big bottles
I just finished developing 2 rolls of black and white film that I shot this past weekend using both my Holga medium format “plastic camera” and Diana camera on the pinhole setting. Making photographs for me is incredibly cathartic and therapeutic, in addition to just being a very fulfilling creative process.
I just don’t get out enough to make photographs like I used to because all the demands on my time with work and all my freelance online teaching. I mentioned to my colleague Cathy Crowell just how much I enjoyed going out to shoot pictures and she looked up at me and said that “in many ways photography is like meditation”. As soon as she said it I knew what the title of my next blog post would be.
It really isn’t about the finished framed image that hangs on the wall of a gallery or our home. The true joy in photography for me at least comes from the SEEING. Spending an afternoon in search of interesting and unique compositions with cameras (Holga & Diana) that have very little technical controls – this forces me to be hypersensitive to the subtle nuances of my surroundings. You can take great photographs just about anywhere if you are able to truly be “in the moment” and learn to dissect external reality into dynamic and creative images.
When I put myself into the “photographic zone” all the anxieties in my life melt away and I totally focus on making pictures. I constantly scan my surroundings in search for potential pictures. Its a spiritually nourishing process and literally feeds my creative soul. Here are some of my favorites from my last photographic sojourn.
It’s a quite Thanksgiving morning and I’m alone in my house enjoying a cup of coffee. It’s nice having a few days off from work, although when you teach online you never truly get a day off – there’s always something you can work on or somebody to respond to. I’ve been thinking about what I am thankful for since going to bed last night. I must admit, I’ve been deeply troubled by the state of our great nation and the direction our “so called” leaders are taking us as a country. With that said…I’m going to focus on positive things in this post and make an effort to leave my politics out of it (for the most part) so here it goes…
First and foremost I’m thankful for my family. I don’t know where I’d be without them. I’m incredibly blessed to still have my parents living on this earth. They are (and always have been) a great source of strength and support to me. I’m thankful for my children Adam and Andei. What a wonderful gift they’ve been to me over the years. I’m thankful that I got to visit my son (Peace Corp
Volunteer) last month in El Salvador. I’m really proud of him and the work he is doing down there. After almost 4 years of my daughter living away from me she is back now and has lived with me since last May. What a tremendous gift her being here during her final year of High School has been even though we’ve had our share of ups and downs together.
I’m extremely thankful for my job and the various career opportunities I’ve had over the years. In this time of employment uncertainty, I am particularly thankful to have meaningful work that I enjoy doing. Even though I’m close to retirement I still get up in the morning and am excited about teaching art and photography + distance learning to our students and faculty at the college.
I’m very thankful for the FREE country I live in and pray it stays that way through these troubling political times. I’m also thankful for our awesome military and the selfless men and women who risk (and have given) their lives serving our nation.
I’m also thankful for our veterans and proud to count myself as one who has served our country. I’m thankful for the Constitution of the United States and our Founding Fathers who had the vision and insight to create a document that is based on individual freedom and liberty.
I’m thankful for our FREEDOM and the fact that I can still articulate my views without fear of reprisal – freedom of speech is one of the first freedoms to be taken from people – usually before they even realize it has happened.
Cathy Crowell Looking at Student Work at SPE Print Sharing
I’m thankful for my wonderful friends and colleagues. You’re lucky to go through life and be able to count all your friends on one hand. I have been blessed with many friends even though I don’t see many of them very often.
I’m thankful for my health and my faith. Without faith there really isn’t any hope – at least in my opinion. I’m thankful for the faith in God my parents instilled in me at a young age – it is constantly evolving, but has never completely left me and has gotten me through some very difficult times.
I just woke up from a dream where I was in a huge airliner flying over New York City with tall buildings zooming by directly below me. It was raining really hard and I could hear the rain pounding the wings and fuselage of the aircraft. For some reason I was able to look out a small window directly in front of me and could see the skyscrapers and some trees directly below when all of a sudden the plane flying very low slammed into the tops of some trees and started to bank and crash into the buildings. I was praying intensely and repetitively with my hands clasped tightly, and at that split second before the plane crashed I awoke and jumped up in bed. Whew! That was one vivid dream and reminding me just how blessed I am to be alive at 56 years old. So many of my childhood friends have died over the years and this Irish New Yorker is still kicking here in North Carolina.
