this is bruce's blog

Picking Up Where The World Left Off...

2009-03-22T22:23:00.009-04:00

©2009 Bruce Anttila van Hoover ~ thisisbruce.com

Completed my first digital illustration since 2005. The second in a series of three airplanes called "Blue Yonder." I plan to print these 5 feet wide and put on a show this summer with a few photography pieces - see my photography blog for those details (coming soon)

Seems spring is a very productive time of the year. I've had my 7th week in a row of 50+ hours. With so many people suffering out there and with so many unemployed, I cherish every moment I am working. I am thankful for each and every client, each project, each mundane detail, I cherish all of you, clients who have faith in me and in my work. I am honored by each request no matter how big or small.

So much has happened, it's obvious I can't bring you up to date in one blog, nor will I try.

(Pandora is the new sliced bread.)

I've lost 1 client, gained 5 more, bought a house, remodeled (and still remodeling) it, I have a new 400sf office, wood-burning stove to keep me warm in the winter, and a new MacBook Pro laptop computer, which is nothing short of amazing. I am working now across all time zones, from DC to Hawaii!

I've joined a rock band, picked up my illustrations, and feel I am on an upswing of creativity. I feel like I am doing what I need to do, in every keystorke, every mouse click, every creative glance at my monitor, every run up my piano, every dreary morning chopping wood to get a fire lit for the day's warmth. I am blessed. I have found flow in Montana.

Did I mention the rock band?

Missoula Weekend

2008-04-28T21:57:00.007-04:00

Complete story on this can be found at Newly Nomads.

Changable Seasons...

2008-03-31T21:05:00.005-04:00

Image: Sunflowers. ©2008 Bruce Anttila van Hoover ~ THISISBRUCE.COM, LLC

You may or may not have noticed, I self-edited. Right here, there was a post, now it is replaced with this one. Yup. Gone. Two clicks and done. Sorry, this blog isn't about student loans and frankly the solicits were getting annoying. Damn phishers.

It's another night home alone without Tia. I'm struggling to find things to do with myself when she is working late. I exercise at lunchtime, best weather of the day in the peripheral season in a northern climate. I think I may start composing music again. I miss my keyboard.

I'm working in the art room on some evenings when inspiration strikes. The artisan gods have blessed me recently with another project. You remember the last one, "Nude with Wine" yeah, that was months ago, like four months, to the day. I've worked on projects since then, you won't see them here, they had a purpose... to help start our nightly fires. The oil colors lit up in an insignificant momentary blaze. They weren't worth the paper I spent to produce it, not to mention the time and the materials.

So I'm on another project. Or done actually. The energy flow working in my favor for a change. Beautiful time spent. Just wish this kind of inspiration would strike more often...

The days are getting longer. I'm seeing the full-swing of the season change! Just need warmer weather!

Hope you enjoy it.

THISISBRUCE.COM, LLC is launched!

2008-01-24T13:45:00.001-05:00

Well, quite a bit has happened since I blogged last. I registered my business name with the State of Montana, established a business bank account, found a CPA to help me set up my business, AND I am now a member of the Kalispell Chamber of Commerce. I am now officially THISISBRUCE.COM, LLC. Feels strange and powerful to say I am now a DOT COM business! I've gotten used to being BRUCE, the guy people send work to, the freelancer. I feel so "ADULT" now!

I solicited people I work with and work for in order to get some advice on how I should attract new business for myself. I got some great responses and I thank everyone for helping me with that undertaking. As a result, I've written my "30-second" spot, the way I tell others about who I am and what I'm doing:

"Thisisbruce.com is an advertising and marketing company offering high-end creative services at competitive prices. Work produced at Thisisbruce.com is always fresh and always created from scratch, ensuring you get customized, original artwork, never a template or clip art. Specializing in corporate and brand identity (logo design), web design, integrated advertising campaigns, marketing and print collateral, outdoor signage and environmental design, fleet and vehicle graphics, animation, and professional photography. Thisisbruce.com is optimized for working with small to medium-sized businesses, entrepreneurs, celebrities, government offices, and not-for-profit organizations. While Thisisbruce.com is a web-based company, in-person meetings are considered the standard. Samples of work can be found at Thisisbruce.com. Please call for a complimentary analysis of your current advertising needs, 941/224.0415 or email me at bruce@thisisbruce.com."

I've also begun learning Microsoft Excel and have created myriads of spreadsheets to track the workflow and cashflow. I've learned how to better manage my expenses and how to document EVERYTHING that happens. I've even been able to pay my overhead this month and come very close to hitting my target financial goal, the first time since moving here in September. Yes, business is picking up. Maybe soon I'll actually draw a salary! We'll see. Lots of hurdles to cross in the coming months.

Let's see, I've also modified my website to be more attractive to searches and more content friendly, so new potential customers will be able to see who I am and what I do. It's still a work in progress and I anticipate more changes to come, but at least there's something there to work with. I am now also learning more about the mysteries of Search Engine Optimization as well as CSS. I'm excited to be picking up these things, more and more these days, potential employers want everything from their Art Directors. they want the killer creative mind, the awesome design abilities AND the avid programmer. That is a rare find indeed, but if they're looking for it, chances are there's a population out there that can fill the gap and I need to be on top of it. Not that I'm looking for employment, but I need to keep fresh in the industry, plus I get bored if I'm not stimulated enough, so I'm self-stimulating, er um... learning more every day!

I've been unsuccessful now at becoming an iStock contributing photographer. Seems my images aren't crisp enough and I'm beginning to doubt my photography capabilities. Not sure if it's me or my camera. I have a stigmatism which hinders my ability to sharply focus, but when I look at past pictures, up close in Photoshop, I can't seem to find a definitive focal point and the image seems completely out of focus. Not good. ALL 50 of the images I set aside as my best from this summer are rubbish. It's really quite a blow to the ego. I'm going to keep on shooting, I want to prove a point after all, but not as hopeful as I was about selling my work as stock.

Happy New Year

2008-01-01T12:58:00.000-05:00

Image: "Nude Reclining on Sofa with Wine" ©Bruce Anttila van Hoover ~ thisisbruce.com

Happy New Year!

I rang in the new year this year in a new way, I was painting. Tia and I discovered a new technique, unique to Montana. Painting with cattle markers. Cattle markers are oil-based sticks, resistant to fading and weather and are applied directly to livestock for the purpose of displaying ownership. Some local artists have been using them to create artwork. We picked up a set of markers, they come in 9 different colors, and have been experimenting with them.

I want to thank Bo for sending a great little art book on living messy, and Tia for encouraging me to get off the sofa!

Enjoy!
Image: "Valentine's Day Pattern" ©Bruce Anttila van Hoover ~ thisisbruce.com

Image: "Bird in Flight" ©Bruce Anttila van Hoover ~ thisisbruce.com

Behind Again...

2007-12-25T12:06:00.000-05:00

WOW! I have been really away haven't I?

Well, I have been busy... Lots of work in December should make for good paychecks in January. I've also been pounding the proverbial (virtual) pavement recently. I applied for about 15 jobs both permanent and freelance across the country. I have an interview with a company that hires freelance photographers to photograph hotels, which is nicely up my alley, AND it involves some travel! I hope it works out. I'm also trying to get my work accepted to stock photography sites to make a little more income when I can. I submitted my work a month ago, but I guess there's a backlog of people trying to get in. Wish me luck there.

I'm with Bo and that I really haven't had much to say here. Just trying to keep focused on staying busy, updating my website, working, keeping on the path, but it isn't easy. We're trying to remain a one car family, but then that leaves me with either taking Tia to work some days during the week, leaving me with a one-hour commute to and from my work (when I work 10' from our bedroom), or I'm stranded at home. Cheaper yes, less gas, yes, smaller eco footprint, yes, lonely and isolating, OH YEAH.

I miss my blog friends, I miss our connections but frankly haven't felt motivated to reach out, either I don't have enough to say because nothing really ever changes for me here or I don't want to hear myself whine. But I will try to be more positive and more bloggerly in the coming months. It's the silly season so life tends to get a little unbalanced.

Anyway...

Hope you have a safe and prosperous new year!

Mindnumbing and Mindboggling!

2007-11-28T19:09:00.000-05:00

It's been a slow couple of weeks for me here, I've only had a few small projects to wrap up, Thanksgiving has disrupted any flow I had for work. Holidays seem to do that for freelance workers, it a work hazard.

So I've had some time to tidy up my photography. I took an estimated 1,500 shots this summer so now I'm processing them all. It's tedious and mind-numbing to say the least, but I hope to make it worth my while. I found an awesome resource in Photo.net. Thousands of amateur and professional photographers posting their work and all kinds of information about the industry. I've never seen so much cooperation among people in a profession and I think the design community could learn a few things from it. I won't go into great detail about the site, you can search it out for yourself, but needless to say I have spent HOURS and DAYS learning. I feel like I've had an infusion of knowledge. I only have a couple of images posted right now, but here's my link: http://photo.net/photos/brucimus

So I've taken all my new knowledge and am now applying it to my own photographs. I'm processing 65 out of the 1,500 images for future stock photography websites. It seems like such a small number, but really, I've selected only the best work, and it's taken me more than 40 hours of processing. I'm embracing the idea of someone buying my photography - this is a big step! For too long I've had the desire to know, but never found the right resource, now I'm glad for this time to work on this. Databases, tweaking, embedding copyright and info into the photo files. The work has really been horribly boring, but I think this will produce some nice fruits in the end.

So I came across a roll of film that I've had around for a little while. It was in my refrigerator, in the butter drawer, rolling about whenever the door was opened. I kept forgetting to take it in to be processed. It eventually made the move with us out to Montana. I forgot what was on the half exposed roll. One day about a week or so ago, I remembered to stick the roll in my pocket and take it in for processing. I almost fell over when I saw the images. It was a roll of film from eight-and-a-half years ago of my second tandem skydive from a hot air balloon. Tia took the photos of my jump, I shot the ground images. I got goosebumps when I looked at them for the first time.

So it's 1999. Tia and I were JUST married, literally, within weeks. She was part of a skydive club and was really urging me to embrace it. Then came the hotair balloon. A company from Tennessee (wish I could remember the name of the company - I later did their logo and it ended up on MTV somehow) The club wanted to do jumps out of the balloon, what skydiver WOULDN'T want to do it right? Well, I volunteered to do my second tandem from it. So I'm the only one in the basket, carriage, whatever, without a parachute, besides the pilot. We're hanging by thread and fabric, all of us. We're clibing through 5,000 feet, then 8k, then 10k, then 11k. The pilot and jumpmaster look over the side and say, "This looks good." I respond, "Oh really, how can you tell?" First jumper goes, second, third. My heart is pumping like it's coming out of my chest. I get strapped to my jumpmaster (who is now one of our best friends). We have to climb up the edge of the basket, some four feet, in tandem. Imagine a four-legged, four-armed, two-headed 300+lb beast that has just been born, climbing up a wall backwards. We get to where we need to be, legs on the rail of the basket, grasping the frame of the burner for the hotair. I'm told to dangle my legs, so I do, inside the basket - "NO - OUTSIDE!" I'm forced to remove my grips, I'm trembling with fear - OF FALLING! THREE! TWO! ONE! A silent moment, a whisper of air, my heart in my throat, we're falling backwards watching the balloon rise hundreds of feet above us in an instant, we catch terminal velocity and roll over, tears streaming from my face, I can hear my jumpmaster laughing and I'm screaming it in at 120mph. When we get together, we still giggle about that jump. I have to say one of my own personal highlights, the kind that makes the cover of the sportpage, or the headline of the reel at the 6 o'clock news, the kind that will live with me forever. Enjoy the pics and smile a bit for me.

Building the Wall

2007-11-19T22:56:00.000-05:00

(Click on the image to see the animation of the wall being built)

It seems like I live my life in the "Bunker" these days. When I'm not working on building business for myself, I'm working on making the space more usable for as an office. So I'm dividing the space so half will be heated office space and the other will half will be a work/storage room for tools and the motorcycles. It's coming along, but I have a long way to go before the office is actually functional. I need shelves and table space. But all in time!

Doin' It...

2007-11-07T17:13:00.000-05:00

I guess I've been waiting for that spurt of inspiration or the "right moment" to begin posting on this blog again. I fear in my absence, I may have lost some following, but if I recall my initial motive in keeping this blog was to document my creativity, which then makes this blog geared for me and my future use, having a community following like I see around the blog world was not something I expected to have. Please, don't get me wrong, I love everyone that comes by and leaves me their opinion and I certainly welcome the witnessing to my process, but honestly, I am doing this for myself.

That being said, no time like the present for an update on what's happening for me creatively.

I felt like nothing was happening, then I stood back and realized, yes, something IS happening here. Something amazing. I'm in a place where my only work options are either go into business for myself and make it work, or get a job at some BIG BOX STORE. Since I don't want to work for a pathetically low wage, I choose to work from home - again. I know what this is like, I know what resources I have available to me. So in the span of a few short weeks since arriving in Montana, I have created something out of very little, and am continuing to grow it. I have secured business council, written a business plan and a mission statement, secured an inexpensive and convenient office - with some modifications - I plan to set this business up differently this time. I want this to finally be an "adult" business, meaning that I'm not just some "schmoe" doing desktop design in his garage. Damnit, I'm better than that. I'm worth more than that and my skills mean more to me than they did before.

Here's my new mission statement:
"To become a leading-edge designer and photographer in a world-wide market with clients across the United States and Europe, having the ability to manifest work and operate in any place on the globe. To maintain a high level of design and photographic expertise, continually learning and growing in my craft, building in myself confidence in my abilities and honing my sales and self-promotional traits. Building solid client relationships backed with a commitment to excellent service. To ultimately gain recognition in my field through competitions and feature articles and to nurture and grow an elevated salary level while maintaining competitive prices."

Every time I think about the people I graduated with, hearing the success of their careers and thinking to myself that I choose to live a "lifestyle" instead of a "career", I weaken my ability to become a success in my own right. I have more self-respect for my creativity now and I'm working on my self-esteem, not personally, but in regards to my marketability. I'm working on my presentation, how I come across.

I hate tapping into ego, I've worked so hard in the past 7 years to reduce and put into submission my ego, but this is a job FOR the ego! I'm going to make a name for myself this time. I'm out for the bigger targets and want to manifest recognition for my skills on a worldwide stage. Vanity is not one of my strong suits, but this is coming from somewhere other than vanity this time. This is an honest drive to become successful, even if it means I'm only successful in my circles in Florida and create a small niche for myself here. The sky is the limit, I have the resources available to me to really do something great here.

...and I'm going to do it.

Moving Ahead, Sunset on our Nomadic Adventures

2007-10-04T14:31:00.001-04:00

Sunset on the Lost Prairie, sunset on the last three months of our lives, moving ahead and looking forward to tomorrow. One inch ahead is all darkness.

Returning soon friends! Internet arrives at the house on October 9th. Blogs, creativity and more!

"Steelmasters"

2007-07-01T23:03:00.000-04:00

All images copyright 2007, Bruce Anttila van Hoover ~ thisisbruce.com

The cats woke me up at a rudely early hour. They hadn't received the memo that we were now on Central time, not Eastern, so there it was, 5:30 in the morning. To further give the cats credit, in this part of Wisconsin, the sun rose earlier than in Florida, say 5:29am. Well, I had to get up anyway to work on the truck. I slipped on some grub clothes and headed out to the machine shop, a few paces from where I was sleeping. Something nice, being a guy, living so close to so many tools... That definately appealed to the blue-collar part of me. I cracked open the door to see the beams of light streaming in through the shop window, as if it were pouring out of heaven into an expansive Gothic cathedral. This light at this hour was my cathedral, this room, my church. I, without hesitation, delayed my work duties to snap off a few rounds, which I hope I have enlightened you with here...

Two More Blogs To Consider

2007-06-19T16:57:00.000-04:00

Among all of the craziness, I've sprung up two more blogs of a more professional nature. One for my photography and the other for my design projects. I'll post new pieces as they come. Check them out at:

Photography: thisisbruce.com>>>photography
Design: thisisbruce>>>design

What Stays and What Goes...

2007-06-18T09:19:00.000-04:00

In our ramshackle apartment, most of anything that resembled our lives removed, comforts of home reduced to "indoor camping," we still managed a huddle of friends in our living room last night. Tamara and Tony and John came over for a visit, the very people that if we could, we would certainly take with us wherever we end up.

It was a short gathering, and filled with the kind of talk that is charged with anticipation for our journey. We laughed at the things we tried, joked about Tia's "Going Away" party last September before she shipped her out to New Zealand and my restless nature for wanting to get out of Sarasota so badly. John quipped that if we decided to return to Sarasota after finding out that everywhere else dulls by comparison, he would welcome us with open arms. (A point he has been trying to make almost every time we have been together). I'm sure all of our friends would welcome us back here.

The laughing and the reminiscing pulled at me last night in a way I hadn't expected though. I love these people. This is my family. All along Tia has been trying to illustrate the depth of those connections to me. I have been listening, but I didn't hear the message until last night. A wave of fear enveloped me. Fear about what we're doing, fear about change, fear about losing these friendships. Rational fear, the same fear I had skydiving and leaving the airplane on my own for the first time.

Like all emotions, I held that fear, felt it, acknowledged it and embraced it.

And I keep telling myself the lesson I need to learn from all of this, things will never be this way again. All things are in motion, change is the only constant. ...and it is all delicious.

New Blog...

2007-06-17T10:55:00.000-04:00

So, for those of you have been following along from time to time. I want to announce a new blog that Tia and I are keeping. The new blog is called "Newlynomads" - the link can be found to the right. We're going to keep fairly regular updates on it - unlike me, on this blog, at least there will be two of us updating that one.

So it's been crazy times for me these days. Giving up steady work I would have thought I would actually have time for more blogging, I actually thought I would have time for all kinds of things and I'm finding myself busier than ever. My body has finally given up on me and demanded rest by giving me a head cold. So we're behind mucho in leaving. Not that we had a strict timeline, but we would have liked to have been on the road by now. So we'll see, looks more like Wednesday now.

Mountains, Transformations and Moving On.

2007-06-07T17:09:00.001-04:00

The intrepid travelers, Tony (left), Bruce (right). Photo credit - anonymous old guy who was handy to snap one off for us...

Been a crazy time lately. Two almost back-to-back trips, wrapping up freelance work, preparing for the trips and just have not had much time to dedicate to writing, but I think I'm making up for lost time in this one... it's a lengthy read, but it's worth it... go on now... really...

It's difficult to even begin to talk about where I've been the past several weeks. I realized lately that I haven't really been myself and I feel I'm just coming out of the shell I kept myself in the past year or more. It's been a long year as you all know. I think I passed through a sign-post on this trip, I saw a brief glimpse of what is and what could be and got a taste of who I am becoming. It was transformational, inspirational and enlightening.

Chattooga River. Separates North Carolina from South Carolina. ©2007 Bruce Anttila van Hoover

Tia and I just returned from a trip to the Carolinas. She had a conference to go to and I went up to see mountains, via motorcycle. This trip was an opportunity do a little guy bonding besides being an opportunity to ride almost endlessly. I rode with my friend Tony, who is Tia's best-friend's husband. We found common ground through motorcycling. I taught Tony the basics of riding several months ago and got him hooked on biking. He was a natural. He practiced, got his license and took the local motorcycle safety course to cover the techniques I didn't cover. He rode up his Honda Nighthawk and me on my BMW.

Waterfall outside of Marion, NC. ©Bruce Anttila van Hoover

The seven-year dream came true the second day we rode as we passed through low hills, and then mountains. The roads were winding, incredibly winding, mind-bending and mesmerizing. The hills were breathtaking. We made an observation that if the posted speed limit is 45 and you can't reach it, you KNOW you're on a winding road! Every time we came to a point we thought it couldn't get any better, it did. Truly a spiritual and ancient energy in the hills, a land unlike any other. Each overpass offered a panorama, each turn, another valley and another mountain river emptying into a lake miles below. Water so crisp and so clean, bright blue skies, clean mountain air. I cannot describe the land and give it justice. All I know is that in our next living situation, I will want to be within an easy commute to places like this. As beautiful as the beaches are where we live, one day in the hills and mountains equals one year of beaches for me. I know Tia feels different, but I am a man of solid earth, soil and rock, not shapeless, drifting sands.

I took my camera along, however the things I wanted photos of, I just couldn't capture, like weaving and winding along the mountain roads. The amazing vistas and panoramas are far too beautiful to successfully illustrate with a camera, however, I am posting the shots I did manage to snap off, but the rest you will have to only imagine.

Part of the Mecklenburg County Park System, NC - a future blog in the works. ©2007 Bruce Anttila van Hoover

For as beautiful as the area is, I'm a tad put off by the overly religious nature of the people there. It is certainly the "Bible-belt" and it lives up to that reputation. Church steeples outnumber mountain tops! Stores cannot advertise alcohol, ABC liquor stores are as unmarked as the paper bags they wrap your "packaged goods" in and to me, that's hypocritical. There was also an alarming population of homeless in downtown Asheville. You couldn't walk down a street without being hustled for money. It's strange to me that there aren't more resources available for them. I know Sarasota has a huge homeless population, but there are large facilities available to them and apart from a few panhandlers, it's a nice city to walk in. In Asheville, I don't think I would trust being on the streets after dark. Anyway, I already know the type of mentality an aggressively religious environment has about it and I think Tia and myself would be in a world of our own there. Nothing against those who follow a more religious path and nothing personally against the people up there, their southern hospitality lives up to it's reputation, but living in the Bible-belt just isn't going to be for us.

I feel like I've been in a shell for so long, working, coping with not being able to sell our house, coping with being in Sarasota and not knowing where we're going, coping with Tia being so far away. I'm coming out of that shell finally, beginning to see things OTHER than this move. Having conversations with my wife that aren't about where we move next. I also finally feel that this past month has brought us to a point of equilibrium from the whole New Zealand experience. I think we passed some turning points in our relationship, vacations have a habit of doing that and I'm not sure if it's just us or if everyone is like that. At one point on our way back to Florida, both Tia and I secretly felt like we could have stayed in our campsite another week, and if it hadn't been for prior commitments in Sarasota, we may have stayed a while longer. But, alas, I wouldn't be here to tell you our latest news then.

There's a RUSH song lyric in the song "Freewill" that goes, "If you choose not to decide you still have made a choice." That about sums up my latest announcement.

Tia and I have finally made a decision about our future. Brace yourself...

We have decided not to make a choice for now. Actually, we've decided to pack up our things into storage and head West and be nomads for a while. Play in the mountains, frolic in hidden valleys and spend some time really searching out viable options in the West. I haven't seen much of this country and Tia hasn't been any further West that Paris, Texas. We both want to see the majestic parks and the deep forests of the north, coastal routes of the Pacific coast and the magical desert southwest. We are preparing to leave Sarasota June 16th.

For now the plan is to limit our trip to 2 months, but we're allowing some flexibility there depending on what we find along the way. We may get tired of living like nomads in a few weeks! So far, there is no concrete plan on where we're going other than to see some national parks, visit friends along the way and check out a few of the cities we have considered moving to. We have no expectations except to have fun along the way and spend some time finding ourselves and searching out our futures as we live from park to park.

So we purchased a customized A.R.E topper for our pickup, I plan on building a platform in the bed of our pickup that will allow for storage underneath and sleeping quarters on top. We bought backpacks and a great backpacking tent which will be our living quarters most of the time, we'll sleep in the truck occasionally if circumstances dictate (like rain or getting in to a site too late). We're putting a rack on top of our truck to hold our kayak and we plan to buy a few used mountain bikes to entertain ourselves with. We're also taking our skydiving equipment for some fun in the air. Knowing that most skydiving clubs will allow patrons to stay for free at their airport, we should be able to make our way across the country fairly inexpensively. I wouldn't mind picking a day a week to volunteer at some state and national parks along the way as well.

So, I'm closing up shop for a little while, unplugging from the beloved grid and setting off to have some fun! The cats will have a temporary home in Wisconsin with my brother.

