Wednesday, April 16, 2008

I Had to Do It!



Having taken photographs in earnest for the last year, I know it is impossible to re-take the same scene twice. I mean, you can do it, but your results are never the same. Nonetheless, this did not stop me from trying as my third best selling photograph is one that has problems. It is very noisy when blown up much bigger than a 16X20 which is not a good thing. When I took it last May I had no idea how to take photographs at the beach--nothing about white balance or using your flash on a sunny day. I've no idea now what settings I used, but the image needed improvement.

Unfortunately, although the daisies were still on the beach dunes, the other vegetation has grown all around it; I'm not sure it will evoke the same interest now.

When I got up this morning I got myself in gear, cleaning my desk, finally getting my business account online going, and in general taking care of business. I hopped in the car around 11 for the trip to Patrick Air Force Base beach where I took the beach daisies. It was an easy 60 mile drive on the Beachline and SR 520.

I've almost never taken 520 into Cocoa Beach before but since it's been widened it's a marvelous road, devoid of traffic. This took me past Merritt Square, a mall in Merritt Island. Memories flooded back after seeing it. You see, when I was 28 years old, serving dinner to our three very young children, the phone rang. It was my sister Nancy saying that our father was dead. Mostly I remember starting to scream. He was not sick, at least to our knowledge--it seems he died of a heart attack. My mom and her best friend were shopping at Merritt Square when it happened. Of course this was long before cell phones so the first my mom knew anything was wrong was when they turned down her street, seeing the ambulance in front of the house. The man across the street found him dead on the kitchen floor with their Siamese cat nestled on his legs.
My dad never even knew our Jon boy. I believe it was shortly after the funeral(the same day) breaking his arm. He was nearly three at the time. My, oh my, those were the days.

Bruce is always buying new CDs which I generally like. Today, while motoring, I listened to REM's new album, Accelerate, and Radiohead's In Rainbow. The later I liked, the former, not so much. I felt like the REM sounded not only angry, but repetitive--I kept thinking I'd heard the song already. On the other hand, to me, Radiohead's album was melodic, nuanced, and fresh.

Tomorrow I'm slipping back into my role as a radiologic technologist, attending a seven hour conference for continuing education points. Hopefully I'll be able to stay awake!----------------
Listening to: Radiohead - Fake Plastic Trees
via FoxyTunes

2 comments:

Amaya said...

I can only imagine the kind of grief you felt that day. The fact that the cat was nestled on his legs really touched me. I hope you found some kind of comfort knowing he had someone loving him until your mom returned.

Amaya said...

I forgot to mention - I REALLY like the top photo. REALLY.

So This is Springtime