That Post I Keep Talking About

For the past 3 months (or possibly longer; I’ve honestly lost track of time), I have been writing and re-writing this blog post easily a million times now.  The first couple thousand drafts read like a pity party and a bunch of really lame as excuses. A couple people who I have talked with about it told me that I should just write it and quit revising it.  Alas, I didn’t listen to all the advice I was offered or given.  Go figure… I am really headstrong (ask my daughters and their mothers).

The basic gist of all these damn drafts (which are saved for me to revisit and laugh at myself a little bit) basically boiled down to one thing.  I have been in a rut.  Creatively. Personally.  Generally a feeling of being completely uninspired. So of course in the process of trying to figure out what in the hell was going on with me, I got to spend a whole LOT of time in my head.  Analyzing.  Questioning.  Then a bunch more over analyzing. Which eventually led to some kind of epiphany (that really was in front of my face the whole damn time).

I have been in a rut and uninspired because I have made myself feel too comfortable in being alone and (self) isolated. Hold on now!  Don’t start thinking I am about to be heading out to all of your social functions and running around town every single night.  I am too old for all of that mess.  Instead, I am taking some advice and changing things up a little bit.  I will still probably continue to enjoy my alone time; binge watching shows, reading (more) books, skating a little more.  But I am going to get out a little bit more; go on walks, watch movies in a theater, maybe invite people to go eat dinner instead of just strings of text messages.

We are social creatures.  We enjoy (and need) to interact with other people, with places.  We kind of start dying a little bit when we aren’t actually living and experiencing what is happening around us.

A lot of my personal identity and what makes me feel good about myself is deeply rooted in the things that I love.  I love to draw and paint.  It is what got me in to photography in the first place.  Besides little sketches I make when Lars asks me to, I don’t draw or paint anymore.  I love skateboarding.  Like to death.  But until recently, I hadn’t touched my skateboard in easily 9 months.  Part of that was because of an old back injury flaring up.  But I could’ve still gone out to one of the many parks in Austin.  Roll around and get re-connected.  I love photography.  The process of creating gets this fire going inside of me that is hard to explain.  It is similar to the feeling that skateboarding gives me. But I am not just talking about coming up with this elaborate idea and shooting a couple of well thought out poses and frames. It has to make me feel something.  Something real and tangible.  Not a made up view of what people want others to think about themselves.  To capture what I see as it happens, as things really are.

I found my voice in my photography a little over 5 years ago.  Got a little lost and confused along the way.  I am reclaiming my voice again.