If this trip doesn't produce a strong desire to settle somewhere in this country, then we have resided ourselves to move to Finland.

Although, Vermont is looking pretty promising these days from what I've seen in the news.

Cheers for now, please keep in touch, if I haven't been in touch, sorry, now's your chance to get caught up!

I've launched a new blog to document our endeavors along our trip. I posted the link in the column to the left called "Newly Nomads." Click it and follow along! We'll be "plugging in" occasionally from the road to give you updates.

Time

2007-05-20T10:03:00.000-04:00

T.A.Rector, I.P.Dell'Antonio/NOAO/AURA/NSF

Music has a way of shaping our lives, of defining who we are or where we are at a given moment. It has a way of transporting us through time to places we were once, it also has a way of making us feel old. But in the end, our music tastes set the backdrop on the stage that we play out our lives on.

We had a rare opportunity last night. A friend of our had two extra tickets to see Roger Waters (of Pink Floyd fame). It was his "Dark Side of the Moon" tour. It's been a while since I had really listened to any of the old classics, but sitting there when "Time" came up, loudly singing the lyrics with 15,000 other fans, I had a small epiphany about my life, particularly surrounding my last birthday a month ago. I turned 37. No big deal, but I do feel like time is truly the fire in which we burn and the flames are getting higher. The lyrics got to me last night:

Ticking away the moments that make up a dull day
You fritter and waste the hours in an offhand way.
Kicking around on a piece of ground in your home town
Waiting for someone or something to show you the way.

Tired of lying in the sunshine staying home to watch the rain.
You are young and life is long and there is time to kill today.
And then one day you find ten years have got behind you.
No one told you when to run, you missed the starting gun.

So you run and you run to catch up with the sun but it's sinking
Racing around to come up behind you again.
The sun is the same in a relative way but you're older,
Shorter of breath and one day closer to death.

Every year is getting shorter never seem to find the time.
Plans that either come to naught or half a page of scribbled lines
Hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way
The time is gone, the song is over,
Thought I'd something more to say.

I feel like the moments enshrined in the lyrics are biting close at my heels. Before we sold our house, I REALLY felt them close.

"Kicking around on a piece of ground in your home town
Waiting for someone or something to show you the way."

In some small way, that's how I feel about the last 10 years of my life, since graduation. I used to be so focused and driven, if I spent a half a minute on a decision it was too long, I knew exactly what I wanted and I went after it without any wasted time. True Aries spirit. Today, this last year, I have been so out of focus and indecisive about what I want and where we should end up in this world. I feel the effects of fear and consequences of decision making instead of imagining the rewards. I feel like I'm running to keep up with time, but sitting still and watching life pass me by here, I'm chasing the sun as it comes up behind me. I still haven't REALLY started the career path I imagined I would have, I'm still in Florida when I wanted to get out years ago (and yes, we are getting out soon), I still haven't made the kinds of marks on the world I dreamt about when I was younger. I feel like I'm made some choices that have compromised the way I used to value life and I feel like I'm becoming or I have manifested the "middle-America" lifestyle they write lyrics about. Rush also wrote lyrics in a song and I felt when I was younger, that I would never live that way:

Sprawling on the fringes of the city
In geometric order
An insulated border
In between the bright lights
And the far unlit unknown

Growing up it all seems so one-sided
Opinions all provided
The future pre-decided
Detached and subdivided
In the mass production zone
Nowhere is the dreamer or the misfit so alone

[Chorus:]
(Subdivisions)
In the high school halls
In the shopping malls
Conform or be cast out
(Subdivisions)
In the basement bars
In the backs of cars
Be cool or be cast out
Any escape might help to smooth the unattractive truth
But the suburbs have no charms to soothe the restless dreams of youth

Drawn like moths we drift into the city
The timeless old attraction
Cruising for the action
Lit up like a firefly
Just to feel the living night

Some will sell their dreams for small desires
Or lose the race to rats
Get caught in ticking traps
And start to dream of somewhere
To relax their restless flight
Somewhere out of a memory of lighted streets on quiet nights...

Certainly I have felt like the misfit or the dreamer and I swore I would stay away from ticking traps. This past year has certainly been a tick trap.

Now, before you consider throwing me a midlife crisis party, I don't always feel this way and certainly I count my blessings every day, but these is a nagging part of me that tells me I'm no longer the kid I used to be, flying down the freeway, long hair blowing in the wind. Living like I'm immortal. I don't have the kinds of time I used to spend writing music endless nights staying up to 3 or 4am. I seem to have lost that activist artist voice I used to have and I'm not much of a trouble-maker anymore. I have more responsibilities, less freedom to shake things up the way I used to. And maybe, just maybe, that's what this move is about in the end. Maybe this is my mid-life era coming to me. I've been trying to determine what the next steps look like for too long instead of just taking them to see where they lead. I'm not living in the here and now, I'm too busy seeing what was behind me and what's to come ahead of me.

I don't know, maybe it's all just ramblings, but I think I'm getting old.

Away for a bit...

2007-05-12T11:35:00.000-04:00

Self-portrait reflected in "Cloud Gate"
All photos: ©2007 Bruce Anttila van Hoover

It's been a while since I've been on blogger and I'm sorry for the delay in posting, Tia and I have been gallivanting through Illinois and Wisconsin visiting family and taking a vacation. I've thought about blogging every day, and it seems that I will "compose" small blogs in my mind every day, just the same way I will "see" photos in my mind as I drive around without my camera. I haven't been online much other than looking for work and researching a future place to land, so… finding a small segment of time today was serendipitous.

Our trip was great. I was dreading it a little (read a lot) before we left, but in the end it was pleasant. Cooler weather, three GREAT days in Chicago on nobody’s schedule but our own – I admit a little embarrassment about not contacting friends in Chicago, but coordinating and scheduling our days wasn’t anything I was up for (you know the feeling of not being on anyone’s expectations or schedule when you need it the most.)

My birthday present was to see Blue Man Group in Chicago. If anyone has the opportunity to attend a show PLEASE do so! It’s similar to STOMP, but is more of a situational comedy about non-verbal communication and great music. It’s an amazing show and I won’t say anymore about it less giving it away. It is truly a unique experience and something everyone can laugh at!

I did take my camera on our trip and managed to fire off 345 times but frankly, I'm quite disappointed in my shots. I don't care for anything I did. Bad crops, bad choices, uninteresting subject matter and bad cropping, bad sets and general inexperience with this camera have all combined to make a completely dull series of shots. I just wasn’t “seeing” what I needed to see. I wasn’t paying attention to the artistic process, I was just clicking away. I think my brain and artistic eye were on vacation. (and I fully admit to NEEDING one desperately!) If I were to compare this set to the shots I take while in Finland, the difference is night and day. Perhaps that says something about my spiritual connection with Finland and possibly a lack of one with my own homeland. I recall a consistent comparison between the two places on-going in my mind the entire time we were traveling. I don’t know how or why it is that way, but for some reason, I’m being beckoned by Finland. I know that someday, we will live there, just maybe not this time around.

So we're still grappling with the idea of where to land. It's really getting old and I'm feeling rather raw about the whole thing. Tia and I chase each other around the series of choices everyday. All of this has taken a toll on my psyche. I'm thankful that I cut my hours back to part time because my brain functions are completely overloaded with the decision making process. By the end of my short day I feel completely overwhelmed. The hours of morning and evening research are draining focus on my other abilities. It must be rather comical from the outside, but my sense of humor is waning. I remind myself that I am in a constant state of choice (if nothing else, at least THAT makes me laugh).

On a sideways related note, while researching clean living, I discovered a GREAT website today put on by National Geographic. The Green Guide is a wonderful resource for all things eco-friendly. Excellent tips on what to use to clean around the house and recipes on how to make your own cleaning supplies. It's a great resource! Check it out!

On with the photos…

Boat tours in Chicago.
"Cloud Gate" Millennium Park, Chicago
Music Pavilion, Frank Gehry
Statue of Vince Lombardi outside of Lambeau Field, Green Bay, WI
Lambeau Field, Home of the Green Bay Packers
Milwaukee Art Museum, Santiago Calatrava, Milwaukee, WI
Interior, Milwaukee Art Museum, Santiago Calatrava, Milwaukee, WI
Interior, Milwaukee Art Museum, Santiago Calatrava, Milwaukee, WI

Fountain outside of Navy Pier, Chicago. I liked how the water danced in front of the trees.

Capturing Tomi

2007-04-25T20:18:00.000-04:00

Picture of my amazing brother-in-law, Tomi. ©2007 Bruce Anttila van Hoover

Couldn't believe I caught this moment. It was a matter of having my camera already in my hand and seeing Tia talking to Tomi on Skype. Just happened to duck my head in to say HI, and Tomi says it back - CLICK - captured the moment. Thanks Tomi!

Hope everyone is doing well. I'm struggling through a challenging balance right now at work trying to fit 40+ hours of work into a 25 hour week. I needed to reduce my work hours in order to be home to do as much research as I can on where we're going to end up. You guessed it, we STILL haven't totally decided on a place to land or a means to get there. I know, tick-tock, tick-tock. We're now beyond the point of pulling out a map and throwing a dart at it. But we're pushing on with it in our temporary quarters. The flavor of the week so far is Eugene, Oregon, sprinkled with tidbits of Boulder, Colorado. Been to either? Feel free to leave a comment!

Hope you're all doing well. Thanks.

Opportunities Through the Lens

2007-04-17T20:11:00.000-04:00

Grazing on Tuesday Morning, All images ©2007 Bruce Anttila van Hoover

Having a camera at the ready during sprintime pays off, especially when the weather is "changeable." I caught these cows grazing serenely in a pasture on my way to work this morning. They didn't seem to mind the busy traffic racing all around them, their grazing field used to be considered out of town, but with the development boom, I'm surprised their grazing land hasn't been turned into another strip mall.

I also captured the new Sand-hill crane babies. They walk by my office every day in a seemingly endless path of grazing for grubs. They are absolutely amazing and I love to watch them as they feed. So graceful. The babies are so delicate that I think the blades of grass give them trouble as they walk.

I sat perfectly still for this shot. They were grazing in my direction. At one point they came within feet of my position. I slowly backed away as to not startle them. I'm not sure if they're just that accustomed to people or if they haven't yet developed a fear of us. If I had not moved, they would have surrounded me and, eventually walked right past me.

Cranes, according to "Animal Speak, The Spiritual & Magical Powers of Creatures Great and Small," by Ted Andrews, are said to signify longevity and creation through focus. "The crane can teach you how to celebrate your creative resources and keep them alive, regardless of the conditions in which the are manifest, both by simply having the proper focus in your life."

Feeding lesson.

Well, we're in an apartment/house now, living in temporary quarters in a house a friend of mine owns, he is sort-of between tenants. He has been gracious enough to allow flexibility to us for our upcoming, and mostly unknown schedule, to allow cats, reduced rent and all of our worldly possessions in it. We made the living room our bedroom and the bedrooms, our storage facility.

My work has been equally compassionate thankfully. I am in dire need of a break and my clients/employers have been very accommodating to my needs including allowing me to take a week off to move and another week off to go visit my family for my parents 55th wedding anniversary. I may be adjusting my schedule to go part time in the next week or so which will help free up some spare time to reflect on where we're going. Right now all I feel I do is "stuff," day in and day out, stuff just to maintain life and I don't feel like I've had any kind of a break or any rest whatsoever. I'm basically burnt out. Not in so much a bad sense. I can still function, I can still source creativity and maintain relative focus, but my weary body and spirit is telling me I need to take some time to slow down soon. I know it's coming. These are exciting times and I am thankful and very happy in our choices!

Too Many Goodbyes...

2007-04-11T19:35:00.000-04:00

Photo: Mom and Dad painting our front door. Bruce Anttila van Hoover.
It's been an unusual time for us. Our lives are now condensed versions of what they were before last week. We closed on our house yesterday and moved one step closer to making a decision about the rest of our lives. In a market that is predicted to continue to decline, we were one of the "lucky" ones to be able to sell a house. I felt my throat tighten during the closing and a tiny ounce of something in the recesses of my heart pinged in pain as we signed away title and deed to 2832 Marlette Street. I know it was perhaps a little more than that for Tia. This IS what we wanted and we have now launched ourselves further towards a decision. My horoscope says to remain flexible to a fluid couple of weeks until the day after my birthday. Not to make any plans. So be it. I'll need that long to recover from the move.

We also said "Goodbye" to my Mom and Dad this morning as they return to the north. My parents live in Florida in the winter time and Wisconsin in the summer. If it hadn't been for them this week, we wouldn't have been able to make the closing in time. They worked and worked and never uttered a complaint, never a time of rest and I, for the most part, had to tell them to sit and take a break. They are the most wonderful people in the world and deserve more than what their hard life has given them. My dad a retired carpenter, retired not by choice but by age (and an annoying rotator cuff injury from a chiropractor) and my mom a school bus driver who will work until she dies I think.

This year we had a "bonus" year with them. Having the house on the market so long, Tia and I could enjoy an additional season with them. This year their leaving was perfectly timed with ours. It was an unusually sad goodbye today. Watching them drive off... I know we will see them again in a month for their 55th wedding anniversary, but I also know that the years of winter card playing, games, eating out and laughing till our sides hurt will never be the same again. It was all I could do to hold back tears as we said goodbye. I don't want to have that moment remembered by tears, but by smiles. I love them dearly and when they are not down here, miss them more than I could ever imagine. What a blessing to have them in my life and every moment this past season was truly stolen.

Searches and Names... Spells Trouble.

2007-04-03T07:52:00.000-04:00

It appears that I broke a rule of blogging a few weeks ago and slipped in a few names (that have since been removed from prior posts) of businesses that have hired me or the company I work for, and as a result, words (not sure if positive or negative) got back to my employers. I wouldn't really think this to be a big deal, I mean, I did the work, it's no secret, and nothing was said that was harmful in any way about anyone. However, I stand by my comments and have always reported the truth (my truth) in my blog and always try to maintain a level of integrity in my actions. But, apparently I slipped up these names and, in a search, one of the owners of one of the companies I have mentioned here contacted the company I work for. I didn't say anything bad or remotely negative, I only spoke my opinion, I said that the place we are working with isn't the kind of place I frequent often. It's a truth about many of the clients I work to promote in many different genres. It isn't to say I wouldn't. This venue in particular is an interesting place and it's certainly very popular and there is a part of me that enjoys going there occasionally, but not really the kind of place I would go to often - NOTHING against anyone who goes there, but now the owner said something to my employers and they have requested a meeting. I'm totally embarrased.

I do not offer any change in my opinion. This is certainly not a retraction. The owners of the establishment are really nice people and I have enjoyed the times (all of two) I have spent there recreationally and also grateful for the professional work and regret any harm anyone, my employers included, who may have suffered as a result.

But word to the wise, you never know who is watching and reading. Nothing is secure in the world-wide-web, email, or web sites included. Be careful out there, don't say anything that you're not prepared to back up.

Chained...

2007-03-27T21:05:00.000-04:00

It has been far too long since I posted last I know. And I know in the process of doing so many other things, I have now lost a few faithful followers and for that I am sorry. I do miss everyone, and I REALLY miss the daily journaling this post has allowed me to be a part of, the daily dribble of information that I can safely allow to gurgle up on my blog. I love going through the process with you, my faithful few. You've been witness to my creative process, listened to me whine and you have been responding to posts that run sometimes weeks in age. I cannot promise change to happen overnight, or even soon, but change is now definately coming. Watching the boxes pile up and my hair turn slightly more grey each day has been a rewarding process in character growth. I am getting there, to the point in my life where I will have time to spend in front of a computer. Right now, it's a labor of love to be here. At the end of the day, after having just spent 9 hours or more on a computer, one of the last places I want to be is on my machine. I am not addicted, I'm chained. It's my source of entertainment and my source of income, it's really hard to hate it and really hard to love it, but I do love what I do and where it can take me. Bear with me a little longer. In June I will be unattached to the full-time place of employment and free to wander the world, spinning tales of our adventures. I am thankful to be here and thankful you are reading this. This IS a beautiful day.

The Door Opens...

2007-03-11T11:40:00.000-04:00

Photo: Bruce & Tia, Bruce's first jump off student status, some time around 2001. Photo by Mike Swain.

I remember back when I was first learning to skydive, years ago now. I remember vividly my first tandem jump. The breathless moments before the door opens, the pit of my stomach in my throat. Anticipating the alien world between airplane and earth at 15,000 feet. The chill of the upper atmosphere as the Cesna cuts through cloud and sky. The door opening. The cool air filling the craft, the dizzying crawl to the door, then reaching into the 70mph air for the strut. Waiting as my friend John readies himself and us for our descent.

That's the feeling I have right now, safely planted on the ground today.

We signed the contract on the house yesterday. It's now official.

My throat is tight, my stomach IN my throat. I listen to one of my newest favorite songs, "The Adventure" by Angels and Airwaves. We're on the strut of the aircraft, the door is now open and we're preparing our adventure through the alien world between what we have now and our dreams. We have spent the last 12 hours fantasizing about what we're going to do with ourselves in the coming months. We have the opportunity to not need a home for a while now, so we can take a trip, have our honeymoon finally (after almost eight years!), escape the gravitational pull of Sarasota and all that is familiar to us. Find open spaces to the west, hunker down in a cottage in the mountains of New Zealand for an art retreat, or motorcycling across the continent, the possibilities are endless and I am looking forward to the much needed extended rest and escape. No bills, no responsibilities except to our selves. A true gift. Larger than I have ever imagined.

To say that this process has been difficult or a challenge would not do justice to it really. I know I've been distant, disconnected, depressed, weak and bitter. But in it all, it has been all part of my process. All been about finding the depths of my soul, the depths of my character at it's worst, and being tested. The 15 month ordeal of us selling is finally coming to an end.

So, we now have less than a month to pack up (closing April 10th) and move to temporary quarters. Strangely, all of our accommodations for months to come will be temporary and alien, stability is now out the window.

And I couldn't be more excited.

Back on the table

2007-03-08T21:00:00.000-05:00

The short version: I think we sold our house today.

Ok. Take a breath. I know I just dumped a load on you all. But did you hear me?

I THINK we JUST SOLD OUR HOUSE today!

I know I said we weren't going to discuss selling or moving or ANYTHING involved with that whole fourteen month fiasco, but... a buyer found us without the house being ON the market. She loves the house and has made a tentative verbal offer (which we will be making written in the coming days).

[gasping]

Where do we go? What will we do?

Well, my friends. We'll keep you posted. Who knows where we'll turn up next, maybe your back yard!

Camera GLUED to my face!

2007-02-23T20:05:00.000-05:00

Not sure why I don't have a camera GLUED to my face 24/7! I don't know what is in store for me, but I am so extraordinarily excited about the shoot I had tonight. I absolutely can't STAND IT - WHY am I not doing THIS for a living!!!!!!!!

These are the shots I took from a place near where I live. It's an interesting place, I can't say I patronize this kind of establishment often, its a pool hall with dozensand dozens of tables and private billiard rooms, a game center with all kinds of video and "activity" games, a full bar, an indoor go cart track, an indoor rock cliimbing wall and a lazer-tag variety shooting gallery. Its a paintless paintball arena and this one is the only place in the world that has it set up this particular way, very decked out and elaborate with all kinds of sound effects and gizmos. Very interesting. Well, the advertising company I contract with has me creative directing the graphics, websites and printed advertising and marketing materials, but I am also the photographer of mention. I've done several shoots for them, but this one merits mention on my blog because right now, I am higher than a kite from the shoot and I don't know why I'm not glued to a camera all the time. I feel euphoric and exhausted at the same time. I'm so uplifted by photography. Design is cool and I like it because its a good challenge, but photography, especially PAID photography is the coolest kick in town! I'm riding a high right now - and mind you I'm 100% drug-free! Well, enjoy my buzz, hope you can catch a little from me! Next week I have a contract to shoot at a restaurant in St. Petersburg, FL. (NAMES REMOVED)

For this shot I had to climbed the rock climbing wall about 30' up, hold on to the wall with my right hand (my shooting hand) and shoot left handed, while art directing the two models, making sure my exposure was correct, angle correct and make sure I didn't drop my camera or fall off the wall. It was SOOOO worth the challenge!

Interior of the gallery. The only lighting was the black lights. Each exposure was 2.5 seconds. The models had to remain still unless directed to move. It was an extremely dark room and most of the time you couldn't see much ahead of where your immediate surrounding were, but the long exposures captured a HUGE room and some wonderful and colorful dynamics. How freaking fun!

Stealing away...

2007-02-18T21:12:00.000-05:00

Photo: Untitled Fine Art, ©2007 bruce anttila van hoover

Finally stealing away here for a few moments of personal time again today. We had unexpected guests this weekend, well, expected, but then forgotten until, SURPRISE! We're coming over! It was a nice treat, but weekends like this wear me out. I've come a long way since living with my family and the constant "ON" performance my family expects is a bit tiring from the normal, internal routine Tia and I share on most weekends. She has taught me though, to be a little more selfish in my choices and not to feel guilty about taking time out for myself. It's our only hope for surviving this type of weekend.

Today Tia and I escaped for a few hours this morning to venture downtown to the Sarasota Art Festival. I used to shake my head in dissappointment at most art festivals here, but I'm more and more impressed in the quality of the work. We even made a few purchases. It felt good to get charged up about art and see the quality of craft increase in this town and felt especially good to be able to share with Tia comments about technique and our own personal paths about art. We're both opening our artistic selves up again and exploring techniques and methods of self-expression through visual means. I'm still working in photography and working my schedule to fit figure drawing back into my life again and Tia is taking Art and Healing classes for certification. Now that she is back, we've made accommodations to perfectly fit back into our tiny and cramped studio, taking turns at space or working at opposite ends of the room, which, to give you perspective means that we're almost butt to butt! (or cheek to cheek)...

We haven't said no to moving yet and keeping options open for now. I'm ready for a professional change though. The temporary, full-time solution that was only expected to last a few months (going on nine months) for an advertising agency is in need of either a notable change in format or a removal of myself from it altogether. It could work if the right changes were made, change in title and job function. There is a possible future job opportunity I am excited about and I am holding on to the possibility of that working out. Tia has been working lighty, per diem, in her field.

Tia asked me something important today, a key question in my path, "What aspect about yourself would you have to grow if everything stayed exactly the same as it is today?" Poingnant... I had to think a while before I could answer that, it calls for searching right down to the roots of our lives. I eventually came to acceptance of my professional means in Sarasota. I also came to the thought that I may need to sacrifice my desire for professional aspirations somewhat, maybe developing a new way of thinking about what I have or even altering my career choices to include more of what I find ultimate joy in, that being a combination of working in design, photography and fine art. Overall that means patience, acceptance. I also came to the thought that there is no real need to move, only a desire to gravitate to an environment I feel more comfortable in, but I am learning that I can make do here, make Sarasota and my professional choices work for me here and continue enjoying success through happinness.

I want to thank my new friend "kunzang" and welcome her to my blog world.

I hope you all have a great week! Good to hear from you!

Same ol' Story

2007-02-07T10:41:00.000-05:00

I have to say, today, writing a quick note to some friends, telling a nutshell version of our story, it feels, having removed our house from the market, that now we're yet again, going against the grain of the universe. It feels like the energy was finally shifting towards the house actually selling, and now we're pulling the plug. The universe provided what we wanted. We now have people interested in our house, and now we're pulling the rug out from any sort of potential opportunity to actually sell. I feel a little slighted. This is something I'm coming more to grip with, like a fog slowly lifting.

Thoughts?

And now.... it's 5 hours later, and I'm finding myself not being able to stop being angry about the whole thing. I'm just flat out mad.

Noteable Notes.

2007-02-04T12:38:00.000-05:00

I am completely amazed and entertained by the absolute Yin and Yang, form, counterform, color and compliment system of living I have with Tia. Today, I am a subtle observer of these normally unremarkable traits and today they make me laugh out loud. In the rare moments I have had this weekend to step away from the computer to witness life around me, I have turned off lights, closed doors and put items away, only to have the lights turned back on, the doors opened and the empty spaces filled back up. Each time it happens, I smile wider.