I truly have a great deal to be thankful for as Thanksgiving approaches. Visiting my son Adam (Peace Corp Volunteer) a few weeks ago in El Salvador was a wake up call for me. We take so many things for granted here in the states. Sure…we have our own set of problems, but I am not going to address politics in this post. With that said, I do believe politicians are the biggest threat to America and personal freedom at this point in time. I believe many people are waking up to this fact – I just hope its not to late.
Back to counting blessings. I have a great and rewarding job doing what I love to do. How many people can say that? Especially with the unemployment situation in this country. I think when things seem really bad or hopeless in our lives its important to just take a deep breath and assess what we do have and the opportunities that are still available to us as Americans. I mean just little things like running water, electricity, refrigeration and a roof over our heads. There are so many people in 3rd world countries (and here at home) that don’t have these basic things and still walk around with big smiles on their faces and are able to enjoy and appreciate life. Unfortunately, we get so caught up in what we don’t have (myself included) we forget to take stock in what we do have, and the freedoms and opportunities this great country affords us.
I believe life is what we make it and in many ways we determine our personal destiny by the attitudes we have towards life and our expectations for it. I’ll readily admit I’ve been feeling down lately for a variety of reasons. Sitting here in my comfortable home with running water, electricity and indoor plumbing, sipping on a cup of coffee and having a job to go to is definitely a wake up call to shrug off any negative feelings and feel good and blessed about what I do have which is a great deal more than a majority of the people in the world. I am going to have to think twice before getting back in an airplane. I wonder if that dream was a vision or warning of some kind.
Time to shower, get dressed and go to work. Life really is pretty good now that I think about it. Oh What a Lucky Man I Am!
Things have been really hectic for me ever since getting back from visiting Adam in El Salvador. I have been coordinating Distance Learning Workshops and trying to get caught up on all my online courses. With that said…I did find time last night to brew 5 Gallons of Red Ale for the Christmas season. I have not brewed beer in awhile and it was fun. Andei didn’t like the smell of the wort as I was boiling it but did get a kick out of me making beer in the kitchen. Brewing beer is always fun and relaxing. Anyone can do it – you just have to follow directions carefully and keep everything sanitary. Early next week I’ll bottle it and then the hard part is waiting 25-30 days for it to be ready to drink. cheers!
I must say my trip to El Salvador to visit with my son Adam in the Peace Corp was very insightful and enjoyable. I learned a lot about the Peace Corp and was really impressed with the work Adam and his fellow Peace Corp volunteers are doing to help the people over there. I hope to go back in the Spring to assist Adam with his computer lab project for the little school he is teaching for. I will be posting more about a fundraiser I want to coordinate in the months to come.
I’m planning to help raise funds build a little computer lab and some new bathrooms for the school. I’m also actually considering joining the Peace Corp after I retire in in the next 2 years. I want to do more research into it, but this is something I could see myself doing for the next chapter of my life before truly settling down – hmmmm, I don’t think I will actually ever settle down, but maybe slow down just a little.
Everyday has been an adventure since arriving in El Salvador last Friday. Hard to believe a week has flown by. Adam hooked up with two other Peace Corp Volunteers yesterday and we hiked to a waterfall and then walked all around this very artsy town of Suchitoto. El Salvador is still a little like the wild west. You see guys with hand guns, machetes and big shot guns walking around. There doesn’t seem to be many traffic laws and its every man and woman for him/herself on the roads. Your dollar does go far here though – so much more cost effective than traveling around Europe. This first photos is a view from my hotel window. I have wireless and a decent room for $20. Not bad! Food (and beer) is cheap as well. Here are some more photos I took the past 2 days.
So far my sojourn in El Salvador has been a truly amazing and an eye opening experience for me. This is my first time visiting Central America and my son Adam who is working as a Peace Corp Volunteer here since last February.
I can’t get over how much I’ve seen and experienced in the past 5 days. The people are absolutely beautiful, friendly and incredibly hospitable. We rented a car and spent my first day in El Salvador at the beach. The waves (HUGE) are like nothing I have ever seen. We just relaxed at a very rustic beach hacienda and I watched Adam surf and took it easy before driving into the interior of the country.
