This Year

2013 brought a lot of changes to my life, most of them good. This year I am hoping to be able to change some of the things I have become dissatisfied with in my life. 

Here's what's happened over the last year (or so):

2013:

• I chose a word for each month to inspire me to improve myself and kind of stuck to them.
• I celebrated 2 years with my guy.
• I took a photo class where I learned to use liquid emulsion and successfully printed photos onto wood, however I never posted any of them on the internet or took actual photos of them so other people could see them except in person. 
• I applied to graduate school to try and get my master's degree. I only got into one school (but that's one more than in previous attempts!) so I decided to go there.
• I competed in debate with some wonderful people and learned a lot about myself, my beliefs, and articulating those things to other people.
• I got a promotion at work and was able to be an assistant manager at a pool for the summer. Lack of teamwork and communication (on everyone's part) meant that I was constantly stressed and over-worked 
• so only about half the things planned for the summer happened.
• I went on some awesome trips and got to see some of my favorite places.
• I packed up my life into 4 (yes, I know that's excessive, I don't pretend to be a person of few possessions - plus they were all different sizes) suitcases and moved to England (to go to that school I got into).
• I made new friends (something I wasn't sure was possible anymore) that I have become closer to than most of the ones I left behind.
• I actually posted more than one blog post here (which seemed to be an achievement until I actually counted), in fact I posted 5 times this year... which is an all-time low.
• I completed a semester's worth of lectures, seminars, and labs (just 7,000 words and I'll be done with the semester).
• I fell in love with animal bone identification and study (ancient diet is my future professional weakness).
• I got to spend Christmas with an amazingly friendly and generous family (but forgot to get them anything to 
• show how much I appreciated it).
• I got to see my guy after spending 3 months away.
• I came to terms with the fact that I am an anxious person, that it isn't something that will just go away, and probably has something to do with the fact that I am probably ocd (and also realized I should talk to a doctor about all of this).

2014:

• I have already had a great (and a little saddening) start to my year. My guy was here to celebrate and just left early this morning, it was a difficult parting.
• I want to try and do the same thing as last year (with a word/goal/idea for each month to focus on) but I want to do better at staying focused on it throughout the month. 
• I want to do better at taking care of myself and showing the people around me how much I appreciate them (because I don't think I do it enough). 
• I want to try and be more organized for the entire year and work as hard as possible so I am less disappointed in the results. 
• I want to take more pictures this year. 
• I want to document my life more fully than I have ever before, including sharing it more openly and fully through different means (blogging more is a big part of this). 
• I want to work on documenting/photographing the people around me, which I know will take some time for me and them.

So, the words for each month of 2014:
January - Focus
February - Plan
March - Commit
April - Create
May - Give
June - Heal
July - Embrace
August - Share
September - Rejoice
October - Love
November - Learn
December - Reflect

I'm hoping to make a post at the beginning and end of the month on this subject. The one at the beginning will be to share what it is that the word for that month means to me, what I hope to accomplish that month and how I think I will be able to incorporate the word into those goals. At the end of the month, I'll discuss how well I feel I've done at keeping my word in mind, how well I've done at accomplishing my goals for the month, and also if I've found myself using words from earlier in the year. The goal is to work on myself, to grow and to take the ideas these words represent forwards into the next year and many more past that. 

P.S. Ignore the weird banner that's going on right now, I'm going to fix it later this week. I know it looks like crap...

The Return

I'm here. 

I've been here all along.

There is a yearning in me,

To document, create, store, and create some more.

But my methods are broken. 

My mind has lost interest. 

A piece seems to be missing.

No photo right now, just some words. 


Words about the future and thoughts about my lack of life goals. 


Because I do really lack life goals at this point in my life. 


Yesterday, on a whim, I made a decision... one the I never thought I would come to (oh wow, this sounds so much more dramatic than it should). I decided to make a New Year's Resolution this year. And so I will be beginning a new and trying photo project. One to help me to be more comfortable with who I am and hopefully figure out some things about what I want to do in the future. 


I am going to attempt, as well as I can, to take one photo every day and to write something, even if it is just a few words, to go along with that photo. I know that this is a demanding thing to do but my hope is that it will take me somewhere new in my photography and my life. 


I'm going to start on January 1st and I will be using this space to share my project with, well, everyone. I probably won't be posting anything else until then.... and I know that very few people even read this, but it is becoming more of something for myself than anyone else. 

I hate when people say photography is an easy artform. That is an impossibility, art is never easy, it is an expression of who you are and therefore takes more courage than most people realize. Good photography evokes the feelings of the photographer in the viewer, good photography tells you something about the soul that was behind the camera when the photo was taken. Good photography is not easy, it is one of the most difficult things I do (and I happen to be teaching myself calculus right now). I simply wish that my photography actually was good, right now it simply feels decent, nothing more, nothing less.

In other news, the winter rains and chills have come back to Portland, part of me dreads it and part of me is excited to be able to continue the project this photo is from... Portland in the Rain.