Today marks the 21st day in a row of work with no breaks - I've put in 85 more hours of work in the past three weeks than most people averaging 40 hour workweeks.

Tomorrow marks the 400th day our house has been up for sale. No offers yet. Ironically, our marketing contract with our realtor also expires tomorrow. We do not intend to pursue the move any longer. At least for now...

Wrapping myself up...

2007-01-29T20:52:00.000-05:00

I frankly don't recall the color of my pillows. I have a hard time sitting still when I get a chance to actually do so. I haven't had a day off now in more than two weeks and I'm absolutely buried in work. It's the good kind of work, LOTS of it! I can honestly say I am busier than I know what to do with. I put in 70+ hours for the past two weeks in a row. I'm producing a stellar amount of work and some nice projects have come my way. I picked up two huge accounts on top of my daily 40+ hour a week contract during the day. I live, eat, sleep, breath design and photography these days! I can't say much for my social life, and Tia understands what I need to do, and has been a wonderful, patient and tolerant spouse through all of this. For now, as long as this seemingly endless surge of work and energy is going strong, so I go with it.

Oh, we had 17 sets of people come through our house Sunday for our three hour open house. That's like 20 TIMES the amount of interest in our house than we have seen since the real estate bubble burst! Not sure we're going to get what we're asking for the house - or if either of us even FEELS like moving - not to mention WHERE!!!???

I'm off to pass out on my pillows... see ya!

International Shooting All The Time Day Contest

2007-01-21T10:41:00.000-05:00

In honor of the International Shooting All The Time Day Contest, I post this little snapshot of my mom and dad at opposites once again. Opposite sides of the door that is - oh sure, I know that they've had their share of opposites through the almost 55 years of marriage, but today, they're on opposite sides of my front door, lovingly refinishing it while I'm busy at freelance work and blogging...

Thanks mom and dad!

Making History.

2007-01-16T22:46:00.000-05:00

A new year, a new start. I'm making reparations to our alienated Sarasota lives, catching up with familiar faces and friends now. Tia is doing better about being back and there's some new hope regarding our lives here. I can't really go into detail too much - but there are a few developments happening that may change things for us in Sarasota in a huge way - I hope....

Anyway. I've gone on far too long about our move and I think over the past year of blogging I've strayed away from the real purpose of this blog - to journal my creative process and offer my work to the scrutiny and sharp eye of the world-wide web and all its participants.

Picture: Thomas Moran, Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, 1872
oil on canvas, 213.4 x 365.8 cm (84 x 144 in)
Department of the Interior

I want to make this world a better place. I want to leave it making my mark on it by fixing, saving or improving it for the future. I know, yadda, yadda right. Well, as an artist among artists, we have the power to influence what people see through our creations. I can't say how many times have I encountered an artist who has helped save a patch of natural environment through their craft. Creativity is a decisive and powerful tool. Yellowstone National Park and the entire national park system was created as the result of the work of two artists, painter Thomas Moran and photographer William Henry Jackson.

William Henry Jackson
Crystal Falls, Crystal Creek, 1871
Yellowstone NP, YELL 50364

Part of the exercise of refocusing my blog will be research into the creative arts by finding and portraying other artists here past or present. I will attempt to make it my goal to find and feature one artist a week. Someone I admire or someone I've just discovered. This will be a good way for me to broaden my horizons, blog at least once a week and help spread creativity into the lives of those around me. Hope you enjoy... In the meantime, it's well past my bed time and it's another long day ahead tomorrow.

Better Blogger, Many Thanks

2007-01-15T11:35:00.000-05:00

Thank you to everyone for standing by us through all of this. Your comments and support have been heard!

Everything is still so up in the air. Tia and I are doing what we need to do right now to find a way to keep ourselves from going crazy. We're looking at other opportunities in this country as well as keeping an open mind towards still making an international move. Feels like we can't settle on any dream anymore until we have some serious lookers for our house and so far, that isn't happening. We've lowered the price again with half-hearted hopes that someone will take interest. I have a whole heart set on moving, Tia just the opposite. We're agreeing that if we can get a decent offer on the house, we will still make a move, possibly out west somewhere. Time however, is running out on that idea. I'm looking for serious work opportunities here in Sarasota in case we need to stay. I am overloaded with freelance work and more keeps flowing in which helps our finances greatly. It's exciting in that regards, but exhausting. Web design work, print advertising and photography jobs seem to keep flooding in and I'm at work right now, so I have to keep this short. I'll continue to update as time will allow.

Thanks for hanging on to our connection. I want to be a better blogger and better friend to you all, perhaps my belated new year's resolution. Now can anyone tell me how I can set up the service that let's you know when one of your blog friends updates their blog?

Cheers and have a great day!

Update from Florida

2007-01-11T19:19:00.000-05:00

I was hoping this would be a surprise update from some new location, a new attitude, a new way of life... Instead it's a post from our Florida existance. I know it's been a while since I posted last and since I visited all of you. I feel my blog has been merely another memory of a time before everything went crazy on us. Before we started down this path that brought us back here again. Everyone assumes that Tia being home has been a remarkable reunion. It certainly has in some ways, certainly I breathe better when we're in each other's company and its all I can do to just get through my work week so I can get home and spend my evenings with her - and even that has been sacrificed with freelance work, updates on my website to further market myself and research for other potential move opportunities. These past few weeks have been filled with frustration and tears about the past two years spent anticipating a move to New Zealand only to have it fall apart by a flailing housing market in Sarasota. Feels like if we put our house up for sale for $10 no one would be interested in it. We're planning a trip out west where land and homes are less expensive, where we can be closer to mountains, have seasons and greater outdoor lives. We're leaving in a couple of weeks, but in reality, we can't even think about moving until the house sells. It's a seemingly hopeless situation. I know Tia has lost faith and I feel mine slipping as my frustration grows. Dose of reality? Yeah, maybe a sign from God, I don't know, but now you know why I (or we) have been out of the blog circle. Please forgive us for not being around these days, but the news hasn't been good. So I work day and night. This is so damned depressing I can't stand it. You guys have been wonderful friends. I'm not signing off forever, but I think it's time you know the truth, I'll be taking a break for a little while. I'll try to pop in once in a while, but all I can promise is just a casual existence for now. Maybe once my freelance work slows down I'll be able to be back up and running.

Home...

2006-12-25T11:34:00.000-05:00

Tia is HOME!

After a harrowing flight home, various delays at airports across the country and nights in strange places, Tia arrived home, exhausted and 24 hours later than originally planned.

It's Christmas morning, the house is dark and quiet, the weather outside is threatening, distant rumblings of thunder and rain pattering the roof. No dinner in the oven, no family around us, no Christmas chaos, not even the twinkle of soft lights adorning a ceremonial tree this year. Our house is a pretty pathetic sight.

Tia is sleeping in the other room having come down with a stomach virus and running a fever. She was up most of the night making quick trips to the bathroom. I feel bad for her, but I know that she needs the rest and I'm glad she is at least in her own bed now, resting, knowing she is home.

I'm relaxing on the sofa, watching TV and resting and looking after Tia. It's a pathetic Christmas this year and I'm glad we didn't make an abundance of plans because they would have all been cancelled.

Hope you and yours are enjoying the day, the season and doing what you need to do, or whatever you want to do.

Still Counting... (and taking pictures)

2006-12-20T22:43:00.000-05:00

Wow, I can't believe it's been ten days since my last post! Time surely flies. So here it is, three-quarter past ten on the 20th of the 12th month... too many numbers there. I guess I haven't posted because nothing has really changed and I've been busy counting hours and minutes until my honey gets here. So far we are at 49 hours exactly! Every time I think about our first meeting Friday I get teared up. I know I'm going to make a fool of myself at the airport, probably a sobbing mess when she gets here, but that's ok, who the hell cares! GOD I MISS HER!

So I've been busy with quite a few photography gigs. These pictures are of items from an interior design firm I am building a website for. It was fun, I liked the textures and the varieties of physical experiences encountered with the camera. I have a gig next week shooting for the City of Sarasota 2006 Annual Report. It's all donated work, but I get photo credit and that will be nice exposure - excuse the pun please. I think my favorites of this series are the colored glass pieces at the beginning and near the end of this post. You really need to click on them and enlarge them to truly appreciate the depth of field in them.

Next I need to figure out how to shoot people, naturally, in their own environment, some people have a knack for it, making people forget about the lens and the recording device, I need to figure that out. Seems like a distant planet right now, I feel so foolish shooting people, I always feel I am being judged and inspected if I know what I'm doing. Most of the time I do what I do on instinct, so to try to explain it, I stumble. I need more practice, I know... Anyway, I'm rambling.... Did I say it was only 49 hours until I get to be with my most amazing, most beautiful, most wonderful woman in the world, wife?

Cheers and Merry Christmas (or whatever you celebrate)!

Counting...

2006-12-10T08:06:00.000-05:00

I'm counting the hours, the minutes and the breaths until my sweetie returns! I want to keep it a secret so I can have her all to myself - at least for the first day or two! I think we have some catching up to do, whaddoyathink?

It will be a sweet Christmas... I'm leaving the Christmas decorating for a time when we can do that together. Usually we put up the decorations the day after Thanksgiving, but I just couldn't bring myself to decorate. So, we're going to make that the second thing we do together. Probably don't have to go into much detail about the first thing...

The temperature the past couple of days has dipped considerably! It has been in the 40's at night and in the upper 60's, low 70's during the day. It's been perfect! It's this time of year I live for here, relief from the blasting heat and humidity of the long summer months. Winter is the only enjoyable season in Florida. Unfortunately, the weather has been unseasonably warm lately and these cold snaps don't last very long and before you know it, the temps are creeping back up into the 80's YUK. I am really longing for a change in climate - and perhaps a change in elevation and geological diversity!

It'll be an interesting time when Tia returns. We're stepping backwards now, back to square one in our plans. Do we adjust the price of the house until it sells, do we stay put for another year or more, do we look at other locations? It's all up in the air. I know Tia is frustrated about all of it, and I don't blame her, I think she just went through a metaphorical social and career blender being in New Zealand the past three months. And I'm burnt out on being in Sarasota. Together it's an odd mix of wanting to take off for another destination and planting ourselves in the sand for the season... Only time, and numerous conversations will tell. The best of all, whatever we do, we'll be together again.

Officially... Christmas Already

2006-12-04T18:45:00.000-05:00

Yes. It is official, my Christmas present has come. Tia is coming back to me. It's true and in stone now, her ticket is dated December 22. We're 18 days from being reunited. We have made no decision about what we're doing, we plan on having a number of lengthy talks about the plan - that's after we have copious amounts of "together" time. (I'll let your minds take you where you may...) It's exciting. Hell, it's damned fantastic.

Opened up my Verizon Wireless bill today... now, as a consumer, I guess I should have been proactive and called to find out what the international rates are for New Zealand... because they're $1.50 a MINUTE! My phone bill is $581!!!!!! I almost fell over. Tia and I talked on Friday (prior to this bill's date) for 150 minutes - that's a $225 conversation! I don't even EARN that much per hour. I'm naucious.

Thanks for sticking by us in our perforated contacts online. It's nice to know you guys are always here.

A Process Evolves...

2006-11-26T15:13:00.000-05:00

Photo: Crop of my ruined touch drawing...

Saturday...

It's been an interesting day - well, weekend as well. I spent Thanksgiving alone this year, by choice. I had 4 offers to enjoy the day with family or friends, but I really wanted, selfishly, to be alone. I needed the solitude and had been looking forward to being alone the entire weekend, no schedule, no place to be, no must-dos.

So figure drawing this morning was the only thing I had planned ahead of time. The model called and was going to be a little late, so the other artists suggested we each take turns modeling. One person went up for 3 poses, then another, then they suggested I go next. eeks... me? next? um... I have no experience... So the time came. I stepped up on to the model stand, feeling very present and aware of all the eyes in the room were on me. On my body. Scribbling, spashing, dribbling, etching, brushing, caressing. I actually kind of liked it, it was, after all, slightly erotic, but to contribute to the artistic world giving my physical body to the artistic process. The bare naivite of the moment... oh, now, keep your undies from getting into a bundle, I was fully clothed... gasp, I couldn't imagine being naked. I thought about taking my shirt off, but then the REAL model showed up... whew...

(Those of you seeking a more male side of the perspective, you're outta luck, I was the only male model today...)

So my process still has me hung up on proportion, but it's coming along. I spent the day in the creative zone. I went shopping for art supplies after class, then went to the beach and drew people playing in the sand, some volleyball players and a couple of kids who JUST HAD to have me draw them. Tonight I'm experimenting with a process called batik. I'm having fun playing, distraction-free!

Sunday

I think about the time Tia and I have spent apart and reflecting back, I wish I had weathered the storm a little better. I know I did what I felt what I needed to do at each and every moment, but I don't feel like I was very brave, or took the experience with any kind of "warriorship." My training in the Sacred Martial Arts in the past 7 years seemingly fell apart on me. All that hard work and discipline and I couldn't handle this separation, I couldn't imagine if something tragic actually happened. Maybe that is the lesson here? I'm sorry if you've had to endure my whining and moaning about our situation. I know next time it will be different - let's hope there is no next time. This whole experience has left me feeling weak. I still have my weak moments, but I'm moving through them now, easier in that I think I'll be seeing Tia here sooner than she would see me there. That is some relief, but I have to question, who am I? What was all that about? What did I learn about myself? What do I need to change about myself? In some ways I feel I have learned some things about myself but not like I'm a better person for the experience, but a better person for knowing how all of that affected me.

So today I'm teaching myself batik, a wax-resist technique traditionally known for creating patterns on fabric. I'm using it on watercolor paper with colored india inks. I saw the technique in a book and I'm finding I am learning more by doing than what the two pages of brief descriptions in the book are telling me. I bought beeswax, a tjangting, the inks and paper yesterday. I started to experiment last night. Of course, just as I am melting wax in a ladel to transfer to the tjanting the phone rings. I jump, wax goes EVERYWHERE and all down my hands (ouch). To add insult to injury, no one was on the line when I got there and I was left with more of a mess than I bargained for. I didn't know how difficult it is to get beeswax off of surfaces until this morning. I spent two hours cleaning it up. But now I know better, it is a much easier process simply melting the wax right in the tool, and quite handy, they might have mentioned that in the book! (and I think I've completely ruined one of my touch drawings "experimenting"... oh well, I knew this would happen, calculated losses I guess.)

I'm also finding today, as I go through my drawings, I have more work that I can keep up with. I want to document the good pieces and set aside the not-so-good. I also want to work up some of the good ones into paintings and further studies, but there are so many. I can't keep track of all of them much less find the time to work them up... the body of work is overwhelming... Then there are the ideas yet to be brought to life... Photos, professional web and print design work, illustrations and touch drawings. So much work, how does one keep track of all of it? Any suggestions? It's enough work to fill several hundred pages of a website...

Anyway, hope you enjoy the rest of the week!
b

Figuring along my process...

2006-11-17T23:51:00.000-05:00

Photo: Nude Number 1 - 11/15/06. Canvas mounted touch drawing. (First mounted touch drawing)

The process of being in my art has been rewarding, and at times, a bit addicting. I get so high from being in the flow with my work, I loose track of time and my essential needs of food and rest! These are a collection of my latest favorites. I can't stop working these up. I'm just not sure what to do with all of this. It's so exciting. I am a minimalist at heart and I don't know if that's really me or if I'm just fearing working them further. Fearig that I'll lose the energy contained in the gesture drawing. At any rate. It isn't for me to figure out for now.

Tia has now resolved her conflict with Telecom, but has also decided to turn in her data card for the time being. We're deciding what needs to happen next. Way too much for me to get into at 11:53 PM. Also way too much for me to handle as well. Sorry this is "surface talk" but I'm worn out with people asking me about it and having to sort through useless (but caring) empathetic suggestions of what we should do, so please don't offer any.

Been a bit of a recluse lately, by choice. I've seen a few very caring friends (the ones who don't ask questions). Have had some fun times with friends. Been running my fool head off these days. I ran 5 times this week, hoping to be in shape to race in some events soon. Been doing 8 minute 20 second miles in three miles stints. Fastest in 18 years. Feels good to be burning off my frustrations on pavement. Something good anyway.

Enjoy my exctasy here. These have been saving me from anger, frustration and desperation. I always have my art and can always find ways to improve. Something I'm also working on personally.

I have to say that I think this has been my favorite series to date. This model was perfect and had some wonderful poses. I think I say that about every model, and I'm not sure if each model is getting better or if I'm feeling more confident in my abilities. My process has been enriching to me if everything I do I like better than the last set.

I'm finding beauty in all nudes. It ranges from men in their 80's to women in their 20's. We've had quite a variety of personalities as well. Dancers, actors and just those who want to sit nude in front of people. I like them all, I think the human form is so beautiful. Nothing to hide when we're nude. Just when I think I can't draw a certain body type, I prove myself wrong. Just when I didn't think I could find beauty in an 80 year old man, I find beauty and inspiration. If we could all see each other as naked in our lives we might not have so many prejudices or cast so many judgments on others. Dunno. Please enjoy my process...

Photo: Nude Number 2 - 11/15/06. Unmounted touch drawing.

Photo: Nude Number 3 - 11/15/06. Unmounted touch drawing.

Photo: Nude Number 4 - 11/15/06. India ink on paper.
Perhaps my favorite ink illustration to date. She's slightly out of proportion, but it's a comfortable adjustment. I like the two-tone grey and the redudancy of line from grey to black.

Photo: Nude Number 5 - 11/15/06. Charcoal on paper.

Photo: Nudes - 11/15/06. Charcoal on paper.

It Just Figures...

2006-11-05T11:31:00.000-05:00

Photo: “Reclining Nude.” October, 2006. Touch drawing, unmounted.

Hey there. I suppose I can’t start yet another blog with, “Sorry I haven’t been around much.” Because I’d be repeating myself again.

The top questions:
1. How’s Tanjariitta?
2. Any bites on the house?
3. Why don’t you just move there and don’t worry about the house selling?

Not many people here actually seem all that concerned with how I’m doing which is interesting. I know Tia gets the same questions asked of her with the emphasis on me instead! Well, not everyone, but a good share!

I’m holding up. I’m through the “drinking to ease the pain” mode. Now passing into something else. It’s damage control whenever I turn around. Like patching a dam with a band-aide, I go from one area of my life falling apart to another. Just when I think I have the spring fixed, it bursts out again. Right now the emergency is our families coming back for the season. Holidays are coming and I was a bit unprepared for that. Pictures of Thanksgivings and Christmases past flooding my memory. I don’t want to celebrate the holidays. I don’t want people in my house, warm foods and gifts. I think I’m going to hide under the sofa until the new year. Really, I hope it isn’t going to piss off too many people, but I think I am going to go away for Christmas, take a solo trip somewhere, get lost, hop on my bike and not come back for the week. I’m moving into the “perhaps I should seek professional help” phase. I joke. Sorry. I am considering reaching out for the group that Steve started, Touchstone. Might be a good time to check in.

I’m a little tired of having to have to leave the house spotless before I go everyday, hoping for the off chance that someone will actually go THROUGH the house before I have a chance to get home and clean it up. Stupid house.

GAWD I can’t wait until the elections here are over. Nothing more displeasing than listening to politicians bashing each other. Distasteful. I don’t care WHO is doing what anymore. The TVs are flooded with horrible ads. No integrity left in any of the parties involved. I can’t stand the Democrats in the race and I’m certainly not electing the criminal Republicans here. This country is SOOOO going to hell. Where is Clinton when you need him? How horribly wrong this country has gone in the past 6 years. Why did it need to get so bad so quick? Where is it all going? I’m reminded of that pin from the “Truman Show,” “How’s it going to end?” Feels like the end is nearing doesn’t it? You’ve got Bush in the White House spending our money on this war, borrowing to our eyeballs so our children’s children’s children have debts to pay off. Then you have Gore on the other hand beating the environmental drum as loud as he can but there are still not enough people concerned that in our lifetime we will see major shifts in the physical world we live in. It’s never too late, but the damage is done.

So why is it that if you protest this war in Iraq, you’re anti-American and you don’t support our military? I don’t get that… Certainly I support our military and it pains me to see American blood spilled in the dirt, but I don’t support this war in Iraq, all the brainwashing the government gave us to lead us to believe Sadam had WMD. Bullshit as we all know now. I honor my countrymen and the flag I live under, the past warriors lost preserving the freedoms of this country, but this war stinks of little boy Georgie going after the bully his father didn’t take out. Why dos it seem no one is doing something about this? How can this still be allowed? It all started with the elections 6 years ago. Are we so stupid and blind to have allowed this moron to walk through the world unscathed while Americans are now being victimized in foreign countries because we’re despised by the rest of the world? We’re fat, obnoxious, spoiled bullies of the world. We want it all and we want it now, we deserve it, we can do it, not because we’ve earned it, but because we can, not because we should, just because we can. Crap. It’s all a bunch of crap. It scares me and makes me wonder what is it going to take to wake up and change the mentality of this country? I know there is a not-so-subtle voice out there that is shouting time for a change in direction, but sometimes it takes a slap in the face before change can happen. I just don’t want to be around when that happens. Maybe we’ll be safer in New Zealand, maybe not.

This has been an interesting period in my artistic life. I have found that practicing my craft is giving me wonderful focus and a positive escape. I’m going to figure drawing class Wednesday evenings and I’ve added a Saturday morning session at the local art center and looking to add another evening or two if I can find the right venues for it. Figure drawing has been so much fun. I am still wrestling with the whole “WHY?” theme, Oscar Wilde’s quote still echoing in my head, but the voice of that isn’t as strong. (Jan 13, 2006) The people I meet don’t seem to question why, they just do it. For now, I can be content with just practicing, but I think the question will return again eventually. It’s not a bad question, and I think it will give me balance and purpose in my art. Going to these figure drawing sessions has given me focus, but I am also starting to see a community here I hadn’t noticed before. Granted right now they’re mostly snowbirds, but it’s nice to talk to people about their craft and get some exposure to other mediums and techniques. I’d like to join some of the local art clubs as well, but don’t know how long I’ll be here. Actually I’d also like to start a professional designers club here in Sarasota. (I know, NOW I get ambitious!)

Anyway, thanks for sticking it out with me.

Making it go away...

2006-10-26T12:48:00.000-04:00

The sun is not shining in my world today. Usually I can get up in the morning and put on a happy face and generally cope with everything, today my skin isn't so thick. I really am having difficulty functioning today. I'm doing the best that I can, but today I just want to shut the world off and not be me. Maybe a week of that might be enough to carry me for a while. I hate whining. I am a strong person and I can tolerate quite a bit, I am on top of my life right now. I'm creating some of the coolest artwork I have done in years, professionally and personally. I was even just offered the position of Creative Director with the agency I am contracting for - if we should decide to stay here that is. I have my health and my faculties. I miss Tia. With every breath, every ounce of my being. I feel not only separated from her, but from a major part of myself. Usually these kinds of feelings pass quickly, or I am able to work around them, but today, I don't know how to get around what I am feeling, I'm angry and upset. I'm hating my life right now. I know I made my own choices. I know I need to just let it pass until tomorrow. I just wish I could go home, go to bed and make today go away. Make this feeling go away.

-AUTHOR'S EDIT- OK. I'm feeling better. I had a good hard run on my lunch break today, a little more than three miles and I think I got some of the funk out of my system, plus it helped that I had my good friend and running partner Charles, running with me listening to me vent it all out. I seems to just be a "one foot in front of the other" kind-of thing. Thanks for listening.

The dream is as distant as the horizon.

2006-10-23T18:58:00.000-04:00

Photo: Another beautiful pre-dawn in Sarasota. This was taken on my commute to work. I find this to be nicely symbollic of tonight's post. Sending my love down the wire so to speak, chasing the dream, just beyond the horizon.

