Love, It's Who You Know

I've been in a bit of a rut, but maybe I too often come here to confess that. I won't describe the rut in detail -- the causes or the effects. Essentially, I have longed -- in every sense -- to do something truly meaningful since I moved to Chicago. It's been (almost) three years since I left the cozy confines of college and family behind in Ohio. We all measure success differently (whatever success is) and I guess I have felt, to a large extent, unsuccessful as a photographer and fairly clueless as a human being. Love has sort of come and gone my way, and maybe, with relentless force, I willed it to come and then waited secretly, in quiet reluctance, to see it go. I've worked hard, yeah, but I really don't think I've worked hard enough in any one particular arena. I've spent too much money trying to establish my safety and secure my dignity. With that, I will be honest, here. I'm lonely. I'm tired. I'd like you to see me as this brazen, capable, highly-motivated and independent young woman. I'd like you to see me without giant footprints on my back, without daddy issues at every corner, without the baggage of a heart broken and re-broken, without the constant longing for connection and reinforcement. But I probably came here to write this because I want you to see all of those things too, and realize that what you see isn't really what you get.

These are just portraits. At a time when taking photos seemed like a strenuous exercise, I turned to the people I see every day -- my staff at my job -- and asked if they could sit for a photograph. I can find some meaning there or I can choose to feel like I haven't mattered in anyone's life. I'll choose the former today, for the sake of several things. I'd like to think inspiration is cyclical -- that you can inspire me by just being present, and quiet, and wholly yourself. And that I can just be me and inspire you, too.

There are more of these to come. Thanks to Emily, Jacob, Joe, Aaron, Edward, Logan, Diana, Tanner, Brad, and Rachel for helping me "break my eye open."

Everyone Leaves

I’d pack my suitcase with myself
But I’m already gone
Cleanse myself with vitamin health
But I’m already gone

I saw it risin’ through the horizon
And I saw it fall
A Jesus fevers flowin’ all over
Believers and lovers

In a black hole I found a broken skull
Now I’m already gone
You can write my whole life down in a little book
When I’m already gone

I started shaking and my heart breaking
And my belly crawled
A Jesus fevers flowin’ all over
Believers and lovers

When I am a ghost, I’ll see no reason to run
When I’m already gone
If it wasn’t taped, you could escape this song
But I’m already gone
- Kurt Vile

Erin on Saturday

Erin came over today to drink coffee and take photos of my shaved head. We drank beer instead and I took her photo.

Mandi + Adrianne

Spirit of the Rising Sun Lift Me Up

I've lived on the lake (well, two blocks away and alongside) for two years, but this past Saturday, for the first time, I made my way slightly south to the water (flat tire + sleepy eyes and all) to see the sunrise. Seems appropriate for a lot of reasons, but I'll let the photos speak this time.

Rise or Fall

Many thanks to KayCee, my beautiful and resilient subject who allowed me to dust off my lonely lens and (for once, begin to) fulfill self-made promises. I know that these photos are all fairly similar-ish and, consequently, this is a considerably big edit but. I am posting most all the frames that I liked, variety set aside. The light was just too gorgeous.

Coca-Cola, Football, Radio Radio Radio...

Summer's nearly gone.

I started off writing a really depressing blog to go along with these photos, but I thought better of it. I've been a very neglectful photographer, and I've felt really aimless. I am only just now taking the difficult though much-needed baby steps toward remerging myself in some sort of creative community so that I can rediscover some inspiration and then, maybe some time in the far off future, I will take more photographs. It's not that I don't care or that I don't want to try. I am exhausted and, to put it vaguely, really struggling with the larger mysteries of life. No, in the end, I don't really know what I want to be when I grow up. I graduated with a passion and a direction, of some sort, in photography, and I moved to this beautiful big city to fully realize the possibilities. But I kept jumping up and down and all around and couldn't get anyone's attention. I didn't know what to do. I had no savings and no job and no plan so I had to start working -- and I mean really working -- long and hard hours at a restaurant so that I could live here. For awhile my photography and my work in the food industry coexisted somewhat. I shot some weddings, some freelance bits here and there, and I even had an exhibit (though somewhat amateur-ly and haphazardly organized on my part) at my favorite little coffee shop this past spring.

Since April, though, I have almost solely focused on being what I hope is the perfect general manager (at previously mentioned restaurant) for my staff. I should be proud that I have stability and that I do my job fairly well. I should be optimistic about the future and my options. I should be grateful that I was promoted and greatly supported (by the owner, operating managers, and a slew of other professionals who know what they are doing in this crazy and, at times, discouraging industry -- not like me) though I'm young, inexperienced, and, well, just generally emotional about life. I have a lot of reasons to feel like I've done a good job, but I don't feel like that. I feel confused and anxious. I feel like I have something inside of me that I've pushed away and totally neglected. It isn't that I don't love my job or the people in my life because of it, but I don't nurture the part of me that has something to say, something beautiful to show. I never thought I was the most creative photographer, but I do have a point of view. Or I did. Maybe I've lost it, or maybe it's just so deeply buried that it feels completely gone.

I am not sure what I am committing to in this blog post, but I want to be held accountable for the simple things that I'm not doing. I don't blame anyone or anything for the overall lack of passion all around me. And so, at the moment, I don't really have much more than these little snaps from my phone from the past few months of summer. It's a feeble statement, but at least I am still half-awake and trying to pay attention.

That's All I Wanted

from what feels like the ancient archives, Marc in November 2010

Denice Korcal for The Promised Lives Campaign

In New York Freedom Looks Like Too Many Choices

In the stillness of the evening
When the sun has had its day
I heard your voice a-whispering
Come away child
- U2