I’ve had an opportunity to stay in Adam’s humble home located off a 12 mile long dirt road, visit with Adam’s neighbors in his village, eat the local food, attend the festival of corn “maize” and be recognized and honored in front of 1000+ people during the opening ceremony for that harvest festival.
We visited the local school Adam teaches in, had photographs taken with the teachers and children, learned about the needs of the community and school, his teaching and peace corp projects and am getting a real feel for what it would be like to be a Peace Corp volunteer. I must say this type of volunteer work is not for the faint of heart and is a real culture shock from all the creature comforts in the states.
Woman in the outer villages (where Adam is stationed) still wash clothes in the river. Most homes don’t have plumbing and many don’t have any electricity.
Yes…this is a very different world from the one I live in and must admit that I would have difficulty acclimating myself to this rustic and simple (hard) live. Just doing the basics like getting your clothes washed, food cooked, and yourself clean is a chore and takes considerable time and effort. I will let the pictures tell the rest of the story of my El Salvador travel experience for now.
When I return I’ll post more comprehensive observations and photographs from my visit here to spend some time with my son who is doing an amazing job as a Peace Corp Volunteer. His Spanish skills are fluent and he knows everyone in the community he lives in and seems very well liked. What can I say? I’m a proud Dad!
I always get inspired when I go to these photographic conferences. It’s great hearing so many wonderful image makers talk about and share their work. I also enjoy seeing old friends and colleagues like my ECU Graduate School Professor Henry Stindt (photo below right) and so many other photo educators I’ve had the pleasure to meet over the years. It’s hard to believe I’ve been attending these conferences since 1985 and it was SPE that helped me land my first “real” teaching job. I’m motivated to go out a take pictures every chance I have in-between work and the various other demands on my time. My students got a lot out of the conference as well. I had them share their thoughts in class yesterday with the other students. Now the entire class wants to start planning for SPE National in Philadelphia this coming March.
One of the key themes behind this conference was making the transition from the college environement to the working world. Speakers like Mark Malone addressed exit strategies for transitioning from college to a photographic career. We just don’t spend enough time on this important issue in our photo programs. I for one plan on incorporating more business and marketing practices in my final Portfolio II course.
There is no doubt that the photographic industry has changed dramatically in the past 10 years and is in a constant state of change due to the rapid evolution of digital technology. Keeping abreast of technology is an important factor in preparing oneself for a career in photography & imaging.
It was also great to hear recent graduates talk about how they’ve pursued their photo careers. I heard it over and over again during the conference. You can’t be a quitter in this industry and you MUST be persistent when it comes to exploring ever option for getting a foothold in the photographic industry. When one door closes you just go to the next one. You get knocked down just get back up and explore your next option. This is great advise for all of us no matter where we are in our careers.
I must admit it was also exiting to be one of the presenters at this years conference. Teaching effectively in the online environment is so crucial now that so many colleges are adopting distance learning and using course management systems like Blackboard and Moodle at their institutions. It was also the first time I did a live Webinar at the same time of my presentation. To think I had people from Italy, Holland, and various states on the US watching my presentation and asking questions is mind boggling to me. This is something I definitely want to do again and get more proficient at.
My college has its SACS Accreditation visit today and I must attend 2 meetings in-between classes so I’ll wrap this post up for now. My powerpoint presentation about Blogging, YouTube and iTunes is linked to the post below. Busy week ahead and then off to El Salvador to visit my son Adam who is in the Peace Corp. I spoke with him yesterday on Skype and he is really excited for me to come and has a great week planned for us. I will be bringing my camera for sure.
I finally got all my grades turned in and got on the road for my Christmas vacation sojourn. I’m sitting at Port City Java in Wilmington checking e-mail and updating the Blog. Going to deliver some of my latest home brew “Andei’s Irish Red Ale” to Ross and his buddies. Plan on crashing in his RV tonight after we hit a few of my favorite pubs downtown Wilmington.
I’m very thankful for the FREE country I live in and pray it stays that way through these troubling political times. I’m also thankful for our awesome military and the selfless men and women who risk (and have given) their lives serving our nation.