I'm sorry our updates have been so infrequent. Wanted to give you all an update to let you know we're still alive, surviving now with infrequent phone conversations and not being able to see each other online like we used to. The f#@%!ing internet company cut Tia off without EVER sending her an invoice. They just cut her usage off when the bill got to be high and when she called them, they told her the bill went to collections already - WITHOUT ever contacting her OR sending her an invoice! Rude bastards. Certainly the bill was excessive, but don't you think they would have sent her a notice explaining what actions they were considering and allow her to make a payment on it?

Life has had it's challenges lately and it seems the Universe (substitute God, Jehovah, Muhammad or whatever there) is constantly showing us a different picture of what our lives should be, and it's isn't adding up to be in New Zealand. It's so hard to understand. All year long, in all of our conversations, in the random interactions with people who had been there, with all of our research, our encounters with synchronicity, our inquiries to get there, our long and dramatic medical and background checks, cat papers, grey hairs, hunches, whims and notions ALL pointing us for a definite move to New Zealand, yet we seem to always be coming up short.

Tia is unimpressed with how behind and backwards the country seems to be. In all of the literature it says that New Zealand is in pace with the rest of the world in standards of living. Well, the houses are small, cramped, drafty, under-insulated, poorly built, and way over priced. You never really know where you'll actually be able to get connected to high-speed internet - one of my requirements due to my work. Most houses have tiny lots and share multiple driveways (and I wanted to not be on top of our neighbors like we are here). The notion of recycling exists, but you have to collect your things and drive them to the recycling center however many miles away that is. The cost of living is higher than we expected, traffic is suicidal, petty crime is running rampant, people throw trash EVERYWHERE making the experience of seeing the beauty of the environment really diminished because you can't go out walking barefoot on any trail for fear of stepping on a broken bottle or fearing what is going to happen to the belongings you locked in your car. Sport skydiving there is really rare - one of the things we were REALLY looking forward to getting back into regularly. Basically, with the reduced price on our house, the cost of our move, the amount of debt we're already in and the relative reduced amount of what we can afford to buy there, it just doesn't seem to be adding up to make any sense.

I do feel a dream being shattered.

My heart aches for my wife, alone in a strange world, cut off from being in regular contact with her loved ones. Cut off from all she knows. Meanwhile, I feel I am living the same day over and over. My routine doesn't change, my life doesn't change. I have a few things that I hold on to. Wednesday night figure drawing. Occasional poker night with the guys. Occasional meetings with friends. I go to work, see the same 9 people. I come home. Feed the cats, do the chores, work on freelance, watch about: 20 minutes of TV before I have to get ready for bed and do it all over again. I can feel depression creeping in. My escapes have been running (like a man possessed) and drinking.

We've considered Finland as an alternative landing place. Right now we can't even look at that because the house hasn't sold and we have NO prospects. It's seemingly hopeless. I can't plan a move beyond the end of our driveway.

I do feel a dream being shattered.

I'm not going to apologize for being down, because I am telling you the truth, no rosy pictures painted with pretty dialogue. Pure truth. I know we made this our choice, and this is our life. Sure we have a wonderful house to fall back on and for that I am TRUELY grateful. I am certain there is a reason why the house has not sold and there is a reason why I, the one who pushed for the move to begin with - the one who REALLLLLLLLLYYYYY wanted the move to happen, is the one seemingly stuck here. There is a reason.

- shit -

Doesn't help any though.

I'm off to run errands, catch dinner and pay some bills before MINE go to collections. Forgive me for not being able to get caught up on all of your blogs. I miss you guys and I miss being a part of your lives. You've entertained me, shared and painted pictures of your lives for me, helped and supported me. For you guys, a world of thanks.

Kia ora koe.

Flowing with the Figure

2006-10-18T22:49:00.000-04:00

OK. It's late Wednesday night, I'm exhausted here and I have so much to get caught up on it's not even funny. I'm wiped out and too far behind on everything... life, blogs, other people's blogs, freelance and so on. I just wanted to pop up a small note to share with you all my latest figure drawings. This has been such an awesome process for me, it's been a 12 year process actually and this class has brought me back and around full circle. I feel myself growing and each week brings new findings and new levels of excitement. But there is soooooo much more I want to share with you all, just having a hard time finding the time right now. So for now, and this is for you honey... please enjoy these charcoal drawings and touch drawings.

Sunday night, Good Night

2006-10-15T22:45:00.000-04:00

It's sunday night. I'm tired from three photoshoots this weekend and I should be in bed. I've had too much wine (again), feel good, but looking forward to sleeping. I did have fun this weekend, even though I worked most of it. But here I am, checking in anyways.

I have a motive for being on-line. I just read my friend Adrien's blog. She a good friend, a hard-working woman and a fabulous artist. No, did I say fabulous, well add, amazing, spectacular, driven, beautiful, and an inspiring artist. What she creates is absolutely amazing. Please drop her a note from me at http://tuffbettybags.blogspot.com/

Peace!

Sunday in Safety Harbor

2006-10-10T21:16:00.000-04:00

OK, tonight’s blog is going to be a bit lengthy, sorry.

It’s been a crazy busy time – STILL. When I’m not working my day job or my night job I’m putting together the myriad of forms and documents for the cats, and THEN paying bills and running errands, did you notice play time on that list? Right. I need HELP! I’m exhausted at the beginning of each day and my attitude is certainly suffering. I am looking forward to being out of this funk and on with my new life in New Zealand. I could go on for the entire night here on how stuck I feel and how hopeless this all seems, but firstly, I don’t want to whine and secondly, I have other things to concern myself with. In fact, this post is not even related to the move – THANKFULLY!

I had an exceptional experience on Sunday and I wanted to share my creative process with you. After all, that’s been the focus of this blog from the start, the rest has just been life and moving… yuk.

I had a hired freelance job photographing an event as well as sights in and around Safety Harbor, Florida on Sunday. The event was called Dock at the Bay and featured live music, craft booths and food booths. It wasn’t huge mind you, nor is Safety Harbor all that large, in fact, until Saturday, I had no idea where it actually was!

The shoot went over very well, my new camera and new system performed with the accuracy of professional grade equipment, I was thinking, here I am, the “bigs.” It was amazing, it was absolutely the most fun I have ever had while working! (I think I say that every time I do a shoot.) I need to be doing MORE of this! It was like a drug, I think I took over 450 photos in 10 hours. The client was hands-off allowing me to do my thing, best kind of client around! My confidence is building and I know I put up a huge smattering of images here, believe me, it was hard to narrow it down to these few. Really, Sunday was the most fun I’ve had since before Tia left. I really needed it. I think I’m operating pretty close to the core these days. I caught myself in traffic swearing up a storm at a truck ahead of me. He did nothing wrong except be in front of me.

Anyway, I think there are some gems here…

Above: This is swiftly becoming one of my favorite photos of the day. I can't believe I captured this!

FIGURING it out

2006-10-07T10:32:00.000-04:00

Hello my friends. I'm so sorry that I haven't been around to share with you all lately, I've really had more going on than I care to endure, but for some reason, I am supposed to walk down this path right now. I am trying to find small ways to balance my life, but there is just a lot happening right now. I'm not complaining, I am in demand these days, so I am keeping in mind my favorite fortune cookie saying while I work, "Wealth is not in making money, but in making the man while he is making money."

I have seen a boom in the need for photography services these past few weeks. I have a shoot Sunday, two next Friday then another on for Sunday. I bought a new lens for my Canon, a Sigma 10-20mm wide angle lens. New toys are always fun, no better way to pay for them than through freelance gigs.

Besides that, of course, I have started the figure drawing course at Ringling. Last Wednesday was the first night, it was a great experience, it challenged me, made me feel insecure about my art. Even though I felt initial dissappointment in my abilities, I feel rewarded knowing that I am trying - and I don't think I'm so far out of practice that I can't get back into it. I actually liked a few of the studies I did and I'm looking forward to what comes in the next 10 weeks. Most of what we did last class was 2 minute poses.

I'm keeping this short because it's time for me to make my rounds to see what you are up to. Then I have to get back to work...

Still no bites on the house...

Cheers!

On This Day...

2006-10-04T23:47:00.000-04:00

On this day, October 6…

In 1887, Le Corbusier of Switzerland, architect/city planner/artist, was born.

Photo courtesy of www.greatbuildings.com

In 1889, Thomas Edison shows his 1st motion picture.

1889 - In Paris, the Moulin Rouge opened its doors to the public for the first time.

Image: HenriDeToulouse-Lautrec, “The Dance” courtesy of www.wikipedia.org

In 1967, Haight-Ashbury hippies throw a funeral to mark the end of hippies. (That sucks, I still want to be one!)

Photo of Timothy Leary courtesy of www.wikipedia.org

In 1961, U.S. president John F. Kennedy advised American families to build or buy bomb shelters to protect them in the event of a nuclear exchange with the Soviet Union.

And in 1970, born of this nobel man:

And this beautiful woman:

this girl was delivered from the Universe into our lives:

And this girl:

And this girl:

And this girl:

And this girl:

And this incredibly wonderful, generous, caring, kissed by God, genuine, inspired woman:

Happy Birthday honey. Hope you don’t mind me sharing your baby photos with the rest of the world, you’re the most beautiful woman in the world!

I have no earthly way to say exactly how much I miss you, how much I ache to be with you RIGHT NOW, how much you have changed my life, how grateful I am that you are my mate and how perfect I think my life is with you. I miss you terribly. I am with you in my dreams and hopefully soon in your arms. I’m sorry I am not there with you for your birthday.

Quickie...

2006-10-04T23:27:00.000-04:00

Quickie catch up here. So sorry that I haven't been around to everyone's blog. I feel bad and I miss you guys terribly. I have certainly caught Bo's dilemmas. I have been completely overloaded with plans and work and have not had a minute of opportunity to blog or to catch up on everyone's lives. I feel bad about that and I apologise. I want to do better, but everytime I turn around, another job comes in and it is REALLY coming in now. I have someone who is available to take the workload off, but everything I have been getting, I HAVE to do. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE to be busy and I'm enjoying the extra cashola and I have been enjoying SOME playtime. Last night was guys poker night, tonight was figure drawing ~ which... um, I have to say was nothing less than fulfilling and I equate the experience to my second skydive, more later... (maybe even images).

I'm so sorry I have not been around, but I have to say, if you're checking in, please be sure to come by on Friday, October 6th for a special blog... All I can say for now. Just dial me in, any time on Friday. You'll see, it'll be worth it, I PROMISE... better yet, I PINKI promise, I double-dutch sundae promise with a cherry on top! ~Thanks...

Catching up with me.

2006-10-01T16:09:00.000-04:00

Hey everyone. Sorry I haven't been around lately. I think I caught whatever Bo has - being busier than ever. If it isn't one thing, it's been another. Usually I'm ok with being busy, but all I really want right now is to have a few days of "normal" whatever that is going to look like. Fortunately, it seems to be starting to let up a little and I feel the weight on my chest is lifting. It's funny, thinking that after Tia left for New Zealand I would have more time on my hands than I can handle, I was really wrong. Freelance opportunities have been springing up left and right. I am thankful for them, but think I need to start turning some of them down. It's time for me to spend some time alone with my thoughts and I can't do that when I'm frantically trying to catch up all the time.

I'm ready to be creative again, I'm ready now to be with myself and my craft. My Figure Drawing classes start up for me on Wednesday and I'm really looking forward to it. I'm mostly looking forward to having some creative time where I'm not sitting at a computer, in or out of class.

So, to begin my process, I went "tipitoo" as the Kiwis call it. Tipitoo means to go out roaming the countryside. Yesterday, after a day of motorcycle maintenance, I grabbed my camera and went for a ride with no intention of destination. I headed for the coastal islands, the keys or Longboat and Siesta. I found an aging pier on the south end of Bradenton Beach. I had driven by it a hundred times or so and never actually recall seeing it. At first, because there was some construction nearby, I thought it was in the process of being built. Walking up to it, I had discovered the reason for my adventure. My camera can tell the rest of this story.

After I soaked up the culture of this old pier, I sat for a sunset. I remember when I first moved to Sarasota, being alone in a strange and unfamiliar place, I used to go to the beach alot. Seemed to help me gather my thoughts, and put perspective to my world. I sat there alone last night, in another strange world, physically familiar this time, but alone without Tia, certainly a strange world to me now.

Thanks for catching up with me. I will try to make my rounds soon, and thanks for understanding.

B-I-F-F-E-D

2006-09-25T20:35:00.000-04:00

YEAH! I finally have something to blog about that isn’t about feeling crappy… Well actually, that’s not entirely true, but not about feeling crappy emotionally!

Inside the mind while rollerblading today.

Panting, picking up speed, good pace today. Not bad for not having been on blades in a while.

Small curb ahead for the parking lot, just like last time now, pick one foot up and set the other down over the bump.

One foot up…

Other foot… eeks…

{Sound of other foot slipping on pavement at 20 mph}

{Quick breath in.}

Crap.

{Body rotating from vertical to horizontal}

This is going to suck. {looking down to pavement as body lunges sideways}

Road rash? Skinned knee? {body continuing to hurtle towards impact}

Will I tumble and roll?

{GRUMPH, SLAM}

{The sound of flesh impacting road surface}

[Dust settles in and around the body skidding to rest]

I want to lay here for a while. Will anyone notice?

This pavement is extraordinarily hot, perhaps I need to quickly get up.

Body Check, Palms, dirty, but no open wounds, knees, open wounds, loads of gravel, back, ok, but adrenalin still pumping, pride, damaged but fixable – SHIT someone coming, did they see me? Crap it’s Nan from the office, play it up like it didn’t hurt.

Best get on with it, pick it up and move it along man, no pain no gain.

Said to self aloud, “No better way to get on with it than to continue blading…”

Mind to self, shut up, that freaking hurt.

To Nan, “That didn’t hurt.”

Nan looking confused…

Ok, I’m off to take a soaking hot bath and ease the pain in my side and back… Have a freaking great day. Cheerio!

Still Waiting...

2006-09-23T08:34:00.000-04:00

So this is the first weekend alone. No I'm not trying to dwell. I'm not as weepy as I was - thankfully, I'm not sure my co-workers can take it anymore anyway. Yesterday felt good and soon enough, I will have a new PC and a webcam so I can at least see my sweetie - I want the "nickel tour" honey, spare no expense!

I do have a list and I was on the fence about taking off to go skydiving today, but the thought of driving two hours to the nearest drop zone and spending the cash to get reacquainted with the sky, BY myself, just doesn't seem like as much fun. Certainly my to do list isn't my sole resource of entertainment, so here I sit, Saturday morning. I was up WAAAYYY to late and WAAAYYY too early. It's strange, I'm just not tired. I used to be in bed by 10 at the latest and now I'm lucky if I'm in bed by midnight. Last night I stayed up until 2am. I think it's nerves...

Sorry I haven't posted any pics lately, I haven't at all felt inspired to get the camera out for some reason, maybe that's what I will do today. I guess I need to get myself out of the house for that though.

Have a great Saturday and weekend... Sorry it's not a more thrilling post... Finding it a challenge to sit and write, but I know I need to. Bo is SOOO right about being and staying in touch with blog friends, sometimes all it takes is a simple post just to let everyone know you're still hanging on there. Thanks!

Helluva Ride

2006-09-20T23:14:00.000-04:00

I've been an emotional trainwreck for the past 30 hours or so. It's been a helluva ride. Tearful farewell, lonely return home. I am thankful I had our best friend Tamara to help me see Tia off, I needed the support. Whoever says this is easy is full of crap. This sucks and if I had to do it all over again, I wouldn't. Thinking I'm a strong, emotionally balanced male, I was a tad off! I guess it's only natural to miss one's significant other, but I didn't know how tied we really are until now. I miss her smiling face, her gentle touch and the smell of her hair. I know I will be with her soon, but certainly not soon enough. Know anyone who wants to buy a house?

We did share an incredible last night together. We went out, courtesy of my current employer, to our favorite outdoor dining facility at sunset. A place called O'Leary's. It's a total dive restaraunt, cheap food and expensive cheap wine. We bought a bottle. Then we went to the place on the beach where we had our first "date" and sipped the remaining wine, watching the daylight turn to night, feeling the wind on our faces, the sand between our toes.

In all of our years of being married, I have to admit, the kiss before we departed, in my opinion, was the best kiss of our entire relationship. Our first kiss, then our wedding day kiss would follow closely. The second best kiss HAS to be the time when I kissed her after graduation. My parents were in the audience and when they saw me grab Tia and plant a HUGE kiss on her, my mom asked my dad, "Who's that??!!!???"

I don't know if you know or not, but Tia asked me to marry her on our third date and two weeks later, we were married!

Seven years later, an entire ocean separates us. I have been alone before. I lived alone for three years. It's a good feeling, I grew so much from being alone. This is a different type of lonliness though. It's still to early to tell how this will settle in on me. I have my art classes coming up and every one of our friends has offered me either a night of beers or dinner! PLUS, I have to get ready for our move and get our cats ready. I will be of NO LACK of things to do. But I still have an empty set of pillows next to me every night.

I've had far too much wine, and it's very late. Tia is now in New Zealand, I heard from her earlier and she is well.

I miss you honey. Wish me the best on selling this damn place! See you soon!

Quiet Saturday Morning

2006-09-16T13:30:00.000-04:00

The guests have all left, the majority of goodbyes have been recorded and we sit in an quiet house today. It was a beautiful Farewell Party and I couldn't have imagined a better send-off for Tia. It's amazing seeing so many loved ones in one place at one time, and not having any of them be blood family.

We're a little puffy around the eyes, but probably more from lack of sleep than crying. Tears were shed, but I think for the most part, we have now come to a place of acceptance of our choice. Our friends now understand, and it's perfectly clear to us that our future dream is about to come true. We're so close now we can hardly contain it!

I know Tia will be dearly missed by many here, but we know who our friends are and know they will always be our friends no matter where we are.

Right here, right now.

2006-09-12T18:41:00.000-04:00

I have so much to say, yet all the words run away.

Right this moment I feel anxiety. My emotional state is largely composed up of waves of feeling slightly scared, to full on panic attacks. Perhaps I am being melodramatic a bit, not clinical panic attacks, but certainly fits of anxiety.

AND I'M THE ONE STAYING HOME!

I was feeling sorry for myself earlier about not being able to go with Tia to New Zealand, after all, I have been the driving force behind this desire to move abroad. My poor wife is now completely left to my devices. OK. So we did make this decision together and she has just as much say in the matter as I do, but the fact remains, as of one week from this exact time, this very moment, my wife will have left behind everything in her life that is familiar to her.

Everything.

That thought alone sends shivers down my spine to think about it. Picking up all that there is, flying some ungodly hours to a place we're not really sure exists yet. No one to greet her at the airport, no one to drive her home, no place to immediately stay. She may as well be relocating to the moon.

I, on the other hand, get to sleep in my own bed, go to my job every day, see our cats, drive our car, eat familiar foods, see familiar people and continue on my daily routine, well minus being with the woman I love.

Clearly, I need to stop whining.

Energy to you my love. And safe travels. Our journey is taking another step. Our dream slowly coming into focus. Our new lives await us, and you have the honor of the first step.

Touching Artistic Bliss

2006-09-09T23:41:00.000-04:00

I am neither fishing for compliments nor looking for criticism. I am merely posting my latest creative adventures (if you haven't guessed that this blog isn't about world views or world social affairs - it is about me). I am looking for your feedback. Honest opinions, artistic thoughts, criticisms, looking for anyone who may have done this type of work. I am only the medium, the transporter of the images, the creator lives within me. What do you have to say? This is the place to say it.

Reconnecting

2006-09-06T20:21:00.000-04:00

Going through all of the stuff a person accumulates over the years, I discovered some old illustrations I had done while living in Wisconsin years ago! It brought up a number of thoughts and feelings seeing the old works. Frustration, awe, contemplation, and mostly, a desire to hold something besides a computer mouse in my hands. I may have a Bachelor's of Fine Arts from a very reputable art school, but I have lost something along the way. I studied Fine Art and Music Composition at the University of Wisconsin for three and a half years before transferring, and losing many years of credits, to the Ringling School of Art and Design. I also switched majors to Graphic and Interactive Communication which is where I think I lost myself as an artist. I am in a creative field, true, but it is spent in front of a computer, even with my photography, I spend more time in the "digital darkroom" than I do behind the viewfinder. With Tia leaving me soon, and leaving me with time on my hands, real, concentrated Bruce time, I have decided to reconnect with my old artist self again. I enrolled in a figure drawing class at Ringling School starting next month and I have also started reading a very good book called the Artist's Way by Julia Cameron. The book teaches the artist how to unblock through twelve weeks of daily and weekly lessons. ...after twelve years of suppressing that artist in me, I'm as blocked as they come...

I'm adding a note to all of this: As I came in to work, I noticed three frogs on my window. Frogs, according to the book Animal Speak, are about creativity. The number three is also significant, in numerology it is associated with creativity. Last night was a full moon AND a lunar eclipse, double auspicious AND I saw a shooting star on my morning walk. I am on my path. The Universe is speaking to me today. Loudly!

Checking In

2006-09-02T09:19:00.001-04:00

"Hi. My name is Bruce and I am checking in."

I don't even know really where to begin. I don't want this to be a whine session, in fact, I don't even want this to be ANYTHING expected.

I am a list maker. A doer. I make lists for myself on Friday and expect the lists to be completed by Monday. My lists always are practical. My rule number one is "Work first, play later." My rule number two is, "It's not worth doing, unless it's done correctly." I seek out pleasure in being accountable for my time. I derive satisfaction from crossing an item from my list. If I don't get to have playtime, then I know I had a productive weekend, and, “Hey man, there’s ALWAYS NEXT weekend.”

I am a driven and responsible German-heritage, Aries male. Son of a carpenter, an incessant project man. Also son of a driven mother, who in her younger years used to get dad out the door, lunch in hand, get me taken care of and off to school, lunch in hand, care-taker of a HUGE house, did laundry, bought groceries, cooked, cleaned and never took time for herself. I inherited some hefty luggage.

I found the list of house projects this morning as I was about to embark on a project. I walked to the front door, messed with the hinges, tinkered a little with the door’s hardware, but something was wrong. I felt uncomfortable as I was thinking about working on the project. I want to repaint the door, I think it would help make our entrance look better and more upscale, maybe make a better first impression for when that prospective house-buyer comes along, but I just couldn't bring myself to grab the tool box and dig in for the day. I stepped into the studio to look for my list again, “How has it been coming… the list? Where are we here, what’s left to do before I feel right with the world and can finally go play… Oh… well, ummmm, looks like we have a number of things to accomplish this weekend, oh yeah, hey GREAT, it’s a holiday weekend, three days to accomplish things.”

As irony would have it, while looking for one list of things to do, I found another list, almost identical to the first one, then another list of other things, and soon I had turned several pages of lists of all kinds of things and NOTHING crossed off on any of them…

Then it happened. I felt a rush of blood to my head, the flushed feeling in my body, my mind spinning.

I passed by Tia in the kitchen. I think she sensed my frustration, or saw it in my crooked face.

The questions have come up again.

It starts with one thing, then blossoms into so much more. I mentioned to her that I may no longer be in the Martial Arts. I may let it go. Maybe I was looking for her reaction to it, maybe I was looking for approval to lighten my responsibilities. We talked for about a half-hour. I think we both felt the heavy thunk as the inherited luggage I was carrying fell to the floor. I have suffered for many years at my own doing, the feeling of not having enough time and being “second” in what I do. I see so many creative people, focused and driven and accomplished. They’re out there doing things I KNOW I could be good at. Then I beat myself up over the fact that I haven’t dedicated enough time to BE that good at this and that. I listed (here we go, right?) all the things I wished I could do with my life and all the things I am currently doing. I wished I could be a better designer, a flash programmer with top-notch design skills, a better photographer, a master martial artist, a feng shui consultant, a fine artist, a musician starting up a band again, a skydiver, a fix-it man around the house perfecting my living space. That’s enough work for six people and six lifetimes and I haven’t been able to do any of those things very well and frankly, I’m being pulled apart trying. I have done this to myself for long enough.

