love love love

A couple months back, I was driving down Winslow Way in Bainbridge Island, and an older couple sitting by the side of the road caught my eye. They weren't extraordinary in any way. They weren't doing anything remarkable, impressive or noticeable. However, there was something about their body language, their way of being together that struck me deeply. They sat calmly, side by side, holding hands, faces turned toward each other. That's it.

Mundane? Perhaps. Perhaps not.

Look closer. What we see here is love, in its simplest, purest form. Not dignified or noble. Not even shiny, exciting and new. But love nonetheless. Tested, tried, worn down, beat up, run through the mud, no strings, no bullshit, honest-to-goodness love.

Love, love love. I could expostulate endlessly on the glories of love, but here's the truth.

It's not about love.

Wait. Allow me to rephrase.
It's not just about love.
It's not just about having a physical, emotional, spiritual attraction to another being. 
It's not just about the magic, the spark, the butterflies.
It's certainly not just about the chocolate, the wine and the sex.
It's not even just about the hugs and kisses, the late night cuddles and dream sharing sessions.

When you get down to the nitty gritty truth, it's about what love does to us. So-- love, not as a noun, but as a verb. It's about how love changes us as humans. It's about putting our own needs aside, if even for a second, for the sake of another creature. It's about relishing the beautiful symbiosis that is created when we peacefully (and sometimes not so peacefully) coexist with another.

It's about being intimately concerned with the welfare of someone other than ourselves, and how that creates a higher consciousness, a selflessness that, Lord knows, we need more of in the world.

But for today, my expostulation remains brief, for nap time is almost over, and I have a lot to accomplish.

the road trip, part I | love story X

If you’ve been following our love story, you will have noticed sprinkled allusions to Wyoming, the roadtrip, the breakdown, etc. 

Are you ready? All buckled up?

This is it.

The Road Trip. Or, as we like to call it, “3,000 miles to Jack-in-the-Box.”

A story like this needs to be broken up into several parts. With photos. And snack breaks. Probably a nap or two. We’ll organize things as follows:

*Departure.
*Disaster.
*Destination.

I like to think of this arc as the pinnacle, the pivotal plot point, the climax of our story. It’s actually not, but we’ll pretend for now.

Departure.

I am some strange mish mosh of quiet, content homebody, and crazy restless adventurer. Starting back in my teenaged years, I developed a passion and an undeniable draw to the romance of the open road. The motion, the movement, that sense of pushing, pushing the road past; I was obsessed. I clung to the idea that I was getting away from here, wherever here was, and that I was going somewhere, wherever where was.

So, that fateful day in Hallmark commercial studio, when Drew approached me, crazy idea in hand, I was hooked. Yes, I thought. Anywhere but here. Add a cute boy to the equation, and I had found myself a screamin’ deal.

The end of June ‘10 had arrived. We packed up all of our earthly belongings, mercilessly stuffed them into/onto Drew’s Subaru Legacy, bid adieu to some of the finest people we’d ever met, and hit the road.

The plan was to drive across this good ol’ country of ours, east coast to (almost) west. Massachusetts to Phoenix. We began in Miller’s Falls. Drove south through Connecticut. Into Pennsylvania. Then, at some point in Pennsylvania (which is way larger than you’d think), we completely changed our minds and decided to go north to Washington instead. The plan was to make it out to my home state by July 4th, to take part in the festivities. We had almost a week to accomplish this. Easy enough, right? We headed toward I-90, and things started getting interesting.

It began pouring down rain.

I know, I know. Rain isn’t that dramatic. But you must understand that when I say pouring, I don’t mean raining. I mean, Good Lord, someone up there must be draining out the bathtub, because I can’t see 3 inches in front of me pouring.

I mean, we could see our own world perfectly reflected in the roadway because there was so much water on it, pouring.

