"All photographs are memento mori. To take a photograph is to participate in another person's (or things's) mortality, vulnerability, mutability. Precisely by slicing out this moment and freezing it, all photographs testify to time's relentless melt."
~Susan Sontag
(Remember You Must Die)
It's time to close 2018. It's so strange how every year has the same amount of days, with the exception of leap years, and yet each year can seem to defy reason and science, by appearing to go by faster or slower than what the calendar says. That's always been a true phenomenon, but never like the last few years. There is time and then there is Trump Time. Trump Time... where days seem like months, and months seem like years.
Trump time is exhausting, and kinda scary. I feel myself aging at a much different rate, but then again, maybe I am just feeling my age more as I grow older. I am not sure how I will feel when this mess is finally over with, and I am not even sure it will ever be over with, so all I can do, is the best I can do, to hold onto my sanity, and thank God that my camera helps me do just that! It helps me process what needs to be felt and done to move forward with life.
In looking through my photos for 2018, I found I had a lot more good days with the camera, than bad. This year was eye opening, in many ways, but nothing was more eye opening than having a Stockton Police officer, knock on your door, LOUDLY, at 7:30 AM, as they chased two carjacking suspects through your backyard and into your pool house! SHIT! At first, I thought it might be the Secret Service, pounding on my door, because of some mistaken remark I made online, led to an investigation of me for threatening the president! Had I gone and done it this time? Had I finally been too damn mouthy on Twitter? Was that third time calling the president a SHITGIBBON going too far? Was this, finally, my arrest?
It, of course, wasn't, but I can imagine the day that it could be that happening. Not that I go around threatening Trump, but what's in my head doesn't matter, it's how he chooses to interpret things, that matters, right? That's another scary, surreal thought, that anything that one says online, could be used against them in such a frightening way. I had to be dead, because everything was just surreal! It made for a bad day, but that day was a necessary evil, because that scary day finally got it through to me that I wasn't dead, and that everything happening in the world was, indeed, real. Including a carjacking suspect, hiding out in my pool house!
You see, that had been my assumption, since before Donald Trump became president, but especially after he took the oath of office! Every single day of his presidency has rolled from one surreal day, to the next, each filled with one FRESH HELL, after another. So one day, in a fit of exasperation, I said out loud to myself... "When did I die?" I felt in that moment that life had become so surreal, that I couldn't possibly be alive! And I went forth with that delusion until that fateful day, the carjackers went through my backyard!
Great! I'm alive. All This Is Real!
Well, autumn and vacation came around, about four and six weeks later, respectively, and it was time to pick up the camera again, for both my sanity, but for the love of all things autumn, which traditionally includes the annual cascade of leaves, our anniversary and our vacation. I couldn't have an autumn where I didn't search out leaves for my project, and I felt like if I did skip a year, that it seemed like I would be giving up. I am not quite at that point yet, but I get tired, often, and just want to walk away and never look back! Stick my head into a book, and not come out.
Never watch another news/political analysis show again. Never go back to Twitter. Never engage in the real world again, but I know I couldn't do that. Sometimes I feel stuck in reality, a place where being aware of life is a good thing, but in this case, is the last place I would ever want to be thinking straight. Fantasy, for too long a time isn't healthy. Reality, especially now, definitely isn't healthy for too long a period of time, unfortunately, that doesn't leave much time.
I guess photography is my best vehicle for surfing fantasy and reality. I did some photos this year that I really care about. Most of them done during autumn, but certainly not exclusively. I am going to try to do some kind of photography, at least once a week this year. It can be difficult to find the right subjects, so I am going to attempt some artsy photos of average, if not mundane, subjects around the house. If Andy Warhol can make art out of a soup can, why can't I?
What I Saw In 2018...
In No Particular Order
Military Submarine Outlook Station
Circa WWII
HWY 1 South of San Francisco
October 24th, 2018
The "Bijou"
Our home theater, finally finished.
July 15th, 2018
Rare Mammatus Cloud Formation
And A UFO?
December 24th, 2018
Stockton, California
There's No Mail, Like Snow Mail
Camino, California
March 2nd, 2018
My Favorite Autumn Leaf Portrait
November 17th 2018
Stockton, California
Beware Of Snakes In A Cemetery
Ione Public Cemetery
Ione, California
October 24th, 2018
My Favorite Book Of 2018
"Fear" By Bob Woodward
Dippin Dots
Cannery Row
Monterey California
October 17th 2018
My Favorite Autumn Sunset
October 24th, 2018
Ione, California
My Favorite Black And White Photo
June 10th, 2018
Stockton, California
My Favorite Leaf Of The Day
"Fleur-Di-Lis"
December 9th, 2018
Stockton, California
My Favorite Public Art Piece
"Peace" By Stephen Kaltenberg
October 21st, 2018
Sacramento, California
My Favorite Church Photograph
Ione Catholic Cemetery
Ione, California
October 25th 2018
My Favorite Cemetery Photograph
Ione Public Cemetery
Ione, California
October 25th, 2018
Angel Monument
Ione Public Cemetery
Ione, California
October 25th 2018
The Old Frosty
Ione, California
August 25th, 2018
Blue Bunting
September 2nd 2018
Davenport, California
Early Winter Sunset
December 24th 2018
Stockton, California
"Incoming"
Pacific Grove, California
October 17th, 2018
Art Deco Glass Panel
The Orinda Theater
October 11th, 2018
Orinda, California
Smoke From The Camp Fire (Paradise, California)
Turned The Moon An Eerie Shade Of Red
A Bright Red Glow OF The Sun, Filtered With Smoke From The Camp Fire, Reflecting OFF The Bricks Of Preston Castle
November 11th, 2018
Ione, California
Happy Independence Day
July 4th, 2018
Stockton, California
Open Window
October 24th 2018
Lockeford, California
And there you have it! The year 2018 in photographs. On to yet another year, but hopefully, the new year will bring a lot more good news, than bad, and maybe even some clarity and hope. You just never know what will be waiting for you. Maybe I will take my best photograph ever! Or perhaps I will be in the right/wrong place at the right/wrong time to capture an image that will be something truly unique or historic! Or maybe I will just continue to photograph things I love, and just try to make it through another year of my life. It's all good. But, I am reminded daily of, Memento Mori.
It's Life.
Happy New Year
2019
~Mood: Quiet
~Me :)