My horoscope for today was perfect: ”Time machines have yet to be invented. Or have they? If they are created one day, we will presumably be able to go back in time. So why then, can't we invite our future selves to come back and help us now? In a funny way we can - without the aid of any technology. Reach out, now, to the person you hope and intend to become. Ask the essence of tomorrow that dwells in you today for its view of the most appropriate way to proceed. Then see what wise and inspired new plan begins to emerge.” Jonathn Cainer, bubble.com

This is an important transition period. I get an opportunity to redefine who I am again AND I get the personal space I need to do it in. I will adjust to Tia leaving, have time to reconnect with myself again AND define a new existence in New Zealand. A rare opportunity is here for me now, and I feel like I just shook hands with my future self. A bit of the past, a bit of the future and my soul. I couldn’t imagine a better time ahead.

I tossed my list to the floor and right now I hear my cat in the other room batting it around. I am going to play. Unfortunately, because of work load this week, Tia has some things we need to do this weekend, so I can’t entirely play all three days, and the motorcycles need their maintenance, but today was a wake-up call. I have felt the shift coming, and it is now here.

Break

2006-08-31T13:24:00.000-04:00

Hey Everyone... Sorry I haven't been around much to blog. It feels like it's been forever and a day since I last blogged, or at least surfed around to everyone's blog. It's been a wild trip this week and last. I feel like I've been put to the test. I have periods of pain in my chest, tightness in my throat and a shortness of breath, then times of calm and cool collectedness. It's been a roller-coaster ride. Plus work has really kicked up for me again. Yesterday and the day before I put in 12 and 14 hour days. Today is a short day, 8 hours. I like to be busy, it helps my focus and I stay closer to my center, only because I don't allow myself to dwell on the fact that in 19 days, Tia will be gone from my daily life. Eeks... the counter on her blog hasn't helped me deal with it any! I know it's only temporary, but it's still not easy. I had no idea how difficult this was going to be emotionally, but I know it's for the better, and that these are our choices. It's exciting, thrilling, nerve-wracking and frightening all in one big delicious bite!

So I'm sitting at my desk, at work, trying to decide what to eat, watching the remnants of Ernesto outside my window, missing... well, you guys. My faithful fellow bloggers. Time to cut this short and go out and visit the rest of you, at least check in... I feel like this little frog now. Big eyes against the world, looking out, looking in from the outside, wide-eyed in wonder and hungry for a change - well, he's probably hungry for dinner. I am visited by this frog on my window every morning, and every morning he scoots across the glass hunting breakfast.

Well, anyway. Enjoy.

Finland, Final Post

2006-08-21T20:53:00.000-04:00

Yes, it's true, this is the final post in the on-going series of photographs I took in Finland. This series finds us in a remote part of Eastern Finland. After miles of dirt roads, twisting curves, steep hills and valleys, we find ourselves at this cottage in the woods.

(Written on Saturday, for some reason I have not been able to post until Monday evening)

I've gone this week from having no emotions and being completely shut down, to today, cranky, happy, then scared, shocked, happy, then cranky, then happy again... whew... and it's only mid-day.

I think after the initial wave of emotions in dealing with Tia buying her ticket to NZ, I kinda shut down. I came home from work, exhausted, barely interested IN actually working. I would skip dinner every night, spend a little time with Tia and then mentally "check out." We had a garage sale this morning and for the first time this week I actually FELT something! I guess I have officially moved through my first wave of stress in this move. I came through feeling good about it. We're making the right choice...

Florida IS the place to have a garage sale INDEED! People here know how to "Sale!" It was incredible, all this crap we thought wouldn't sell, stuff I thought we should just deliver to Goodwill, sold up like hotcakes. In a couple of hours we were already a couple of hundred bucks ahead, all for ten and fifty-cent items! It feels wonderful to have wrapped up all before noon! And NO MORE JUNK! I am the family neatnic if you haven't guessed it yet. If you haven't used it in the past six months, it's ready to hit the road! The exercise in purging has been therapeutic to us. Helps us to keep track of the things we do value around here, plus it feels like we're moving on.

Anyway, I now stare blankly at the open attic space that was once filled with a world of discarded items, childhood memories, college projects, forgotten dreams and the rubble of living and being a human. There were days I would curse all of the stuff with the devotion of a monk. We moved here from a very simple (and notably tiny) one-bedroom apartment with one functioning closet and now we have many rooms, several walk-ins, an attic and have allowed our "waste-bands" to expand into every nook and crannie of this place. In the process of living, we have also collected, and I'm thankful to have purged. We have gone through the process about three times in five years, but the stuff always seems to grow back, where the hell does it all come from?

The experience and feeling I get while blogging equates to the feelings I have about total random acts of kindness. None of you "know" me personally, but I've let you into my mind, a part of me that my friends in person never really see. And yet you've all shared your lives, hearts, souls and kindness with me and I truly appreciate every moment and every comment!

This is the end of the photos of Finland, the cottage in the woods... I've given myself a new photo assignment while I am here. I am going to photograph patterns in nature in the area we live, one last way to say "Goodbye." Look for those in the coming weeks!

Photo (above): The view from our cottage deck, many a beer was spent with this view!

Photo (above): Here ya go Vickie, the other "Laundry on a Finnish Line" I promised you... I only had packed for a three day trip, thus being the fourth day and having had worn these clothes for a couple of days, they were ready to be washed. So the story goes that we (Tia, her brother Tomi and her dad) are alone in this place and I, without hesitation, stripped to my birthday suit and hand washed these in the lake, beating them against the large granite rock the formed the basin for the lake. It was quite refreshing spending so many hours in the buff, in broad daylight, not a care in the world, not many places in this world that you can do that without being eaten by bugs or bugged by people. This place felt soulful. Clothing didn't matter here, certainly not in a perverse sense, it was a truly spiritual place, naked before the world and the heavens above.

Photo (above): Taken around 10:30 or 11:00 PM. Sun just about to set... Of course the sunset blends into the sunrise in Finland in the summer. It's beautiful.

Photo (above): Moss and a small pine growing out of the rock.

Photo (above): Tia rowing us around thelake some time after the sun had set, must have been around midnight or later...

Thanks for being patient with me, showing you in nine posts, all 76 out of the 650 shots I took in Finland. This was alot of fun and I thank you all for sharing in this with me!

Perplexing...

2006-08-20T19:22:00.000-04:00

This is now my umteenth attempt to update my blog today with absolutely no success. It seems each time I try to upload an image, Safari crashes. I've restarted Safari, rebooted my machine and checked for updates and no dice... I promise, I have a blog ready to go, all of the last images of the Finland trip... I wonder if Mercury has had something to do with all of this... anyway, check again tomorrow evening as I may have better luck. I'm exhausted and the monitor is a big furry blur in front of me. Sorry!

cheers!
~bruce

Rare Midweek Post! ...more Finland.

2006-08-15T19:35:00.000-04:00

Photo: Changing Landscapes.

OK, I swear the Finland trip pictures are coming to an end soon and I won't know what to post anymore! One more post to go and they're from my favorite spot on this trip!

So I've had some pretty interesting observations today about myself. No creative breakthroughs, but some discoveries. Bopping along on my creative process, I discover I am too much in my head and my life struggle seems to be the process of extracting my SELF from my HEAD!

SO! My discovery is that my creative mediums, design and photography (and it seems everyone in this town is calling themselves a photographer or a designer these days) make me think too much. They are perfectly purpose-full mediums. Design allows me to make a living, which then allows me to photograph... things... I like the challenge of finding the right composition in my viewfinder that balances light and dark, tension and peace, active composition, narrative, technical form and detail. I am, after all, a realist at heart. Photography lets me be an observer - AH HA! An observer indeed, shamefully hiding my face behind a big camera, pointing out things and observing them, THAT'S just what an observant mind would observe! I think, oh shit, another observation, that I need to get OUT of my friggin head and EXPRESS something. Create a voice. I am sick of looking through the magazines around town OBSERVING other artists building a creative style. I need to pound the earth, bend steel, shape clay, make noise, splash paint, get out of my mind and DO SOMETHING! So here I sit, on the computer, another night.

I need an intervention! I need someone to step in, pull me away from my desk chair, pry the mouse from my hand and take me to a place.

Reading this, a few hours after I wrote it, still doesn't convince me that things will change even. Not without some routine life changes. Change is coming...

UGH!

So, OK, enough of the rant... On to Finland (again)...

These first pictures are of my brother-in-law, one of my favorite Finns and someone who is just as much of a brother to me than my own blood relations! Tomi - thanks for a great trip and some great parties!

Photo: Martian landscape in the castle!

Photo: this was HIGH atop a low mountain. We were probably a couple of hundred feet above the water on a sheer cliff. The photos don't do it justice.

Photo: There were so many lakes in the area, Finland, instead of building bridges, has ferries at various intervals. So nice that they preserved the landscape by NOT building a bridge.

All kinds of stuff

2006-08-12T18:36:00.000-04:00

Photo: “Shine – Self-portraits in Sand. Took this photo the other night. I needed a shot for the cover of the invitation for the “Official Tanjariitta & Bruce Farewell Party.”

Hey there! How's everyone?

I love this process Tia and I are going through. We've opened every door, uncovered each box, left no stone unturned as they say. We're going through all of our collected stuff from years of school and marriage. It's encouraging. To me it feels like momentum is building. We're moving. It's all happening! We're throwing ALL KINDS of crap out now. It really impresses me when we sit and thumb through all of our stuff, even the things we were certain we were taking with us we're pitching.

It's been a blast to go through all of our things. I remember Bo going through her things in one of her last moves. Christmas all over again! I've discovered some hidden treasures and some old friends buried in our boxes of clutter. We will be down to our most essentials soon.

It seems my blogging life is really only limited to the weekends for posting my own and random lunch breaks during the week to get caught up with the rest of you. Just too tired or busy at night during the week to be on another computer. Plus, being a one computer family and having an over-zealous blogging wife doesn't help much. Just kidding honey, I know you offer the machine whenever I get home... the beast of a machine.

I find myself being carried away with all kinds of emotions thinking I have only 38 more days with m'love. We're anticipating her leaving September 19, with a party on the 15th to send her off. It's scary to me sometimes, but not as much as it used to be. We've both come to a place of understanding and fortitude about the circumstances. We both feel it's the right thing to do and the timing is perfect for this shift to happen. Actually, it couldn't feel more right.

"WE'RE INTERRUPTING OUR REGULARLY SCHEDULED BLOG TO BRING YOU THIS URGENT MESSAGE." I'm editing this blog entry after having read Bo's blog just now. I say, here, here Bo, what's that, doesn't EVERYBODY need a driver and super-stretch Hummer limo, super bright teeth, boob-jobs, face lifts, tummy tucks? And that's JUST the teen girls around here. I'm glad we're all so well cared for that we can't see past the sheen of our high-gloss, polished hoods of our Hummers. Stupid waste, stupid human waste. Sorry if I am about to offend anyone here, I do have a tendency to be anti-capitalism and anti-establishment. So here goes... Bo, great post, sounds like it didn't take you long to tap into the real pulse of this nation, CASH. Capitalism sucks in my opinion. It strips a nation of it's own self-respect and steals the culture and replaces it with plastic, mass-produced replicas. This country hasn't seen a hey-day since the 50's. I gave up on having health care two years ago because I can't stand driving by the marble-laden insurance companies. The "haves" have taken over in Sarasota, building their replica Mediterranean-revival homes 10 feet from a shore line that in one hurricane will wipe their house away - but hey, that's what we have insurance for right? Oh, the insurance company won't cover it because they are bankrupt, well the government will bail us out for sure! It's smothering in Sarasota and it isn't the heat. Am I being too negative? I'm sorry if I am but I can't help but to be disgusted by the mass public being more in tune with their portable DVD players and iPods rather than actual humanity. WAKE UP AMERICA! You're losing your soul! Sorry if I offended anyone. "WE NOW RETURN YOU TO YOUR REGURLARILY SCHEDULED BLOG..."

So anyway, I still haven't wrapped up all of the photos from our trip, so on with the show! Of course, by the time the show is over, it will be into winter before I run out of images to post… Hope you like ‘em.

Photo: Chairs outside a store in a tourist town in eastern Finland. This photo marks the beginning of the road trip Tia, her dad, brother and I took. We spent four days in the summer heat walking through old battle sights and historical places in eastern Finland.

Photo: This was a netting masking off a church facade that was being restored after having been burned out by fire.

Somebody Loves Us!

2006-08-07T18:05:00.000-04:00

They arrived today! Our visas stating we are now free to move to New Zealand!

No go on, continue looking at my Finland pictures! More coming...

The Changes Have Begun.

2006-08-05T15:30:00.000-04:00

Photo: Steps leading into the house Tia grew up in. So many people have stepped into their home, generations. These are the steps I had been waiting to see. Steps that give me a sense of being home - even though it isn't my own home.

I feel the winds of change coming, the predictions and the planning is all coming together in one dramatic performance. I sit in a silent void in my mind, I hear the rush of the wind, the wind that will sweep up our lives, carried like a speck of dust, I feel the nervous anticipation in my throat. Stopping to test the wind from time to time, I see the sun’s rays on the horizon, the sun rising in New Zealand. I also see this dark time ahead. Knowing full well that one inch ahead is all darkness. All I can do is visualize the events. I see our destination, I also see the period of time where I will be alone. Alone in the dark, sitting in a silent house, half-packed, waiting for the call that the house is sold. Wondering what is happening 13,000 miles to my southwest. Waiting for the storm to approach. The one I have waited for longer than I can seriously recall. To be swept away under a torrent rush of emotion, unbalance, turbulence and rootlessness. The time is coming. It is carried on the backs of a thousand prayers from the time of a thousand days. The thousand days I intended to spend in Florida, now counting to three-thousand, six-hundred and fifty. The time has come. Our lives are no longer what they were. One inch ahead is all darkness.

Sorry I haven’t written in so long. With Tia home now and having only one computer, I would rather spend my time with her than the machine. Doesn’t help that I’m on a machine most of my day as well.

Of course, the changes have always been happening. I'm just looking at the sense of normality of our lives, the day-in, day-out habits we slip into, some comfortable, some rut-like. Like tonight, I don't know why I continue to turn on the TV. We've pared our TV service down to local only channels having previously had the Dish and 150 channels. So now, instead of having 150 channels of crap to watch, we now only have 8 or so, and it never fails, every time I turn it on to find some short and sweet form of instant escapism, I am woefully dissappointed. Thus I am here. Blogging away on my Saturday evening and feeling much better about how my time is being spent, minus that I cannot spend it with my wife while I am here, but she is engrossed in a book or something. Cheers to me being here...

Had a happy hour last night with my employers, a self-indulged appreciation hour. A time to spend the way the employers would have it be, in their home, on their own terms. I have criticized that kind of event before, but I see it differently now. Because I have a history with these people and this company, I have a hard time differentiating between old feelings and new, and I know that aspect goes both ways. I worked for them for more than two-and-a-half years and left on not-so-good terms. Didn’t tell anyone off, but spoke without much tact my truth and I know there were hurt feelings. Then worked on my own for a year-and-a-half, meagerly. Then I got the call last May. The company has grown, the owners with it. The relationship has mended and I feel particularly well about the situation. Also helps in that I know it is only temporary. But I am there, invited for my creativity and inspiration and they have let me know it, FULLY. I am letting go of the old ways and feelings and hoping that it comes across in what I do and act in the company. I may not always like what I do or the kinds of projects I am faced with, but this job has been a blessing. Truly. And I am free to stay there as long as I am in town, right up to the day I move. Nice to have some security.

Right now I’m grooving with some old ELO, Huey Lewis and a song called Funky Town, it’s a riot!

OK, more pictures!

Red toes peeking out of the pond after enjoying the sauna.

Laundry on a Finnish Line

Moving On in Finland

2006-07-30T12:09:00.000-04:00

Photo: Pinja, Tia & Aapo

Well, I'm still recovering from this cold. I have a feeling it was Strep Throat. I used to get Strep as a child at the mere mention of it. The symptoms this time were consistent with Strep. My throat glands aren't swollen today for the first time since last Sunday. I'm also eating my first solid food since Wednesday and can finally swallow without much pain, but I'm pretty hesitant to scratch it, so soft foods for now, mushy bananas and smoothies. I've lost all the weight I gained on vacation which is the only good side effect!

While sick I also had a chance to finish reading a book. I had started Dan Brown's "Angels and Demons" while on vacation. (IF YOU HAVEN'T READ IT YET, AND WANT TO READ IT - SKIP TO THE NEXT PARAGRAPH) It's the supposed prequel to "The da Vinci Code" which I've read already. I started off enjoying the fantasy adventure of it, but then, after the book's climax, felt totally sucker-punched by it. I had the same feeling in "The da Vinci Code." I agree 100% with Dan Brown's thoughts on science and religion and feel the book offers a wider perspective on religion and I think it is needed in this world today. However, I feel the carrier of the message is a bit trite. A cheesy adventure wrapped around a theme with a love story intertwined, same story as "The da Vinci Code." Perhaps I've outgrown that kind of storytelling, but I think perhaps from novel to novel, maybe the method might change a little. It was to me anyway, that A&D was an early manuscript for "The da Vinci Code." But that's just one man's opinion.

After we left Turku, we went back to Tia's home town of Forssa. From there we visited our Goddaughter and her family. Pinja is my favorite child on the entire planet. The best behaved, smartest little 2.5 year-old I have ever met. Perhaps also a main reason why I would not want to have children, she is the perfect child, why would there be a need for there to be any more? We had a nice midday brunch with my wife's cousin's family, Roope, Heidi, Aapo and Pinja. The time we spent with them was the highlight to my vacation without a doubt. Their house overlooks a lake and they have a small fishing boat that they took us out on. While we were on the boat, Pinja crawled up by me in the bow of the boat and we discussed trees, boats, caps and bridges. Of course, she speaks Finnish and I only speak English and she just couldn't understand why Godfather couldn't understand her, so, she decided to bite my nose! So amazing. I could go on I'm sure, but I also know that Tia will have quite a bit to say on the subject as well...

Pinja's smiling face.

We're going to eat the WHOLE thing!

Dad (Roope, Pinja and Tia)

Baby brother Aapo

Baby brother Aapo

My favorite photo, my two favorite women!

Your Sadistic Tour Guide

2006-07-26T20:01:00.000-04:00

Photo: Tile on the side of a hotel in downtown Turku. I like the way the light hits the tile and the rhythmical pattern here, it's almost musical in quality. Structured, steady, paced, like a Philip Glass composition.

Hey there, your hapless tour guide again with more photos from Finland. You’ll see… I promised you so many pictures of Finland you’ll be begging me to stop, I have a flood of them. This is the “kind” replacement for the ritual of inviting your friends over and showing them a slide show or photo album, how many of you have sat through one of those?

Still sick today, I went to work anyway, better to be paid and I don’t think I’m contagious anymore. I just keep taking good drugs (OTC) and the day floats on by. Just wish I could swallow something and enjoy a good meal. Dinner tonight sucked, couldn’t taste anything and it was one of my favorite meals. Oh well…

Anyway, photos…

The cities are lined with musicians. They come in all shapes and sizes, kids, and old guys are more common. Some smell really bad, and I think many are destitute, and probably Russian in origin. This guy seemed different from the others. Seemed to be there enjoying himself almost just for pleasure. Played well too. Didn't notice the Michigan hat until I got home or I might have struck conversation. He had an earthy look to him, maybe not destitute, maybe blue collar, or maybe ultra famous, but traveling through Finland in-cognito as an accordion player knowing no one will give away his cover!

This shot just cracks me up everytime I see it.

I was experimenting with exposure, I wanted to capture a cool shot of the Finnish flag. This was a fluke I hate to admit. A happy accident nonetheless. There was another shot after it that had the correct exposure, but I really liked this one better.

I know it's just a do not enter sign, but I liked the graphic and the fence imposed over the people enjoying themselves behind it...

We've come to the catch of the trip. My ABSOLUTE favorite photo of the entire vacation. Go ahead, click on it and enlarge it for a better view, tell me, yes TELL ME I caught ONE good shot on this trip! Anyway, I'll get over myself, while walking through the city Tia spotted this rabbit, our only "captured" wild life of the vacation, a rabbit, in the city. Old "Itchy-trigger" (me), stalked out good cover (a wide open sidewalk) while "Bunny-chaser" (Tia) stalked the prey... Wun wabbit wun.

White Man Can't Dance...

2006-07-25T14:17:00.000-04:00

Photo: Finding my way. What was that, walk into the light? OK, is that where the bathroom is?

I've been sick these past two days, well, three actually, I just didn't know the pain I was feeling on Sunday was attributed to this virus. I haven't gone to work Monday or today. Really bad sore throat, all kinds of aches, chills, sweats, you name it... yuk! It was all I could do to muster enough strength this morning to go to the drug store and get some Advil. The sleep has been nice though, sleep all night, 10 or 11 hours a night, then naps all day long. The medicine is working, I'm in that asleep/awake zone. I can't feel my nose. I'm also listening to a childhood favorite group, Ozric Tentacles. I know weird name, weird group too. Progressive Instrumental Rock. Bizarre rhythms, overlayed with oscillating synthesizers and electric guitars and all kinds of weird samples. Song and album names like “Inflatable Potato,” “Pyramidion,” “Sploosh.” “White Rhino Tea,” “Erpland” “Strangitude” and “Sliding Gliding Worlds.” Hey, I was a kid with a wildly overactive imagination and these song names appealed to me! Anyway, it's all pretty upbeat in tempo and helps me reach a higher level of mental awareness. I get the same sensation with good trance music.

I was on Vickie's site earlier and she took the club dancing quiz, here was what it said for me: "So maybe the club scene is not your thing. You prefer to slow dance (like you did in Jr. high). There is something very romantic about this and it is great as foreplay." Dancing to me should be more like the scene in Matrix Reloaded, just after Morpheus' speech, they shook the walls of Zion with their dance. It was a couple hundred of people, jumping, writhing, moving to one beat, one purpose, one whole. It was amazing - I would dance to THAT! White guys dancing, to the music played at the clubs around here, is just plain stupid, and I don't fit into that. Besides the fact that all the clubs around here are mostly for tourists or the single, plus 50's - still trying to hang on to 20 - crowd. It's pretty silly actually.

Tia and I did manage to get out while in Turku. Friday night the city seemed to come alive. We staked out a spot on the banks of the river and watched people go by. Armed with my camera and a six pack of beer, dusk lasted hours. I had an opportunity to be an observer, some people spotted me taking their picture, flirting eyes and a casual smile, others were oblivious and a small amount approached us asking to have their picture taken. Most Finns are really quiet and reserved, but give them some alcohol and look out! There was all kinds of craziness going on. This post, inspired by Vickie's clubbing post, is a dedication to all of the drunk Finns we partied with! Good times!

Was it just me, or did it seem like it took forever to load images on blogger today?

This guy approached Tia when he noticed the camera she was holding, can't remember where I was, probably trying to open a beer without an opener. He really wanted his picture taken. So, I shot him. I have his email address, I think I'll send this off to him, he won't have a clue when this was taken, he was blitzed!

Bikes were everywhere in Turku, many 2-up riders. I liked what I captured here, the driver smiling, confident, out to party, navigating the busy sidewalk, the backseat driver shouting directions, wary of a collision. Nice tension.

An elevator light.

One of the party boats along the banks of the river in the center of Turku. By day a nice place to eat, by night, a club.

Caught this Chevy as it pulled up. Played with length of exposure a couple of times, then noticed cars approaching behind it so I played with a timed exposure and a trick of the lens, kinda fun huh?

Amazing to find the only thing lit was this drink, this was not staged...

Hope you enjoyed! I'm going back to bed!

So I'm Back, Now what?