The Subaru started to overheat. We pulled over on some desolate stretch of Pennsylvania highway and poured the first of what would be an inordinate amount of coolant into the engine. You know that stomach knot that forms when inevitable doom approaches? See here, the first flutterings. On the other hand, those may have been because we were pulled over right at the gaping maw of a menacing copse of trees, and I was having visions of roadside hobos (if it can happen in Vermont, it can happen anywhere).

Flashback: when we took the car in for its pre-road trip tune up, I, in all my haughty cleverness, made some slight about how the car probably wouldn’t make it all the way across the country. Open mouth. Insert foot. Close mouth.

We drove on.

The first night passed slowly. You never quite understand the void of nothingness until you’ve taken a 2am-5am driving shift through the middle of nowhere, while your partner snores peacefully in the passenger seat. We finally made it through Pennsylvania and into Ohio, just as the sun awoke. We stopped, ate some nondescript breakfast, and somehow found the energy to continue on, mostly fueled by an all consuming desire to get off the east coast.

Next up? Indiana. Here’s where we started to notice an interesting trend: the further west we drove, the nicer people got. Small changes, slight differences, but it becomes apparent when you frequent the gas stations, fast food joints, and rest stops of the world. We felt encouraged, we must be on the right track.

Turns out, Indiana is home to a lot of corn. Which is fine. Boring, even... until you get to drive through fields of it in the pouring rain, with lightning striking all around you. Then it becomes epic. Well done, Indiana, you made corn epic.

Illinois yielded much of the same, including more storms. Wisconsin yielded our first trip to a Piggly Wiggly (ironically, an item on my list of things to accomplish in life), a whole lot of heat, and my first in-car sunburn. Minnesota showed us a whole lot of kindness, especially from the pseudo Canadian accent sporting residents, one of whom worked at McDonalds, and gave us free pie. The sun set on our second day, driving through Minnesota farmland.

That night, as Drew slept, we entered South Dakota. Or should I say, South. Dakota. The gentle hills and rolling fields grew up into dark, menacing mountains, then dropped completely away. Things began to feel empty, and, if we’re being honest, creepy. Exhaustion took over, and we stopped for the night. Now, if we had been normal people, who had things like sensibility and money, we would have grabbed a motel. Sporting neither of those, we pulled into a rest stop and slept, crunched in our seats, slouched against the windows, and ungracefully draped across the front, with the e-brake relentlessly digging into places it really didn’t belong.

The night passed. The day dawned. And sh*t hit the fan. 

[…]

physical goodness | bainbridge island wedding photographer

If you a) know me personally  b) have ever heard me talk about photography  c) have ever read this blog or  d) all of the above, you know that I'm constantly touting the goodness of that which is physical. No, I'm not talking about hugs and kisses, though those are nice, too. Before I start prattling on like an unbearable old gasbag, let me get straight to the point.

In 50 years, when you're showing your wedding photos to the grandkids, you're not going to plug in a USB drive/DVD/floppydisk/hypermagicstoragedrive into your computer and pull the images up. First off, computers probably won't exist as they do today. Second off, what fun is that?!

Oh yes, my point. Digital files are wonderful, but this has nothing to do with that. I unconditionally guarantee that at some point in your life, you will want to hold those beautiful wedding images in your hands. Not on an iPad, not on a laptop, not on a desktop dinosaur. The moment you see your photos "in real life", without the glow of a screen behind them, your experience, your perception of them will change. I promise. It did when I held our wedding photos in my hands. It does every time I hold a client's new album in my hands. It's sort of a chilly, giddy, teary, magical rainbow coloured unicorn sort of thing. Sounds crazy, but it's true.

This Friday, we're proud to be the featured artist at the local Bainbridge Island First Friday Artwalk. We'll be showing a little gallery of carefully curated wedding images, all in print form. Of course, I used this as an excuse to drop a dollar or two on a ton of new products, which I'm very excited to show a sneak peek of here.

If you're around the island this Friday from 6-8pm, stop by Prettystick Beauty and say hello!