The Path Forward

The reflection of the sun, as filtered with smoke from the Central and Northern California wildfires.

"I don't know whether you can look at your past and find, woven like the hidden symbols on a treasure map, the path that will point to your final destination."

~Jodi Picoult

Handle With Care 

Okay, time to get caught up. My last post, before I broke for the season, was dated March 23rd, which means there is a lot to share here as far as my photography goes. So, less words tonight, more photos from the last 6 months or so. Happily, despite the pandemic, I managed a fair amount of new photography, mostly shared on Twitter, and Google photos, of course. I keep forgetting to update my Twitter TL to link directly, I am not sure what they mental block is all about but from now on, no excuses. It's time to get my shit together. It actually feels good to be motivated, its been a while since I felt that way. Hey, it was bound to happen at some point... right? I mean how long could I continue hiding from life?

Enough with the wordiness. Time for the photographs to speak.

This was just a sampling of my work since January, I did a lot more photos and subjects. If you'd like to see more click on the link below to be redirected to my Google album for this year. Feel free to leave me any feedback you want, just be respectful.

Ellipsis 2020 

Carly

August 24th 2020

Stockton, California

 

17 Years! And 2020!

 "All photographs are memento mori. To take a photograph is to participate in another persons (or things) mortality, vulnerability, mutability. Precisely by slicing out the moment and freezing it, all  photographs testify to times relentless melt."

 ~ Susan Sontag

 

So, here I am, celebrating my 17th year of this blog and what happens? Blogger changes it's entire formatting process, and I am having to sit here and learn it, as I type this, a whole new system of formatting! It's a situation that just couldn't be more 2020 if it tried! Sheesh! Oh well, it will be a challenge, and a welcome distraction from all this pain and uncertainty, and HEY, I'm officially back, and that feels good! 17 years, who would have believed it?

If you're wondering about the photo... it's a representation of what the sky, in my world, has looked like this past week. There are currently, little, AND BIG, fires everywhere, caused by lightning strikes all around the Bay Area, North Bay, San Mateo Peninsula, and Monterey Bay. We had hellish temperatures a week ago, and it all came together to create the worst possible conditions. Now the sky, and air, is reminding me a lot of how thing were in 2018, during the Camp Fire in Paradise.

 I will touch on all this again in the coming days. For right now I just want to be glad I am home, on my blog for another year. We are coming up on the political debates, autumn equinox, our vacation in October, Halloween and of course, the national election on November 3rd. I will be doing a ton of new photos this year, to document it all! Things are just getting good!

 

 Stay tuned!

 

~Carly

August 23rd 2020 

Stockton, California

 

8 Weeks, Give Or Take

"Illness is the night side of life, a more onerous citizenship. Everyone who is born holds a dual citizenship, in the kingdom of the well and in the kingdom of the sick. Although we all prefer to use the good passport, sooner or later each of us is obliged, at least for a spell, for identify ourselves as citizens of the other place."

~Susan Sontag

Illness As Metaphor

The last time I posted here was on January, 18th. Just about eight weeks ago. So much has happened in that time, but it's Trump time, which is time that seems to move differently than any other measure of time, because of his knack for creating a NEW FRESH HELL daily, and the last eight weeks have been no different. But in addition to his bullshit, other things have happened. In no particular order, I learned that I am now in late, stage three, Chronic Kidney disease. Valentine's Day happened, which was great this year, because Alan and I got to spend the day together, and he gave me my first Valentine's day card in years. Spring officially began last Friday, and along with all the rest of it, came a pandemic.

 It is believed that the Covid-19 virus (novel coronavirus) began late last year, in China, but that is somewhat unclear in detail. Right now that is just the theory, because it's not definite how the first human contracted it. Trump, in his usual racist form, likes to refer to it as the Chinese virus. A term which is not just wrong, but again, racist. Blatantly so. So, as you might imagine, his speaking daily, alongside his coronavirus task force, helps no one. He speaks, down goes the stock market. He speaks, a whole community of Americans are put into danger from racist assholes. He speaks. He lies. He puts folks in danger from so many directions it's staggering.

I've been dwelling on my childhood, and the little memories that seem like a billion years ago, but also, somehow, feel like a couple days ago. I miss little things. Like eating on Christmas eve, at the little fish and chips restaurant, that my family loved so much. I remember eating there, on the first day of autumn, in 1976, after I went shopping for back to school clothes. I can remember everything about that meal, and about the clothes I purchased that day. I had chosen a brown cardigan sweater, and two skirts. A solid plum colored skirt and the other one was black and covered in tiny gold flowers. I bought a long sleeved green sweater to wear with that one. Also in the bag, I had a new pair of tennis shoes and a new pair of boots. A new purse and some folders and pens. And now I am hungry for a restaurant that hasn't existed since 1984.

But...

back to today. I am not sure why I am dwelling on those memories, except that it feels like my mortality is in serious play. Covid-19 tends to hit folks who have compromised immune systems. Between my Fibromyalgia and my kidney disease I feel like it's just a matter of time until it comes for me. The Trump administration has bungled the response to the pandemic.... thoroughly. All of it surrounding Trump's ego and pride, but fortunately individual governor's have really stepped up! Like Gavin Newsom. He was the first governor to shut a state completely down to all non-essential gatherings, including work. The state is closed, which means stay home unless you need to visit a grocery store or your doctor. It's an eerie feeling, and an even eerier sight, but that's the order, and it's so little to ask, if it will help stop the rampage of this deadly virus.