2006-07-23T13:41:00.000-04:00

Photo: Boat tied in port, Turku, Finland. I liked the lines of this shot and the contrast of the white ropes with the color of the hull. The shadow on the hull with the white chain helps hold the composition.

OK, I'm home, been here for 6 days now, without Tia - who is still with her family in Finland. So, now what? I've been cleaning house, top to bottom today. Purging a month of dust, cat hair and dander. The patio was an accumulation of several months’ dirt. Yuk. Just can't seem to keep up. Well, when you’re an anal metro like me, I have to keep things clean, it's just what I do. I like a clean house, my friends back home used to tell me that I'd make a nice wife someday. I think I may have pissed off a few roommates along the way too! So, I'm back, and on a cleaning binge.

I'm also cleaning myself out a bit. I'm off alcohol for a while. Since returning to a 50-70 hour workweek a few months ago, my medication of choice has come in the form of beer, and lots of it. Then vacation and foreign beers, then home again to fall back into the same habit - BEER! So I saw myself in a few photos and today in the mirror, and I'm done with it, all of it, at least for a while. I think my liver is ready to pack up and go! No solution for being depressed anyway.

Yeah, honestly, I have to face it and admit I'm still down and I know I could let myself sink into a pit of self-loathing, but I won't. I think it's something I need to go through and push through to the end. Thank you for all the well wishes by the way. Suffering is just another human emotion, a necessary one, something to appreciate happiness. I can no longer deny the truth in my life. I don't know what is going to make me happy, but my way of life as of late has only been a mask, self-medicating with tons of work and alcohol. I wish I could be a bit more satisfied with living here, but it always seems to be just me adjusting to something less than ideal, making do with a situation. Not sure what I'm looking for actually. That's the root of the problem. Time to get back to meditation.

So my new self-medication is cleaning and exercise. I outlined a regimen for myself of daily meditation and martial arts exercise. My former sifu (teacher, master) used to tell me that I should become a monk (not literally of course, just in spirit). Do your daily chores, happiness the same as sorrow. Become a warrior; find your soul in the mundane tasks. Face the truth, whatever it may be.

I got up this morning and ran 3 miles on the beach, worked in the yard until it was too hot to breathe and now I'm scouring the house. It feels good. There was a time in my life, say 7 years ago, I used to take anger or sorrow and turn it into something good, since then, I haven't had to know sorrow or anger much. So, I had my tantrums over the years of being married (and she still loves me), and found that the river still flows deep, but mostly, I've been convinced that life has been good and happy. I'm a bit impatient with money issues, and REALLY impatient with living in Florida, but we do have a beautiful house (no matter how much work it takes to maintain) and a wonderful circle of friends. Yet, coming back here, to my home, was a bit depressing. Traveling alone. Coming home to an empty and silent house minus the occasional meow of one of the cats. This has to be one of the last times I come home to Sarasota. I can't keep coming back here, it seems to repulse me. I know being alone is a good thing, I spent an entire year alone with my thoughts when I first moved to Florida - and I recommend it to everyone once in your life. It's an amazing way to grow inward. Sit. Be alone, don't reach for something to use as a crutch, get to know your thoughts. That's what I am adjusting to once again, even if for only a little while. I may have to face it again though if we plan to send Tia off to New Zealand ahead of me, and for who knows how long. It will be a difficult time I think.

Back on a better note... I have always been so impressed with the Europeans way of living. Almost EVERYTHING gets recycled. I drank a beer with a date on the bottom of the bottle and my brother-in-law told me that it was the bottle's creation year, it was a vintage 1992 and still in use! They pay you to bring them in, they clean them, test them and put them back into service, it's astonishing all that they recycle actually. All kinds of things. It's common for a kitchen to have three garbage cans, one for recycling, one for organic waste - which gets composted, and one for real trash. The landscape is clean, people pick up waste in the streets, the local governments have workers who plant flowers and maintain flowers throughout the land, everywhere you go you see fresh flowers in bloom, it's amazing.

So, photos, the beginning anyway. I’m still sorting through them all and have edited it down quite a bit, but still, there are so many! So here is a smattering of some of my initial favorites from the trip.

Photo: Flowers. A large portion of my photos were of flowers. Everything was in full bloom in Finland while I was there. Can't have too many flowers I think.

Photo: Exterior of a Ship. Turku is a port city. Also a major manufacturer of cruise ships - this is not one of them... This is of a tugboat on the banks of a river that flows out to the Baltic. It was being renovated to be turned into a restaurant - obviously, they missed a spot! I like the color and textures present here.

Photo: Dappled shade in a window. Seems my photographic themes while I'm in Finland revolve around light, color and texture. The light there is different from other places I've been. I can't quite put my finger on why, but colors are crisper, the sky bluer and the way the light touches the landscape inspires unique observations.

Photo: Graffiti in a bicycle underpass. Guess who?

Photo: Spools. We visited an old part of Turku that was converted into a museum as the remaining part of the old city. It is known as the Luostarinmäki Handicrafts Museum. A fire in 1827 destroyed much of the city of Turku but this area was saved. This was the cord-maker's workshop.

Photo: Ambient and direct light. The angle of the composition and the angle of light entering the room allowed for the contrast of light, the coolness of the ambient light and the warmth of the direct light.

Photo: Blocks of type in the printing office. Moveable type has always fascinated me, I wished I had worked in my profession in a time when it was a tactile, physical profession. No computers, leading was actual lead. You have to be a designer to get that geek reference.

More later gang! Cheers!

Hey, I'm back!

2006-07-22T09:52:00.000-04:00

OK! Hey there, I'm back. I've actually been back since last Monday evening. Sorry I didn't just jump into an update immediately but being back has not entirely been enjoyable. In fact it's quite depressing. But I won't dwell on it. Tia is still back in Finland dotting around the landscape and I'm here to deal with some rather stressed out cats, a house that has a number of needs to attend to - although I am almost caught up now, and 2.5 GIGABYTES of photography to go through. I also started work this week and after five days, I still feel like I'm jet-lagging.

Don't worry, photos are coming...

Yes I had a good time in Finland. The summer was absolutely beautiful, we enjoyed a long stay in Turku on the western coast. Participated in some summertime activities, walking the city, going to the market, eating ripe cherries and strawberries (smaller berries have more flavor, but don't tell the Americans, they like 'em big and bland). We also drank like fish, another Finnish summer pasttime and frankly I could use to clean out for a while! Well, maybe not THAT much, but I did get my fill of Finnish beer and Swedish Cider drinks. YUM! I also think I gained 20 pounds! I think we ate homecooked meals twice in 17 days! I feel like a stuffed sausage.

I did say that I have 2.5GB of photos, I've been avoiding going through all of them, just overwhelmed with the 600+ photos to sort through. The camera performed very well, changing my batteries only once while we were there - an amazing feat in and of itself! The camera performed amazingly well, but the photographer on the other hand, did not. A large amount of what I took didn't turn out unfortunately. User error, seems most of the mistakes were exposure issues, but I haven't gone through enough of them to know fully. Chalk it up to being out of practice with a professional camera and being unfamiliar with this one. Oh well, perhaps I'll have the system perfected by the time we move to New Zealand.

Well, after this trip, I can honestly say I am ready to move to New Zealand now. It was good to see everyone in Finland, great to spend time with our Goddaughter and Tia's cousins. I do adore Finland and think I may try to get my Finnish citizenship while we are in New Zealand. I think it would be good to have and I could still see us moving there at some point if the distance in New Zealand gets to us. Citizenship in Finland is possible because Finland recognizes dual citizenship and I wouldn't have to give up my US passport. I would just have to travel to the US on my US passport. We're getting our NZ residency permits so citizenship there isn't something we need entirely. We will have options then of where to go.

One thing I have gotten used to living in Florida is my space from our families. Distance does make the heart grow fonder. It's easy to overlook the annoying sides from thousands of miles away. I miss my family at times, might be nice to spend a tad more time with them, but one thing I learned while in Finland, is personal space from awkward family dynamics would be paramount to living a sane and happy life. I escaped my own bad family dynamics by moving to Florida to go to school and it's easy to pick up on them whenever I visit home, things I used to not ever see while I was there. Alot can be said for getting out and moving on, there's a step in personal growth when you're secluded and no longer within reach for the "usual" craziness. No family is perfect, and there is no such thing as normal, well there is I guess, normal for your family, normal for my family, but no two the same. We got caught up a number of times in family dynamics while we were in Finland, being not my blood family, it was easier to recognize and deal with, sometimes annoying, but I could see how my wife fits into her family and how much she has grown from them, but her walls are paper thin. Things she would NOT dare tolerate from me, she easily lets in with her blood relation. Gave me some insights in family perspectives that I think I can use for my own family I think. But then, I am so different from the rest of my family by now I'm not sure it matters... but still, I guess I'm still the same in many ways. Hard to really put to words. I just know that wherever we go, personal emotional and intellectual space is the rule. The line in the sand is clearer.

Quick Hello

2006-07-06T05:08:00.000-04:00

Hey everyone!

Just wanted to drop you a quick update from the road. We're in Turku, Finland this week, spending our time going to the market downtown, enjoying eating on the boats along the river, and of course, spending time with my wonderful in-laws here. The food is fantastic, the coffee is perfect, the weather couldn't be better and I'm ready to stay here. This place is so beautiful. It's an interesting blend of old-world ways with modern times. I am always impressed that there are so many parks so close together, so that no matter where you are you can walk to a park within minutes. I greatly admire the ease of getting around, no car needed really. Travel between cities is relatively cost effective, travel in the cities is easy by foot, and everyone rides bicycles to get around. I have always admired the European way of life, minus the cost of goods and the high taxes - but the trade off of having healthcare is probably worth it.

IMMIGRATION UPDATE: One more hurdle has been crossed, our New Zealand immigration officer informed us that our visas are going to be approved! YEAH!!!!!!!!

Anyway, I hope you are all having a wonderful July!

I'll keep checking in from time to time. Sorry no pictures today, I'm on a foreign computer and don't know much about PCs to install the software needed to do the trick, you'll just have to see them all when we return.

CHEERS!

OK, Now we're REALLY gone!

2006-07-01T12:21:00.000-04:00

It's about an hour from our departure Europe bound! Just thought I'd post one last time to leave on a good note, the last post was a bit too whinney.

I finally feel like I'm going somewhere. It's been a wicked six weeks of work and now it's time to do some heavy-duty playing - the European way! This is a pathetic photo of me, but if you understood the context of it. The place: Amsterdam Airport. The time - who knows, it was a LOOONG flight and I look like crap, but the good news was that was my first Eurpoean coffee of the trip. The Americans don't know coffee. European coffee IS FAR more superior than any American blend I've ever had! Debatable I'm sure by many bean sipping American coffee addicts! Anyway. the image is perfect, I'll be sipping one of these in Manchester airport within 24 hours!

Cheers! Maybe the next image will be us sipping some fine Eurpoean beers! WOOHOO!!!!!

See Ya!

Really, No I Mean REALLY, ready to go...

2006-06-29T18:26:00.000-04:00

This has been a challenging week indeed. I am SO ready for a vacation I can't STAND it! A little background here. I LOVE to be busy and focused on a daily basis. I LIVE for action and activity while I work. I enjoy working under deadline and sometimes I think I THRIVE on it. Some of my best work has happened at four in the morning after a night of struggling to find the right creative hook. These past weeks have spoiled me, I've been given huge projects and completely unrealistic deadlines and I've pulled it all off with my contractors smiling and their clients happy as clams! Then this week came. Because I am leaving, no big projects, no towering deadlines, just a week of regular-guy kind of work. I am so bored I can't stand it! I get stuck in rush-hour traffic - which isn't around when you leave at 8pm - I get to take a lunch break - one of the first times I got to do THAT - and I have little projects, and very little of them... Oh well, I guess I shouldn't complain, I do need a break after all!

So, we're outta here, today's theme picture. Taken while we were in the Bahamas about four years ago. And THAT'S another story for another time, perhaps Tia will post about it - NO BUTT shots dear - well, ok, maybe a little one for HNT's sake!

Now to top it off, I just crispy-fried my dinner! OIY! Sorry for the whining, I guess I needed to dump some of it off...

On a more positive tone, I LOVE Virgin UK Radio. If you haven't tried it out yet, go NOW and plug in. It's the ABSOLUTE BEST radio station I have ever heard - and I AM PICKY about my radio. I am finding myself sourcing all of my new music tastes with their playlist. The Brits have really something good going there. Their DJs are great personalities, their playlist rocks and even their commercials ooze with great British humor. I LOVE it! Right now though I am listening to one of the most beautiful classical guitar pieces, Concierto Madrigal for 2 Guitars and Orchestra by Rodrigo. It was a rare day today, I had the truck - most days I take the motorcycle to work. I had NPR on and on my lunch the last three movements were playing. Some really fascinating guitar work, both having been written, and played.

I guess I better get on with my evening, the quicker I get my work done, the earlier I can crash!

Wish all of you a spledid time while we are away!

Recovering

2006-06-24T14:19:00.000-04:00

OK, I've decided to post this blog, but I have to say that I have second and third guessed it all day today. I spent several hours working on it and keep thinking that I am too "full of myself" in the way it comes across and I certainly do not mean that. I am not one to be boastful or full of ego, in fact, in the last 6 years of being a martial artist, I have done a great deal of work to eliminate as much ego as I can, and learned to become a spiritual being, a warrior and a monk. With that said, this isn't a post about any HUGE, WORLD impending theme, this is about me, enough...

It's a fine Saturday afternoon, I slept in this morning, spent the morning rolling around in the sheets with the woman I married but rarely see anymore. Enjoyed a late brunch with her at a new favorite whole foods sandwich and coffee shop (not the Whole Foods chain mind you, a private store). I wrapped up an amazing week of work yesterday, but have to go back tomorrow for a full Sunday of work. I'm tired today, but thrilled to be where I am. Thrilled to be doing the best work I have ever done. I have never really been a "career" man. I graduated 7 years ago and have been in the same field, but I find that the structure of work in America is FAAAAAR to rigid for my tastes, health care is horrible and the system is driven for the corporations, never the consumers. I am an artist after all. For me to be excited about the work I have been doing these last 5 or 6 weeks is an amazing concept. I don't dread doing what I am doing and I LOVE IT. I am allowed to be creative, almost completely carté blanch. I've never been happier with my work and career. It feels like an addiction. Only one day this week did I actually put in a normal 8 hour workday. It's been 11, 14 and 18 hour days, but all good work. My life is totally out of balance, but so much so that it isn't annoying. I don't have a couple of hours at the end of a long day to even think about what I should be doing otherwise. I just work. Then I come home and sleep, albeit very lightly. I'm getting used to sleeping only 5 or 6 hours a night. I recently was in contact with a former co-worker. He was a Creative Director and I only had an opportunity to work with him for 3 months, but he made a giant impact. He is now working in LA at TBWA/Chiat/Day, the opportunity of a lifetime for anyone in the creative/advertising industry. I am very privileged to have worked with him and he has been a valuable source of information on career aspirations - not to mention an incredibly talented individual - although you would never know it from looking at him, bright obnoxious Hawaiian shirts, flip-flops, and always smiling or cracking jokes. He made work fun, and at the time, the company we worked for, needed it. Anyway, being in touch with someone who made it to the "BIGS" has been rather important to me. A path to follow. I have spent several years of questioning what I am doing with my life and career, and now I feel like I am being "discovered" at least in Sarasota. It's a good feeling to have someone who knows the field out here to tell me that, after searching for 18 or 20 months for killer creative, that they realized that I am that person. And I KNOW it. It's a new sensation and I don't ever want to sound boastful or full of myself, I hope those of you who are reading this don't get the wrong impression of me, I'm not that way in the slightest. I am now just finding new wings and flying higher than I have in the past and the view is incredible!

Anyway. I took some photos of the latest project that wrapped up Friday. We were commissioned to design an interior sales office space for the largest Real Estate firm in Sarasota, Michael Saunders. I was given a smidgeon of time to produce the concept, create the look and execute the design of the multi-room space. Early on in the project, we were told that our deadline could not be pushed because the client had already mailed out invitations for a private party to show off her new space. It took the efforts of many to organize and choreograph this production nightmare! Images and artwork printed on canvas, designs in cut acrylic, overlapping elements, maps, and templates all to be created in a time space of minimal proportion, absolutely no room for error. It took us two full days for three guys to assemble the pieces and we wrapped up 90 minutes from the deadline. It was exhausting and nail-biting, but through our white knuckles and gritted teeth, we wrapped it up. Our client was extraordinarily pleased and has now commissioned us for ALL of her sales galleries. Just hope we got longer deadlines next time.

I'm off to relax the remainder of the day. Another long week ahead of me, then it's OFF to Finland. I can't wait! I'll try to post again before we go.

Chaos in preparation for the assembly

Putting together the individual canvases for the back wall

The back wall coming together

A canvas spread in a sales office

Lettering template

A complete line of type

Had to have some proof I worked on this!

Complete side wall

Part of the completed gallery.

Elusive Baby

2006-06-22T00:17:00.000-04:00

For about two weeks I have been trying to capture a family of Sandhill Cranes that live not far from where I work. I saw them one morning walking and feeding in the grassy areas outside my window, two babies and two adults. The babies were wonderful, watching as they mimicked their parents, bending to feed from the grass. the babies must have only been a few weeks old, but were already walking as gracefully through the tall grass as their adult counterparts. I saw them several mornings in a row, then I started to carry my camera with me and they didn't show up for several days. I was worried something had happened to them. then, the other morning, they were walking along the side of the road, only one baby in tow unfortunately. I was able to get within feet of them to shoot these pictures. Hope you enjoy. Cranes mean alot to me. Being a sacred and totem animal in my life. My martial arts and Tai Chi instruction involved white crane techniques. When a crane appears in my life, I feel honored. This is dedicated to the spiritual warriors in my life, in my past, in my present, and in my future.

Exploring

2006-06-17T17:26:00.000-04:00

OK, here we go! No more excuses of "working in excess of 70 hours a week", or "long days, long nights," or "I just don't want to be on the damn computer!" I am just going to have to make the extra time to be around more often. Taking a break from work to post a message, or coming home and update even if it's short. Damit, just do it!

There is so much to get caught up on it’s not even funny! The house is off the market now, we had to say goodbye to our last realtor. He didn’t show the house once. Once we return from Finland, we’re going to reevaluate our situation and possibly relist, but honestly, I don’t think we’re looking at the possibility of selling much before the fall anyway. It’s a touch market, it's also hurricane season, and we’re asking ourselves how much we’re going to be willing to sacrifice on price to attain our dream. I think a bit of sacrifice is worth it in the long run.

So, hello to all the new visitors, you've all been very cool to hang out with and it does seem as though we are building this nice little community here. I need to get to a few more of your posts today - I've heard rave reviews of Michele's blog and some new friends in New Zealand, must get around to those. And of course, my old favorites...

So, I've had my NEW camera for a week now and I LOVE IT! It is SOOOOOOOO NICE to have a manual focus, SLR (single-lens reflex) in my hands again - WOO HOOOO - so I get a little carried away, and those of you with perverted minds, a word of warning, I can dish it out as quickly as it comes in! I could become a total tech geek about it, but I won't bore you with that. I MUST say though, for a slightly outdated digital camera (meaning there are newer and better ones out there), this is a perfect step up on this amateur's repertoire. The imaging sensor in this camera rocks. At 100% and 200%, the images resemble film, very fine noise altogether. The Canon 20D is great! Moving into amateur/professional grade photography means alot to me. Whether I move ahead with it and create a new livelihood from it, I don't care really. I just want to have a camera in my hands and something worth while in front of me to shoot. Nothing feels more right for me. I've been chasing the dream of having a digital SLR for a very long time, all the extra work and long nights are paying off and allowing me to afford some extras in life.

Photos...

I have been taking my camera to work with me every day. I stopped by a pond and snapped off a couple of shots of the cattail and the lilies. Then, Friday, a co-worker, Charles, ran in and grabbed me from my desk, camera in tow to show me the beautiful Black Widow he found. She (or he) posed nicely for us, showing off her beautiful hourglass marking on her belly. Friday night Tia and I went to our favorite hang out, O'Leary's pub. It's an outdoor dive, wood patio on a beach overlooking the Marina downtown, probably one of the only last original "places of character" this town has left in the downtown area. It's a beautiful place to escape with a nice beer and some live music. Anyway, the woman with the dogs is from that pub. Then we went to the beach and I snapped off a few rounds of some storm clouds and sea oats. Perfectly cliché'.

Anyway. Probably should get back to work (again).

Quick Note on a Thursday

2006-06-15T13:52:00.000-04:00

Just penning a quick note for the sake of keeping my site fresh. It's so difficult to keep up these days with so much work on my plate. I absolutely love what I do, I get to be creative on some very nice projects during the day and then come home to my faithful clients in the evening. I do like being busy, knowing that in the near future I will get a break, also knowing that sometime, down the road, things will come to an end here and I will pick up either a new career or new opportunities to be creative wherever I go in New Zealand.

I have thoroughly enjoyed all of this, but it leaves very little time for the other things in life like watching movies, updating and keeping up my blog, spending time with friends - thankfully my family is no longer in Florida. I feel a pull of guilt also for not meditating and practicing in the (martial) Art like I used to. Gone also is time to cook, clean, do household chores (which I do enjoy), also maintaining our house and lawn, keeping up our gardens. My life, in one phone call four weeks ago, changed. I am now fully adjusted to the new lifestyle and have come to enjoy it, but I do miss everyone and the process of journaling about life and the move.

I promise soon, once we are back from Finland, I will have SOOOO much material (photos) that you'll be begging me to stop posting the photos from Finland - PUHLEEEEEAAASSSE!

So in the meantime, check back with me once in a while, I'll be here always in spirit.

NEW CAMERA!

2006-06-11T16:25:00.000-04:00

Hey everyone! Sorry it's been so long between blogs, been working 60 and 70 hour weeks these days. The work is good, but spending any time on a computer after hours has been a challenge, in fact, even today it has been challenging to even get dressed!

Anyway, I took the plunge this week and bought myself a new "toy." I finally splurged and bought a Canon 20D Digital SLR camera! I found a used body on-line and saved a bunch. It seems to be a decent camera and so far I LOVE shooting with it! It feels so good to have a manual focus lens in my hands again. It just feels good to have an SLR back in my tool box. Should be able to pay this off with all the new work that's been coming in. Hoping that this will help my photo career open up.

To those of you who I have missed blogging all this time, I am sorry and I do hope you all understand. Thanks!

Whatever is Working... I guess.

2006-05-27T06:16:00.000-04:00

photo: prosthetic knee

Well. I have finally found a smidgeon of time to finally post a new blog message. I've been working pretty hard the last several weeks. It's had some pretty good side effects too. I put in over 50 hours Monday through Thursday, took a half day on Friday. I worked a 29-hour shift Wednesday to Thursday, preceded by a 12-hour shift Tuesday. I then slept for 16 hours straight so here it is, Saturday morning, 5:30 and I'm wide awake, what better a time to post I guess! Anyway, the good side effects, yes, the money is good. I like what I am doing mostly. I still think a career in photography is something I would like to explore. I had a shoot Tuesday night at a machine shop up in St. Pete. It was a great opportunity to shoot some technical stuff (pictured). Commercial photography, to me, is so much easier than design and doesn't at all feel like work. I put in four hours shooting and felt like I could have done more. Design can be fun, but it is a constant mental challenge, balancing the elements of form, content, concept, client perceived need, actual client need, educating the client, educating the audience, determining the audience, appealing to that audience, creating solid concepts to do so, appeasing my employers, satisfying my need to create something! So many things. Really, shooting in a machine shop late at night was a vacation from work!

