Fine Tuning A Creative Life

New day shines

Exploring and learning are the center of my constant personal creative path. I live there. As a lifelong music fan and collector, I've wanted to play guitar for more than four decades. Seems it's time.

With plenty of encouragement from a great friend over the past couple of years, I got the bug that I've been waiting for and finally committed to playing just over a year ago. His friendship has been so influential, with hours and hours of teaching me a wide range of guitar technical skills, sharing musical influences, and showing me how to maintain my instruments. There is still a mess load that I need to learn, but I'm now making sounds and much further along than I've ever been. I'm thrilled to have finally added this 6-string creative outlet to my artistic journey.

Takamine

Over the past day, I fully detailed several of my guitars. I even went as far as to challenge myself to break out the tools to make a few truss rod adjustments. My uncharted challenge worked like a charm. Measuring now at 3/32 on the 12th fret, the action is perfect on both guitars. I was so jazzed about my learning escapade. For you longtime players, this task probably seems like a minor feat. For me, though, it was a proud win and reminded me of the feeling that I had when I changed the motor oil in my very first car all by myself. Yeeeeessss!

Oh, and that car… it was a chocolate brown 1965 American Motors Rambler Classic with mini chrome tail fins and a 3-speed manual transmission on the column. It showed its 12-year share of dings and mileage, but yes, I detailed the heck out of that $300 ride every weekend. Every weekend.

I am such a goober for self-maintenance projects. Ask anyone who’s known me through the years, and they’ll tell you that I have been a detail-focused geek all my life, perhaps even a bit anal retentive about it. Okay, I proudly own that... but for now, it’s time for a bit of practice. Missed chord or not, get that tour bus ready. I dig this stuff.

Guild Champagne Sparkle

It's Christmastime

That time of the year is here again. And with it, I look forward to seeing those I love in the next week. I'm counting on those days being filled with plenty of soul-filling goodness: puppy kisses and wagging tails, teary-eyed laughter, reading, studying, loads of fab music backed by a tad more groovy tunes, and a dinner and movie date (heck, maybe even two). It's Christmastime.

As another year passes, another one of promise and dreams will begin just behind it. Seems I'm still the same kid that would loudly sing along to his favorite song as it played through the single mono speaker on that lime green portable AM radio.... the one with the matching lime green wrist strap and the retractable chrome antenna. I still dream. I still laugh to myself ...and frequently laugh at myself. I'm still curious about life and sometimes wonder what if? ...what happened? ...where are they? …and often just a simple why? Why?

Through it all, it seems that I'm still defining me. Why would I ever stop? Each day is a gift, a lesson, an opportunity to smile at someone; not that plastic smile.... but the real eye-to-eye contact kind of smile. Those are the ones that count and the ones that really make a difference. I don't want to search or define reasons to create something new.... I just want to create with the hope of maybe leaving something of value, purpose, and good behind. It doesn't need to be extravagant or epic or life-changing either. Just make it real. That promises to make all the difference.

Looking back, I love the simple dirt under my fingernails, blue-collar, work-hard-every-day upbringing that I came from. It was genuine and provided me with the perfect starting point for my unusual, let's take this turn, roundabout, where the hell are you headed path that has brought me to where I am today. Five years ago, along that very path, I gifted myself with sobriety. It was the most humbling and honest soul-searching I have ever experienced. I awake blessed, thankful, and alive each morning. I dig this place.

I really loved that spark and spirited, song singing, love everyone, always smiling, creative kid that I used to be. I hope he's still the same and never loses that.

Love and stuff... It's Christmastime.

Growth and Child Games

Opportunities present themselves and provide growth. Growth is knowledge, experience, self-discovery, and eye, heart, and mind opening. Occasionally, that opportunity thing requires a late night or two, maybe even three… and often those extended evenings begin as a morning start before the sunrise. Moving in a forward direction is a powerful motivator.

Franklin Terrace

Six years ago today, I began my career at Virginia Commonwealth University. It was an opportunity for me to welcome and explore all of those things above and more. Since that day in 2008, I’ve expanded my skills, my list of influential life-changing people, my patience, my love for common everyday moments, and my passion to continually absorb knowledge while graduating with two Master’s degrees from VCU.

Opportunity often reminds me of the children’s game hide and seek. Rare is it that it comes looking for you. It does, however, love and invite you to take the initiative to search for it.

Tag... you’re it.

Best Friend's Promise

Best Friends

It’s been nearly one year to the day from that hot and humid Saturday afternoon when I met one of the best friends I’ve ever known. The day was probably as much a surprise to him as it was to me. Then again, perhaps none of that really ever crossed his mind. He simply followed his natural instinct to believe and to trust.

Although our introduction was unexpected, we bonded from the start. To add to my surprise and maybe his, in just four months, I would adopt him along with all of his unique little quirks, his bright-eyed spirited gazes, and his unspoiled life-loving character. Never once have I second-guessed my decision.

Laughing at the World

Zero and I spent last week vacationing along the Chesapeake, where the bay meets the Atlantic. The timing couldn't have been better. I needed to clear my calendar by disconnecting from deadlines, tasks, PowerPoint presentations, and the consumption of media, politics, worldly, and backyard crises. Our time away was beyond healthy. I found myself laughing more than I had in a long, long time. And while I still believe I did nothing wrong, I was scolded by my 15 lb. friend on Tuesday evening after leaving him home alone for two hours while I shopped at a local record store. How dare me? Fortunately, all ills were forgiven and any grudges resolved with a single peanut butter dog biscuit and a swim in the ocean. The world was once again at peace.

Puppy Dreams

Our time away was every bit of that. Away. We both danced together to an unending queue of great music, hiked miles and miles of scenic trails, caught afternoon naps in the warmth of sand and sunshine, and drove with the windows down along Shore Drive. In the odd event that we happened to forget, each day reminded us of our escape with a constant gentle breeze whisked in from the ocean.

Of all the things that thrill me the most about our friendship, is that it never once has included beeping, buzzing, or dinging notices of a new voicemail, email, or text message. We still, however, remain completely connected each day.

Focus

To this day, I'm still not totally convinced that I'm solely the one responsible for our shared promise. Part of me wants to believe that Zero stepped up and adopted me on that same day. Either way, it was a win for us both. Our relationship is, oddly enough, a mirrored reflection of that week we spent at the bay. It's always honest, loving, face-to-face, unplugged, and never requires a status update.

If he ever does need to leave one, I’m sure it will always read the same. Good boy.

The Numbing

The event photographer

I rarely find myself in front of the camera. My place is to always stand behind it.

For this photograph, I maintained my normal position while waiting for guests to arrive to the holiday party I was assigned to document. Seeing this particular setting provided a welcoming invitation with its placement, framing, and available light. It was far too perfect not to use.

Despite the joys of the holiday season, a brightly decorated Christmas tree, a punch bowl of warm apple cider, brightly colored sugar cookies in the shapes of trees and candy canes, and all of the usual party festivities, my mood at the moment when I tripped the shutter for this image was hauntingly numb.

This reflective self-portrait was captured just minutes after hearing the tragic news of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shootings in Newtown, Connecticut. I was heartbroken. I still am.

A Father's Reflection

While testing my new old school Gossen Luna Pro light meter for the first time yesterday, I was greeted by two highlights.

First were the rich and deliciously true light readings for my camera's exposure settings. The second came with one of the test shots, unveiling a haunting resemblance of my father through my reflection.