Before his order went into affect, folks throughout America panicked and cleaned out the grocery stores of everything, from toilet paper to canned food. We have driven the state up and down trying to find one package of toilet paper, and can't. It's not available on Amazon either. We are down to our last two rolls, and then we will have to do something fairly unpleasant, but workable. I don't want to think about it. We have food and for the most part supplies for us and the boys, and that is what matters. We are fairing a lot better than the hospitals, which at the moment, can't get masks, ventilators and other much needed equipment. Trump knew in late December what was coming and did nothing about it. He is about a dangerous man who has ever lived. These sure do seem like the last days, but I don't want to think about that. Why? It's not like worrying will stop the apocalypse... right?

Oh well. That gets Ellipsis caught up on the most important changes that have taken place. I will touch on everything as we move along going forward. Right now, here are some photos in order of what inspired me since January 19th. Small steps as we go. Right? Okay, moving on to some images, beginning with the sunsets. There will be more sets to come, in fact, some upcoming posts will simply be sets of photos until I get things caught up. 

Keep checking back.

 Set #1 The Sunsets

~Mood: Sad

~Me

A Central Valley Sunset In Two Acts

"You are my soul on a cold dark night, my muse during the light of the day and the one wish my soul would make."

~Grace Willows

I love that quote. I find myself daydreaming more in winter than I do in summer. I am not sure why. Although, now that I think about it, it might be because I find it so much more difficult to carry a coherent thought in summer, than in winter. Anyway, I saw this gorgeous tree on the way to Ione last night, and was lucky enough to get a good shot of it was we drove by it. It's now one of my "not bad for out of a moving car" portraits. I played a bit with lighting and color, and came away not being able to decide if I preferred it warmer or cooler. The sunset going on behind it was a great big fussy golden/red winter angry sky, which may be why I created and alternate universe of cool blue to enjoy it. Cold. Winter. They go together, but on the other hand, the sky in gold and red could have been a metaphor for a romantic cozy fire on a cold winter's night.  

Interpretation is in the eye of the beholder.

Mood: Happy

Me  :)

Windmills And A Yellow Leaf

"The tall white windmills that came to her mind. How their skinny long arms all turned, but never together, except for just once in a while two of them would be turning the same way, their arms poised at the same place in the sky."

~Elizabeth Stout

Anything Is Possible

As we were driving across the Altamont Pass, earlier in the week, I was of course captivated by them, as I always am, while scoffing at Donald Trump's assertion that the noise from the gives you cancer. I can't pass them without thinking about that lunatic remark. If you can't get what you want any other way, lie about it, even if it makes you seem like, well, you're a lunatic! I mean just look at them! What's there to fear? I think they are beautiful, in fact, I was thinking the other day that this new sleeker type remind me of my favorite bird, the Snowy Egret. And before you say it, this kind of windmill was developed to be less dangerous to birds of all kinds. 

Windmills are a good thing. I will risk the cancer.

Something pretty from the natural world. A new leaf! 

January 14th 2020

Castro Valley Community Center

Nikon 

Mood: Happy

Me  :)

*BIJOU* Another Thin Man

"The whole of life is just like watching a film. Only it's as though you always get in ten minutes after the picture has started,

 and no one will tell you the plot,

 so you have to work it out all yourself from the clues."

Terry Pritchett

Moving Pictures 

It's the middle of January, obviously, but being sick during the year end holidays has put me behind with some things I thought would be fun to share, like that cool little marquee you see above! That is an awesome little light-box I gave Alan for Christmas. He and I put in a movie theater in the spare room a couple years ago, and it's a lot of fun, but the one thing missing was seeing the name we gave it up in lights. I love it. The sign fits really nicely, just above the entrance to the downstairs room we call the Bijou! As we go along I plan to add more features and decorations here and there, but for right now this is great! The Thin Man was the last movie we watched in 2019, one of our favorites! 

Mood: Happy
Me  :)

If There Is Autumn To Be Found I'll Find It

"When people look at my pictures I want them to feel the way they do when they want to read a line of a poem twice."

~Robert Frank

I know that autumn isn't everyone's favorite season, so I do feel the need to apologize from time to time about just how heavily dependent on that season I have become. Shrug. What can I say, I still need it, long after it goes away, so I will pretty much be looking for earth tone colors in the natural world, long into any given new year! Sometimes I think I have become an autumn detective, lol, but really, it is just that it has become a game of distraction to ease my brain and body. A game with beautiful benefits mind you, but a game all the same. So is there any harm? Am I really missing out by not paying much attention to other palates? Is it harming my photography over all? Well, I am forcing myself to consider those questions, because I know I have gone through a lot of creative changes since moving in 2015. As this year moves along, I may give myself small assignments of seeking out spring colors and see how that works with my choices in non organic subjects. Hopefully I will learn, and grown in my photography. That's the goal for this year. To see an improvement in instinct and goal!

For now... a new autumn gallery.

I was down in Hayward yesterday on business, and to my surprise I actually saw a tree with some early pink blossoms. It was lovely. I am going to do as much practice with as many blossom colors as I can. I would love to find some Quince, that has always been one of my favorite blossoms to practice on. I am enthusiastic about 2020, at least as far as my photography goes. Everything else... politics... is still scary as fuck! It's all just time travel I suppose. It is what it is!

Mood: Happy
Me   :)