I'm very glad the opportunity to work came when it did. I am working for my former employers, the ones I left to pursue a life of freelance (and getting ready for the move). I didn't entirely leave on the best of terms, I didn't tell anyone off, but I was honest with them, to a fault. Over the year and a half I was gone, I managed to send them a Christmas card to try to make some amends, at least make sure there was no bad blood between us. In return, 3 months later, I received an invitation to their open house. It was a little awkward, uncomfortable greetings, do we hug, do we shake... Seeing old friends and clients. Making or forcing conversation. So when the call came in a few weeks ago to help them out in their new office, I thought it might be a good opportunity to come around full-circle with them and be able to leave on a positive note - a second chance. I've been given full creative license and all of the juicy design jobs. Something has changed. The work is what I have been looking for since graduation in 1999 - and a decent paycheck to boot. Life can be so damn ironic sometimes. All this time we have been preparing for this stupid move, hoping to find better jobs and a better social situation abroad, only to find some pretty nice things here.

photo: grind pattern

Well, I'm dodging the topic now it would seem. I guess working has helped me dodge a few critical decisions. Frankly I don't actually give a crap about whether or not I am on top of it. We pulled our listing on our house last week and haven't reposted it again. We were planning on listing with another agent, but after reading through her stuff, we're both just turned off from the whole thing, AND the market is still stalled with no signs of moving ahead. It makes me so mad to think about it that I am glad I have been so busy. We have considered posting the house ourselves, I honestly don't think anyone is out there buying so really what does it matter? Even our visas for New Zealand are delayed again. The closer we get to realizing this dream, the further away from it feels. I know I can speak for both my wife and I when I say that we "over" this process. Never thought it would be such a challenge.

Anyway, that's the news. Sorry I've been away so long. Hey, I actually kind-of like being up so early and posting, maybe I'll be back next Saturday. Have a good one. Thank you very much!

New Workload

2006-05-10T06:38:00.000-04:00

Thank you for the inspiring emails and comments about the Haunted House and "Ghost in the Pennies." It's been wonderful finally getting all of that down on paper, er um, on file. It has stirred up something insode of me and I still feel spooked by it, but I think I'm coming to terms with it. I now feel inspired to do a little more work of my own next time I go home and try to dig up some of the news articles about my old haunts!

Well, keeping this blog up is getting more and more difficult each week. My days have now been bought up by an advertising agency here in town. Full-time day-time freelance and nights servicing my original clients and other smaller accounts. It's going to be a busy spell for me but I'm glad to finally making ends meet - after a year and a half of slowly sinking into debt. I will do my best to keep checking in from time to time and try to make a regular habit of keeping tabs on where we are. Thanks for checking in with me from time to time.

Looks like we are stuck here for a spell. There doesn't look like there is going to be any break in the real estate hum-drums of past and it's a tad frustrating. At least I have work now, enough that I can afford to float the house and bills and send my wife off on vacation to Finland to see her family before we make the final move to New Zealand. I'm excited about her going and really wish I could go to, but I'm ot going to start passing on work. So, by the time she gets back from her trip, she can start looking for work again too. I know we could send her off to her new job in New Zealand, but we haven't spent any more than a week apart since we were married seven years ago and frankly, we're both a little nervous about it. Wouldn't want to be that far apart from her for that long. Who knows when or IF this place will ever sell. I don't want to be desperate here either. Anyway...

Gotta run off to work. More later!

The Ghosts in my Past

2006-05-04T10:16:00.000-04:00

I have been prompted to write about the haunted house I grew up in that I made reference to in my last blog. I have also searched high and low for a photo to correspond to this story, but the only photo I have of this house is not in the place I thought it was...

My parents play a role in this story and before anyone casts judgment on them, I hold nothing against them for any "lack" of action on their part. They did only what they knew to do and had I been in their shoes, I might have sent my little boy off for psychiatric evaluations! I know I can be a bit dramatic, but I'm pretty sure my parents thought I was flipped! I hold nothing against them in any of this, and still hold true that I grew up exceptionally well and in a loving home. All the time I was living there, my parents had only clues as to the goings on there and never put together that the house was haunted. It was only after the house had appeared in the paper after we moved out that they believed me.

This is a story of a fully documented true haunting. (and I retain all movie rights!)

In 1978 my dad designed and built his dream house near a small Wisconsin town called Mukwonago. It was huge. He bought a large plot in a subdivision on the side of a hill overlooking a marsh and a lake. The land used to be the farm where my mother and her sisters grew up with the exception of a few wooded plots on this hill.

The home is a wood-frame two-story built in the modern-style. It has a long sloped roof-line extending from the front up to the center of the house and down the back. There were three balconies on the front of the house, one that wrapped around the front and two on the upper level for two bedrooms there. A giant fireplace in the middle of the front that extended from the exposed basement level to reach above the second floor - which looked like the third floor from the view in the front. The interior had an open staircase by the front door, two balconies in the upper living room that overlooked the entrance on one side and the fireplace on the other. The house featured hanging chandeliers and large open windows to capture the beautiful view. The upstairs was all open with cathedral ceilings. Each upstairs bedroom had sloped ceilings.

I picked a room on the upper floor, above my parent’s bedroom. It had a balcony, sloped cathedral ceiling and an unusually large walk-in closet. Even the closets had cathedral ceilings. It must have been fifteen feet tall, absolutely cavernous!

Just after we moved in I began to start seeing unexplained things and had weird feelings around the house. I was all of eight at the time, so I couldn't really know what was going on, all I knew was that my room was the coldest room in the house even in the hottest summer. I saw things in the night. Things in my room moved in the shadows. Being a frightened eight-year-old, I cowered under my sheets, laying awake for hours into the night as I watched my red digital alarm clock vanish and turn itself into several small blips and freely float in front of my bed. The next morning, everything in the room would be as it was the night before and I was left to wonder, did I actually see anything? The next night would come, and the whole scenario would play out again.

Every time I went into my closet, it was like I was walking into a meat-locker. Frigid cold and the space seemed always a bit askew. You know the type of lens distortion where, in a movie, the camera views down a long corridor and the space seems to stretch unnaturally? THAT'S the way I felt in my closet, like the space wasn't quite right. I would go in there and it felt like I was being watched. It was a bad feeling - I have never quite put it any other way, but it was a feeling that made me not want to be there. The strange occurrences continued the entire time I stayed in that bedroom. I moved out of that room and into another room after a few years.

One summer night, I went to bed on the floor next to my huge box fan. I always slept with a fan, the white noise puts me to sleep. It was still early, my parents were still up. I was laying with my head near the fan when I heard whispering. Whispering just softly enough as to not be understood. I sat up. Nobody around. I laid back down and heard more whispering. I went out to tell my dad, who lovingly told me to turn the fan up to a higher setting.

I had a play area in the basement that was on the same side of the house my bedroom was on. I had a giant train set there that was in a constant state of disrepair. In fact, our whole basement was in disrepair. Exposed masonry, stacks of lumber from construction projects my dad was working on, lots of junk as my mother would put it. Across from where I was working was a window looking out to the front yard. Beyond the window the ground sloped away from the house to a small grove of trees. At night when I was working on my set, it would feel as though something was peering at me from the window. I would look into it from across the room and it was blacker than pitch. It actually gave me a terrible sense of fear to look at it and felt as though the energy that was coming from it passed right through me, yearned for me to move, get out of there or die. It made me feel grossly out of place. Not long after I had a few night experiences like that, I stopped playing there at night. Eventually I avoided going into the basement at night, and even during the day I was uncomfortable being there. My train set was never fully completed.

The one defining experience stands out in my mind. One night, I was home alone, my parents were out playing cards. We had a small ShiTzu dog that would sometimes scratch her claws and rub her face on the carpet stairs the way most dogs do. I heard the scratching on the staircase, but it was "different." I walked over to the stairs to get a clear, top-down view and the dog was nowhere to be seen! But the noise continued, I quickly turned around and the damn dog was hiding under the sofa. My skin crawled! I ran to the phone and quickly called my parents to explain what was going on. They probably thought I was a disturbed, imaginative little boy, they did the only thing they knew to do, continued playing cards and passively deny the whole thing.

Later on, I began to put some things together in my mind about some of the signs I saw that might have tipped me off that the side of the house where my first bedroom was located was haunted. On that side of the house it was never really completed. There was always overgrowth of weeds, no matter what we did to landscape the area and the wood panel siding on the house above the same area, leaked a disproportionate amount of sap. Sure, these things could be explained by logical explanations, the angle of the sun, lack of nutrient in the soil, but I think I knew better.

Looking at photos of the house after the fact, the house looks demonic. It's beautiful and massive and by no fault of the designer (my dad), but by the look in the windows, the eyes of the home, it looks ill and twisted.

We lived in this house for ten years, from the time I was eight until I graduated high school. Soon after we moved out of that house, the new people expanded along the side of the house where my and my parents' bedroom was. That proved to be the home's fatal mistake. Just after the construction was completed, it is reported that the woman of the house was taking a bath when holy hell broke out in the bathroom, her toiletries flying about her while she bathed. She was reported to have run out of the house naked, and screaming. The owners had the house looked at by the scientific community. She reported that after she would clean the house, items in the house would find new places to exist. Her knick-knacks would change places or move to face a different direction. She would vacuum the carpet and moments later see a set of footprints in the carpet where she KNEW nobody had walked. It was later deemed fully-haunted and was vacant for the several years after. The investigators found the area contained Indian burial mounds and found that the side of the house where my first bedroom was, had been partially built on a burial mound. The people that later expanded on that side, went further into the mound and thereby activating the house fully. I wished I had saved the news reports, perhaps on my next visit home, I might do a little more investigating myself and try to dig up some archives at the local paper.

Since the ten years of my life having lived in other-worldly presences, I have come to recognize a certain feeling inside myself whenever a presence is near. I can sense the energy of a room and the energy of a whole house. In fact, it took many months of living in this house before I felt my energy had taken hold and any negative energy had become sub-dominant. There is still some negativity here, because when I am alone at night, I am a little uncomfortable. I am very particular about the positioning of items in a room and have since learned the art of Feng Shui. I believe, as do many others, that the way that we live and exist in a space leaves a residual effect after we are gone. Some of our energy stays behind, even after we leave in the morning to go to work, there is an energy left behind. It is important to live happy and balanced lives, not only for our own good, but for the good of what is around us and for the good of what is to come us us next. Always leave a space better than when you found it.

The experience has left one bad side-effect on me and that I am a VERY light sleeper. However, living among spirits has also given me a broader view on life and the afterlife. We must respect the other side of life, be aware of what's around us, and most of all, keep an open mind.

Those experiences are a part of me now, and I am a better person for having experienced them.

Thank you for allowing me to share that with you all, feel free to leave me a comment!

Ghost in the Pennies

2006-04-26T12:26:00.000-04:00

While taking some photos of a penny jar, I stumbled across this image. Apparently I was not working alone today. I thought about reflections and if my face was in light in order to cast a reflection and I was certainly not anywhere near the lights to cast off my likeness, nor is it even a likeness of myself. A true ghost? Perhaps my spirit guide saying hello? With all the troubling times around here, I imagine the angels and spirits are keeping a close tab around here. Having spent ten years of my childhood in a scientifically actively haunted house, I became "aware" of what was around me and today, working in my house, I can honestly say it is not haunted to my knowledge. But, I have had these pennies now since I was about 6 years old, collecting them through all of the years including the ten years in the haunted house, perhaps a bit of the past is still holding on in my penny jar! What do YOU think?

Last Times - The Downside of Moving

2006-04-24T15:02:00.000-04:00

I hosted my parents for the last time in this home this weekend. I've been an emotional basket-case this whole weekend. I've gone through a gambit of feelings, happy, sad, depressed, confused, irritated, regretful, fearful, guilty. I am witness now to all that I am making them go through. The pain of change, the distance separating us all, growing further as I write. The time had to come eventually for them to go back to the rest of the family up north, for them to return from whence they came. I am selfishly aware that I have them to myself down here, no other family they spend time with to take them away. It's been a fair compromise, me being in Florida, and easy convenience, an easy way for them to have winters in Florida and still spend time with family. While it was wonderful to spend so much time with them this year, I hadn't prepared myself enough to say goodbye. But really, how do you fully say goodbye? We all have our health, but for how long? I jokingly say to them, "Oh yeah, you've got another 30 years yet!" I'd like to think they do, but honestly, I'm not so sure, and now I'm moving to the middle of nowhere, in a vast sea some 13,000 miles away.

The final hugs passed, my mom mentions to me that she hopes all goes well and smooth, that we sell our house and live our dreams, then admits that secretly she is simply pretending that I will be here again next year, in this house, hosting the whim of family card parties, grilling out in the backyard, having bon-fire parties and running to the farmer's markets with them when they come down to spend the winter. Emotional support mechanism I guess. I waved goodbye, tears already streaking down my face, I don't think I have ever cried in front of my parents as an adult. I see their moist eyes and them smiling through the tears and I hold back from completely breaking down. They back out of the driveway and slowly move down the street, knowing fully that I won't ever see them again this way. Next time, regardless of where the meeting is, will be fully and completely different, but wondering if there will be a next time. But whether I am here or there also makes no difference, because NOTHING will ever be the same as it is RIGHT NOW. Nothing will ever return to the way it was. No matter if we are here, Finland or New Zealand. One inch ahead is total darkness.

Please excuse the emotional nature of today's message. You are here and have read all of this because you are a friend or family member who cares and I appreciate you all witnessing me though this process. This is the real reason for this blog.

We had our last times now, the last meals prepared, the last card games played, the last motorcycle rides, the last laughs in this house together. Today is surreal, empty and I feel totally disconnected. The house sits as a shell. Full of memories, but vacant and empty. I go about my normal routine, cleaning, making the house ready for a buyer to preview, doing the dishes, working or attempting to work. Distracted. I do feel like someone or something has passed away.

These pictures are of our last weekend here. I didn't take too many photos. The moments I didn't capture on film, are better served as memories instead. But these are the token few shots.

Emerald green water along the intercoastal waterway.

A lone fisherman in the sun.

Riding through Myakka State Park - water levels were low.

Riding through Myakka State Park

Dad riding along behind me, I almost ran off the road to take this shot. I like the blurriness of it, seems to speak to me in an other-worldly sense.

Dad in my rearview mirror - the road ahead, the road behind, he will always be my riding partner, in person or in spirit, always right behind me.

No More Brit Bashing OK?

2006-04-20T15:47:00.000-04:00

OK, I may have been a bit harsh about our companions across the great pond there. I do appreciate the British, in fact, they are quickly becoming some of my favorite people, right after Kiwis and Finns! (Ok a select Turks and Canadians TOO!) The British have given me my ALL TIME favorite radio station, Virgin-UK Radio out of London. YOU GUYS ROCK and NOTHING in America even comes close. The Brits given me the wonderful vocabulary: arse, brilliant, bloody, bum, bugger, cheesed off, cock up (to screw up - nothing with the male anatomy), crikey, fiddle sticks (which I've used for decades not knowing it was owned up by the Brits), getting off (snuggling), hiya (which I always thought came from the Finns), twit (which my brothers used to call me - HEY!), on the piss (out to get drunk), off your trolley, quid, rubbish, shag, snookered - all reference thanks to a wonderful site: www.effingpot.com. Have I made up for bashing the few Brits partaking in the roll-over contest yet? I'm certain that for every ONE stupid British thing there are about a half-million stupid American tricks to top it. Like driving in circles to see how fast we can go - what is the thrill in sport racing anyway, I mean really! For that matter, I think sports is played up too much in this country as it is. But I won't get into that, another can of bloody worms!

Anyway, we have a tentative plan established once again and I'm feeling much better. Yes, still disappointed, but not like I was. Thanks for listening to me ramble and I'll try to keep a positive slant because I KNOW things could be alot worse! You have to understand, I'm an Aries, I have a goal, I set a plan of attack and I go after it full-force! It's hard to have that plan shift and elude me.

So the plan is that we keep the house on the market and see how things progress. We may or may not raise the price again depending on how the market rebounds. Really, not to be desperate, but I REALLY want for us to move at the same time, but I'm prepared to have Tanjariitta move before me and I follow when the house sells, but it's too early to say if that will be the plan or not seeing as how our plans often change quickly!

In the meantime, have some photos of berries. I can't keep up with the production of our tree, it's amazing! I picked most of these without the aid of a ladder. They practically fall off the tree. That gives me an idea.... maybe I should have a grove of Mulberry trees and start making jams, jellies, juices and wine from them! Whaddya think?

Cheers!

OK, if you're a family member or a friend that has dropped by and been following my rants and you HAVEN"T left a message, WHAT'S UP??!!??! I know you're out there... Don't worry, clicking on the comments link doesn't obligate you or associate you with any thing that could be potentailly threatenning or harmful, just don't leave your credit card number like last time and you'll be ok. =) Anyway, it would be good to hear from you, I like to think my family and close friends are paying attention once in a while.

Rants and raves!

2006-04-19T08:37:00.000-04:00

My social rant for the day. I just clicked on a video segment from cnn.com in which the Brits celebrated a roll-over contest. Just before viewing that, I read an article about the shortened supply of oil and the escalating price of gas, so tell me, when is this world going to wake up and realize that time is running out on fossil fuels? Americans drive their HUGE SUVs, one person per vehicle on the way to work, speeding and driving like maniacs and the next minute whining about how high gas prices are. I'm sorry, try living outside the good ole' US of A. Fuel prices in Finland for example, and this is somewhat congruent throughout Europe, are typically $3 and $4 a gallon MORE than what we are paying, yet the world can have time for car flipping contests. Excuse me, I love the Europeans and their way of life, their use of mass transit, but this contest was just wasteful, environmentally disrespectful, juvenile and irresponsible. Shouldn't we be preserving and conserving? Using the last reserves the world has to offer for emergencies and mass transit? Shouldn't we be thinking about the time when the precious crude runs out? Wake up!

Anyway, that's my rant for the day!

Yesterday was better for me, besides being my birthday, I feel better. It's still frustrating to be stuck here, but I'm feeling more optimistic. I have some new work contacts, some nice opportunities thanks to the job bank at the Ringling School of Art and Design, and I just read that the feds are putting the brakes to rising interest rates finally. This means that MAYBE the housing market may be picking up. I was speaking to a friend of mine in the Midwest yesterday and he said the real estate market up there was in the same place, stuck. I'm encouraged. So come-on hungry house buyers, get out there and shop! Stop at my place first!

I had a wonderful birthday. I found work during the day, so we can continue paying the mortgage and feeding ourselves. We went out to eat last night at my favorite French bistro - check them out at LeParigot.com. SOOOO wonderful! Every dining experience there makes me wish I had been born French. Every bite is an explosion of flavor and perfection. You know when you experience something, from operating a finely-tuned piece of automobile perfection, or an expensive, finely crafted piece of furniture or exquisite design, melding form and function? That's how every meal is there! Perfection in every bite. Anyway, nice wines, a beautiful Amber prayer bracelet, the beauty of my wife beside me, the world is right here for us. Nothing else around us. OK - enough sappyness! It was a wonderful time!

April 18, 2006

2006-04-18T09:11:00.000-04:00

Hello everyone. To those who leave comments and those who just check in... (hint, hint) Here's what's happening today, April 18, 2006

Wishing I had better news these days. We had an open house on Saturday - now that we dropped our price by a staggering 10% (that's $30k) - the only people to show up were mortgage brokers soliciting my realtor for work. Right now we could be listing our home for free and we wouldn't have any interested parties. SOOOO many homes for sale and not enough buyers. I hear every so often that there are some properties moving, but rarely. So now we wait. Seeming to be stuck here.

So I've come to some conclusions. I have decided to give up whatever it is that God or the Universe (or whatever name you wish to substitute there) wishes me to give up. To let go of expectation. (This is simple in concept, but try planning future employment around it sometime!) I am trying to live by each breath and enjoy the process of life. Trying to remain optimistic about a situation that could easily cause me to be pessimistic. I am focusing my energy on manifesting what it is that is needed to sustain life here. Not caring about NZ, Florida, Finland or anything else. Just being. So, I've come full circle on being in Sarasota. Fine. If that is what is right for me, so be it. I will stay here and be happy. Plant another garden, spend more time with my friends. Be happy. If the right people come along and offer us a fair price on our house, we'll decide then what we will do. THIS message IS my manifestation to the powers that BE. OK? ok...

So in reality, deep inside of me, despite all of this forced optimism, I am upset. Sure, all the lessons are there, patience, tolerance, humility, but right now, I feel angry that things are the way they are. I can feel it, embrace it and move on. So for right now, I acknowledge it, and embrace it. I'll let it go later.

... breath ...

Well, it's my birthday today. Another year in the books. Whatever IS happening here, at least my horoscopes sound optimistic:

Tuesday, 18 April 2006 ›› New Zealand Herald
Your eloquent side is emphasized by Mercury, but in what looks like being a remarkable period, you will also be adventurous, ambitious and attractive to others. And that special but elusive goal may soon be reached.

Tuesday, 18 April 2006 ›› Jonathon Canier ›› bubble.com
What's the point of entering into an argument that you can easily win? There won't be much sense of satisfaction - nor of surprise. You'll experience much more novelty and interest if you set out to lose it, rather than win it - or if you embark on a more difficult debate instead. A drama of some kind, today, is probably unavoidable. You can, though, choose whether to have a predictable battle - from which you learn very little - or a challenging encounter during which you make a great discovery. Ask the universe for what you want this week... and you could actually get it.

The Oracle gave me this message today:
Tie up loose ends in your life, be it family or friends. Complete your work on your past and move on. Let it go. You contain the same light and energy that transcends all, permeates through all life forms and is everywhere. Open your awareness to this light and knowledge. Trust that what comes to you is of that same light and meant for the higher good. Learn from all of this. Get up, get out and make something happen. Break the spell of boredom, you are the creator of your own reality. Bring balance back into your world, you have the power to overcome any obstacles.

Numbers: 54, 36, 51, 9

Nothing Short of Frustration

2006-04-14T15:19:00.000-04:00

Well, we're not running low on frustration these days. The house has been for sale now for two-and-a-half months. Our realtor dropped by today to deliver the truth of the housing market in Sarasota. It's dead. Too much inventory, too few buyers. Seems like the high end market is sailing, but for the middle and working class - who mainly cannot really afford to live in Sarasota anyway, it has come to a complete stop. Now it gets interesting. We have seen prices drop by as much as 10%. Last year at this time, we could have imagined selling our house and closing in no more han 35 days with several offers, earning what we were dreaming of. Now? Certainly a different story. The only interested party we have had on the house, today informed us that they cannot afford the transaction.

We had been faltering and waivering on a decision to move abroad now for about 6 years. This past January, we became clear that we wanted to move abroad sometime in 2006. Clear as a bell. As soon as we became clear, the housing market stalls and backslides, our immigration status has been delayed multiple times and it looks like the opportunity is starting to slip from our grasp. It will eventually become clear again to us that this move may end up being too costly in the long run. How much do we want to falter and reduce our price in order to attract a sale? How willing are we to sacrifice our belongings to reduce the cost of the move? How long are we willing to wait for something to shift?

We have our blessings certainly. We have our health, each other, a beautiful home should we decide to keep it. The sale of the house, minus the commissions, will ultimately get us out of debt and on the side of a better life, but considering we just lowered our prices today by 10%, we won't really have much to take with us to start a new life abroad.

That's the news today. Hope I don't seem to whinney. I do have my perspective in order and know that there are many millions of people worse off than we are, but this blog isn't about those topics, well, not this time anyway.

Peace.

Sailing Down The Suwannee River - Day Three

2006-04-08T09:45:00.001-04:00

Conclusion of our Suwannee River Trip, March 29 - 31

Day Three. "Omelettes and Zen"

The third day we knew we didn’t have to paddle quite so hard, only eight miles remaining on the river. So in the morning we took our time getting ready, had coffee and an organic omelette and fried potatoes (camp style – pre-packaged & freeze-dried). It was wonderful! I was, of course up again with the break of dawn, camera in hand and snapped off a shot of the sun breaking over some trees in a field not far from where we camped.

We broke down our gear and set out for the last day of our trip. The further down the river we drifted, the more dynamic the landscape became. Large formations of exposed limestone lined the river walls. What was unique about them was that they were pocked with holes and seemed more hollow than solid. Tanjariitta actually described them as being gothic. Tree limbs and roots coursed their way in and around the pockets, and some of the holes were large enough to swallow a person. Most of the holes weren’t any larger than the size of my fist and seemed to be a great snake hideout as we found several in and around the stone rock faces, sunning themselves.

Along the last stretches of the river were another spring house, an abandoned bridge and increasingly more civilization and with it, people.

Our trip came to a close back at the outpost that rented us our kayaks. 38.5 miles, 54 hours, 10 snakes, 3 gators, 2 wild turkeys, a dozen or more turtles, dozens of birds, 3 rocky shoals, four tired shoulders, two very fulfilled campers, and unlimited memories.

We got home. Tired and filthy. The transition from serene beauty back to the craziness surrounding our quiet home in the sprawl of the city was a bit severe. Even the convenience of a warm shower was no consolation for being away from the river. Ever so clearly we need to live closer to our passions and closer to the earth. It is impossible to know what lies ahead for us, but in the idea of living closer to the earth, we aspire to live closer to those dreams in our new lives in New Zealand.

Our trip brought about many things. Some very powerful awakenings, some nice reminders, and some new discoveries about ourselves. Not many trips can do that. Many conversations I never before had with Tanjariitta. In seven years, we still haven’t run out of topics to talk about or self-discoveries to make. Like a good book, our marriage unfolds when it is meant to. A slow, romancing mystery. Our past, our present, our future yet to be defined. Ourselves. Our lives. Sublime.

Sailing Down The Suwannee River - Day Two

2006-04-06T17:32:00.000-04:00

Part II of our Suwannee River Trip, March 29 - 31

Photo: Spring Morning on the River.

Day two... “Things you can do with opposable thumbs.”

We woke up the next morning at the break of dawn. A soft haze blanked the area. It’s an amazing thing, waking up at the crack of dawn feeling refreshed, even if the sleep wasn’t deep. I think about how I wake up at home under the same circumstances, totally different – groggy until I’ve had my coffee, not entirely interested in getting out of bed, but forcing myself. Anyway, I woke up that morning at the campsite, refreshed, wanting to be up and discovering the area in the soft, warm sunrise light, camera in hand. I was looking for that one shot, the one that captures the light and sums up the feeling of the moment. Whether I found it or not is completely beside the point, the point is, I’m up and it’s beautiful out here, I’m away from everything, no distractions, one with myself, my God, my nature, and nothing else.

We had breakfast, packed up our camp and made our way to the river. A little down the river we finally spotted some of the wildlife we were hoping to encounter along the way. We came across a gator. Ironically, in all of the time we spent on the Suwannee in the last 7 years, we never encountered any gators. This is Florida, home of the gator. There have been reports of gator sightings by other people and anyone who knows Florida knows that any time there is fresh water, there are gators. A beautiful creature, and it was so startled by our presence it plummeted several feet from a low limb into the water in an alarming and ungraceful bellyflop! Never seen that before! But there it was, our first gator sighting. A little further down river, we came across another fine specimine, ironically not at all startled by our presence because I passed within 10 feet of it. It was enjoying a fine afternoon sun and allowed us to take a few pictures.

It seemed up until our gator sighting we thought we were alone on the river. There were however, a myriad of birds we came across, including a large blue bird we dubbed a “Shirpabird,” The “Shirpabird” was an interesting sort of fellow. Would sit on a branch about 50-75 yards ahead of us, just along the river’s edge. It wouldn’t allow us to come any closer and it would take off from that branch and fly a couple of hundred yards down the river. When we were close enough for it’s comfort, it would take off again, swooping perilously close to the water and prop itself on another branch along the river, leading us down river the way a shirpa would guide you through a mountain pass – hence Shirpabird. Later exploration online revealed that it was the Florida Scrubjay. We encountered Scrubjays all along our trip, all guiding us in the same manner.

Just after we got oriented in the river, we took a closer look at our map. Seems we were only eight miles into our 38.5 mile journey and our next campsite opportunity was about 20 miles down stream. OK, T-W-E-N-T-Y M-I-L-E-S… Ummm, sure… that only meant one thing, we needed to get paddling, no dawdling along the river today. We put our minds and backs into it and got moving. Old Sideways Bertha was up to her usual tricks and the ache in my untrained arms was quite more prominent. Maybe a trip or two to the gym before the trip might have been a good idea.

There wasn’t much time for photography the second day, but who can resist taking pictures of wildlife as we encounter it. I spotted a snake crossing the river in front of me, looked more like a twig in the water except for the rhythmic pattern of movement across the current. We stopped to inspect it. Beautiful snake, minding it’s own, not really even cautious of our presence. Like it knew what it had to do, it was crossing the river to get to the other side, that is all. “Ahhh, hello. You’ve come to watch me do what it is that I do. Good for you. I’m now going to scale this vertical 30’ wall, me a tiny 12” snake, with no arms and no legs. Just you watch me, you human. Opposable thumbs, pah! Who needs ‘em!” Mindless of the audience, it posed for a few snapshots and tolerated our presence and climbed with much grace.

We paddled. Then we paddled some more. And more… more… more. We came to the little town of White Springs. Must have been around or a little after noon the second day. Felt like my arms were going to fall off. I know, I know, you’re supposed to use your whole body, by now, that didn’t matter anymore. Using my back only relieved a little of the soreness. It was a good kind of soreness, a firming up of my upper body while I enjoy life in the Florida sun.

We decided to stop off at White Springs. White Springs was named for the giant sulfur spring found beside the river. The area was first settled by the Timucuan Indians . It was their belief that the spring held magical healing powers. In 1835, Bryant and Elizabeth Sheffield bought the land (from whom I wonder) and the springs and made it into a plantation. A bath house was erected over the spring to harness the healing sulfuric water. Among the famous visitors to the springs, I mean besides myself, were Henry Ford and Teddy Roosevelt.

While in White Springs, we decided to top off a few of our most important supplies, namely some cooking spray and a bottle of wine. As we were walking into the tiny village, we must have been a sight because wherever we went we had people downright starring at us. I mean I know we spent the last day and a half on the river, we did bathe, but still, from people driving by to others casually walking along the sidewalks, we turned heads sideways. One elderly man actually followed us, from across the street. He finally bit into his curiosity and approached us. He simply wanted to know if we came from the river. Seemed to astonish him that we would camp out on the river and travel in such a way. Doesn’t everybody?

We got our supplies, said goodbye to White Springs and paddled on another 13 miles or so to our next campsite.

High on a bluff overlooking the river was our next stop. Our campsite was under a spanning Oak tree in a hammock. A hammock is a tract of forested land above an adjacent marsh in the southern states. We set up our tent overlooking the water. There was enough daylight after we set up camp, gathered firewood and dug in that there was time to cook dinner while watching the river flow by. I could have sat and stared at the river’s flow for the rest of my life. It was entrancing. So mysterious, so dark, both inviting and foreboding. Supporting life of all kinds around it. Drawing myself out into it. Out of my overly analytical mind and into my soul. The place where my intimate and infinite existence dwells.

We slept. Still sleeping lightly. Thoughts of the river ramble in my mind all night. Soft conversation still fresh in my mind from sitting around the fire.

Day three to come...

Sailing Down The Suwannee River - Day One

2006-04-05T07:47:00.000-04:00

Suwannee River Trip, March 29 - 31

Photo: Sam the dog.

We rent our kayaks from an outpost near the small town of Live Oak in northern Florida. The outpost based at a campground for the Spirit of the Suwannee Music Park. The outpost isn't associated with the park, but they share the same space. We arrived late in the evening and camped our first night at the outpost.

The next morning, we arranged for our kayaks and identified what part of the river we wished to go down. We put in roughly 50 miles to the east at a place called Cone Bridge. Two years ago, on almost the exact same weekend, Tanjariitta traveled down the same stretch of river by herself. We decided that we would take the same trip so she could show me the beautiful things she had seen the last time she was there.

The Suwannee River is a federally designated wild river and today is the only major waterway in the southeastern United States that is still unspoiled. All along the river dot parks, springs and walking paths so the river can be hiked as well as paddled. The river flows from the great Okefenokee Swamp in Georgia 266 miles to the Gulf of Mexico. The unusual deep red color of the water is derived from tannic acid from tree roots, oak leaves and peat. In fact, watching Tanjariitta’s bright yellow paddle completely vanish eight inches below the surface was a neat trick. The river is so dark as to be ominous both day and night.

The first day was pretty laid back, we took our time meandering about the river. We rented two kayaks, a single and a tandem. I took the tandem. We like having the extra room a tandem has because we can put a few extra items of gear in it that we wouldn't normally have if we went backpacking - like comfortable sleeping gear and extra food. The rented kayaks are nice, but they do define the expression "mental-rental." I dubbed my ship the "Sideways Bertha." Mind of her own and sideways down the river was her favorite means of travel!

The temperature of the day didn’t much go above eighty degrees and the sky remained hazy. Weather in March and April is always the best for any outdoor activities in northern Florida. The days are respectively warm and the nights not too cool. In fact, it was the 34th day in a row with that kind of weather, not hard to take, but with the sacrifice of no rain. In fact, the river itself was pretty low, by as much as ten feet in some areas. It was as if the shore was afraid of the water. It looked as it someone had pulled the banks of the river up like a person hiking their pants up before wading into water to keep them from getting wet.

The area was about to break into Spring. Many of the trees were completely barren and at first glance gave the appearance of being dead, but on closer inspection, they were only just about to bud and bear their leaves. A few more pleasant days like this one and Spring will be in full swing.

We meandered about, me sometimes sideways, many times wrestling with Sideways Bertha to keep her aligned, pushing my arm muscles to their limit. We also spent time eating as we kayaked. Eating before we kayaked, as we kayaked and after we kayaked. In fact, I don't recall a time in the entire trip that I didn't have something in my mouth. I also had the camera at the ready to capture wildlife or scenes of natural beauty as we made our way.

Photo: The Island of Music

A few miles into our cruise, we came across an island, a sandbar really, in the middle of the river. It was a place that Tanjariitta knew about from her last trip here. We stopped off for lunch. As we were stretching out and taking a break from all of the "hard work" of drifting down the river, we discovered the island's hidden treasure. The sand we walked on could sing! As we walked over the course sand, it would chirp. Investigating further, we found that by continuously rubbing our hands through the sand produced sounds equivilent to the sound of a wineglass caressed by a wet finger. The sand could be played tonally (although not very easy to control the pitch) as well as percussively. The favorite sounds it made was when we would hold as much sand between our hands as we could and rub back and forth. As sand would fall out, the chirping pitch went from a low woop, woop, woop to a higher and increaslingly faster wip, wip, wip, wip, wip! Truly amazing indeed. We enjoyed a little more over an hour on the island, eating and playing our secret sand music. It was difficult to pull oursleves away from it, knowing that we may never see it again.

Further down the river we came to the only whitewater rapids in all of Florida, the Big Shoals. It's not huge, but it is listed as a Class III rapids and certainly not runnable with a kayak that has a reputation of running sideways. We pulled off at a portage site and walked on ahead. All of the rapids come only to about 100 meters (roughly 100 yards) in length. A large number of boulders marked the beginning of the falls with several more areas of rapids after and culmonated in about a 7 foot drop overall. It might have been fun with a sport kayak and no gear, or maybe if there had been a little more water on the river, but not having any experience or training with rough water, we decided that the extra work to portage would be worth it. Not to mention that above the shoals is a State park with plenty of camp sites within earshot of the shoals. So we decided to put in for the night there.

Photo: Big Shoals

Our site overlooked the shoals on the down river side. Beautiful white noise behind our camping experience. Softly lulling the mind into deeper relaxation.

The state park we stayed at was beautiful. However the people that used the park before us must not have ever known how to camp. The saying goes, "Take only pictures, leave only footprints." The area was littered with toilet paper around every turn. Not like a garbage bag burst and the wind carried it away, but the places where people had to make a deposit. I stopped counting the piles I saw, it was really disgusting, I mean really, how difficult is it to respect nature, the park, the other people who will be using the park after you to simply gather your paper and either burn it or place it in your garbage bags? It isn't difficult.

That evening, after we got a modest campfire going, with the modest amount of firewood we found in the area, we sat, ate freeze-dried chicken stew, leftover mac & cheese (from a neighboring camper) and sipped on wine minis. It was a meal unbecoming of a night in the wilderness and a nice way to end our first day on the river. After we were both done with the meal, we each admitted to each other that the chicken stew was perhaps one of the worst camp meals we have ever cooked and compared the experience to cooking cardboard! At least we weren’t hungry anymore, but the thought of gnawing on tree bark did cross my mind once or twice while eating…

The hush of the river sixty yards away, a soft breeze in the tent and slowly dipping temperatures gently put us to sleep. Strangely enough though I never could sleep all that well camping. I guess I sleep with one eye open if there is any possibility of gators around – even though we were high above the river.

Photo: The Close of Day One

Back from beyond - or am I returning to the place beyond?

2006-04-04T08:51:00.000-04:00

Photo: Sneak peak at a photo from my trip down the Suwannee River.

Back from the river! I'd like to say that I feel totally refreshed, relaxed and recharged. I would LIKE to say that. Don't get me wrong, it was a wonderful trip, perfect in every way. I love being out in the wilderness. As we made our way down the river, we also made our way further and further from "civilization." Now, as we have come back, it has been a bigger challenge to reintegrate with the rest of our culture. I still can't stand Sarasota, but I'm finding myself less and less interested in even living so close to other people. I don't like driving around them, living next to them, hearing them, seeing them or smelling them. Maybe I live too close to my neighbors, and certainly too close to the sprawl of the city. I am also searching out for our next living environment to be away from it all, surrounded by as much land as we can afford and away from the noise, smells and bustle of this town. But it isn't just that. I have also found that I am increasingly more interested in falling off the grid. Unplugging, leaving technology behind. I know I can never do that entirely, right now I have to make a living at being on-line and plugged in as far as I can be, but it hasn't been easy. Sorry I can't be more positive about my return and I hate whining, but this is honestly how I feel. I would be a liar to paint a prettier picture.

A positive reflection of all of this is that I am ready to sell my TV and PlayStation 2 set. I found that watching the river flow by slowly or a campfire dwindle was wholly more enjoyable than any fabricated entertainment I find on TV - including the news. Our trip was really wonderful though, despite the mood I'm in this morning. I'll be posting a short story and pictures of the trip when I'm done writing it all up and editing the photos more.

Then this morning, I made the mistake of reading the news. Creature of habit I guess, I could have just left well enough alone right, I didn't have to go to CNN.com, but I did. Apparently a congresswoman, Rep. Cynthia McKinney, is making the news for a scuffle she got into with an officer when she attempted to enter a House office building without proper identification. The story states that she walked right on through the entry gate, ignoring the officers' attempts to tell her to stop. After three attempts to get her to stop by shouting at her from behind, an officer reached and physically tried to stop her by placing a hand "somewhere on her" to get her to stop. She swung and struck the officer. Clearly, in my mind's eye, the security around Federal buildings is in place to protect the people who work there. Having and showing proper identification isn't asking too much to enter a federal building. Now, I don't know if there are any other mitigating circumstances around this incident or if she has had an issue with these officers before. That said, perhaps I do not know the true depths of the incident apart from what the news is saying, however, this is the part the IRKS the living CRAP out of me: "she was a victim of inappropriate touching and racism and said they were considering pursuing civil action against the officer." The thought that she feels, because she ran through a security checkpoint and evaded and struck an officer who was doing his job makes her a VICTIM, puts to shame all other cases where racism IS an issue and people ARE victimized by their race. Rep. Cynthia McKinney takes my award today as IDIOT OF THE DAY! I feel bad for the officer involved and hope justice is rightly served on his behalf. It's news like this that is making me want to run from this country screaming my fool head off!

OK, on another note, I have to say that it has been very difficult to keep up blogging. I absolutely love doing this but have so little time to dedicate to it. I am always thinking of things to say here, but never have enough time to say them, then I forget. Between trying to maintain this house and sell it, looking for more work, maintaining my current clients, looking for full-time employment, making ready all of our things to move, planning the move, hosting long family stays and entertaining all the people who want to visit with us before we move on - I'm totally spent! I will try to keep my promise to update at least once a week, but probably cannot do it every day like I would like to. I know the few of you who stop by understand. Thanks.

Berries and Down the River...

2006-03-28T13:32:00.000-05:00

Sorry I haven't been available much these days, had the rents for 5 days, and now I'm heading out of town to go overnight kayaking on the Suwannee River in northern Florida until Saturday. YIPPIEEEEEEE!!!!!

It's a new moon as well as the day of an eclipse. My astrologer mentioned that Turkey was among the countries that observed the eclipse today, Keda, did you see it? Anyway, it's a day of new hope, new promises and a time to make a wish upon our star. Start something new today or give up an old annoying habit, your new idea or plan is more likely today than any other to be sure to stick with you!

The Mulberries are in and looking good! Here are some pics I took after picking some succulent, voluptuous berries! Jessica had mentioned that she would not eat these berries and referred to the means at which the tree sources it's nourishment as "night soil" meaning soil fed with human waste. The process isn't directly human waste applied to the tree, the tree feeds from the septic tank's overflow area. The tree then processes what it needs to produce the largest Mulberries I have ever seen. Is there anything else I should know about "night soil?" Would you eat these berries?

Hope everyone is well and I promise river pics when I get home!

See ya!

The process

2006-03-24T08:27:00.000-05:00

Here is the progression of Tabula Rasa entries to date. The process can be just as beautiful as the final piece I think.

Tabula Rasa 2 - EDITED 03.23.06, 13:50 EST

2006-03-20T08:01:00.000-05:00

EDITED 03.23.06, 13:50 EST - Keda's contri as well as my own addition. Pretty cool huh? Keep em coming if you wish!

EDITED 03.21.06, 08:05 EST - Jessica's contribution pictured above.

EDITED 03.20.06, 15:46 EST - Steve's contribution to the space is posted above. Download his contribution and add yours. then email it to me, email address below.

Thanks for all of your posts over the weekend, sorry I was away, visiting with my Mom and Dad as well as running a yard sale. The time is swiftly approaching when we will need to purge all of our things, right now it was just items we had no use for. It was exciting to see so much of it go though!
Anyway, I have made the first edits to the Tabula Rasa (oh, and my brother-in-law corrected me appropriately, it spelled Rasa, not how I had it at Rosa - but I've now seen it both ways). My intentin is for each of us to download the file, open it in some photo editing program of sort and create a digital picture all our own. Feel free to add whatever you like, be it illustration, your kids line art, a photograph, gradiants, filters, whatever you feel would be right to add. We shall see where this experiement takes us. If you don't have a photo editor, email me your chosen photo and I will edit into the layout. My email address is bruce(atsign)thisisbruce.com. for some reason blog posts won't let me post my email address with the @ (at) sign.

Thanks! Good luck!

My word verification for the day is: "smghgi" In a way, the damage wasn't so bad, but the damn smghgi isn't going to get us on our way now is it?

Tabula Rasa - EDITED BELOW

2006-03-16T18:54:00.000-05:00

Reading through your comments has given me one clear, profound message, JUST DO. My martial arts teacher used to tell me in the middle of sparring - when I would usually freeze up - "Bruce, don't think, just do." You're so right, maybe what I've been creating around me has been a series of excuses why I could not do this or that. I'm a product of Depression era parents, I always watched my dad work hard at what he did, mostly making the best of the few tools he had. I learned from that. I rebuilt a motorcycle, without the aid of a proper shelter, knowledge of motorcycles and tools to work with. I compensate where I need to in order to achieve my goals, including this move to New Zealand - I just considered becoming a truck driver so I can make sure the bills are paid. I would like to say you've all inspired me to jump up out of my chair and start on something, but I'm not jumping yet, I still feel a bit stuck, but not so much in my head as I was. I want to experiment with introspection, to work through creating something from nothing, a story to tell - whether it's in photographs, pen & ink, crafts, woodworking, blogging or whatever. I'm even thinking about opening this up to all of you too, maybe make it a huge group effort. I liked what Steve did on his blog with the short story, but that is now Steve's medium. Any ideas out there?

Thank you so much for your stories and what you found inspirational, they all mean so much to me, and I very much appreciate knowing all of you through this medium. You're wonderful people! Keep blogging!

AUTHOR'S EDIT: 03.18.06, 15:05 EST
LOL= Laugh Out Loud
Tabula Rosa = Latin for "Blank Slate"
I actually had the though that we might collectively create a picture/work of art from the white space I have provided, anyone care to start with the first mark?
Thanks!

Artist Shoots Shoes, Searching for Creativity

2006-03-15T09:13:00.000-05:00

[What to do until inspiration finds me, shoot shoes, at least it paid the bills]

I guess it's a good sign that I am finally feeling better when I'm back wrestling with the same old dilemma about creativity. In the empty moments this morning I found my mind wandering off in the familiar world of self-doubt. I thought about the notice I saw last night about another photography show. Steven Katzman is an area photographer who I have been witnessing as his career is taking off and his craft is gaining a voice in the area. I saw that he is having another show, this time on his photos of the Newtown area. (Newtown is an economically depressed area here in Sarasota) He is a documentary photographer and is doing what I have dreamt of doing. In a single photograph he communicates so much. Steven's photography is untouchable, his craft perfected, his subject matter perfectly composed, without feeling contrived. It is precisely what I see myself doing. How does one find the resources to do such work? What does he do for a living, is it from his documentary work, is it from other work? What is his technique like? How is he when photographing his subject matter? How is he with his subjects?

I know I have the resources to do what he is doing, I know I can be that creative, but I still feel I need to convince myself of that. I still need to prove that to myself. I feel I am still reaching towards that, but not enough that I can get there. Another David Grey song comes on the radio as I write this, yet another performer I admire greatly. I know I could write music like this, but again, I feel like I'm waiting for something, striving to reach out but feeling held back. I still have ideas, but I have no idea how to go about searching them out. I feel constrained still. All my life I know I was going to be an artist, I went to school, studied hard, worked towards my goal. I achieved my goal 7 years ago, now I'm trying to figure out what kind of an artist do I want to be. I've never had a question in my mind until 7 years ago, and since then, I have questioned everything. Do all artists go through this? I'd like to hear from you, I'd like to know your struggles and the ways you championed them.

New Perspectives

2006-03-14T09:42:00.000-05:00

[If you squint your eyes, you can pretend you're somewhere else, anywhere.]

I'M BACK! Well, still tired and a bit weak from being so sick, but at least I'm here once again.

I'm feeling more and more trapped these days, the house has been for sale since the first of the year and we've only had two people do walk throughs, and that was when it was for sale by owner. Anyway, since listing it on the MLS we haven't had a single sniff at the house. Makes me think I may be here a while.

In the meantime, I need to search out full-time employment because business has slumped completely, why not take the opportunity to shut the doors now and just get a job. It's funny, when I went through the paper, there really isn't much for work out there that I am qualified to do and if I am qualified, it pays $7.75 an hour. Yikes! I guess I've been a bit spoiled! I like what I do but the opportunities in Sarasota are very limited for designers. Makes me feel a bit stuck. My horoscope says I should be prepared for a positive surprise this week, I hope so, I could use it.

Anyway, we went to see a documentary on New Zealand last night. The film was horrible, the only redeeming value of the film was the footage of New Zealand. The writer lacked any creativity whatsoever. It's hard to shoot something bad in New Zealand because it's such a beautiful place, so the footage of the hills and scenery was wonderful, it would have been perfect if on mute. Or maybe had only Maori music playing in the background. Makes me want to take up documentary film-making and do it better. Well, I came away with a perspective that made it worth going to see. Tanjariitta and I have a very unique gift in having the opportunity to move to such a beautiful place. Not many people have the opportunity we have. We are truely blessed to be able to do so.

Out for a while

2006-03-10T10:19:00.000-05:00

Hey friends and family. Sorry I haven't posted in a while but I have been sick for more than a week now. I did see a Dr and now have medications to help me through this, but probably won't be updating until next week. Thanks for checking in and I'll be back next week.