Blog Archives
5
On December 22, 2008, I decided to start a photography blog. I am not sure where the idea came from – I didn’t read blogs back then, and didn’t do any kind of regular photography, either. But the idea showed up and wouldn’t leave, so I kicked it off my first blog on January 1, 2009. Today I am completing five years of posting a photograph every day.
My Research Department could probably nose around and find those early blogs, but the Department has worked very hard this year, and deserves some time off. So, here they are. That first one in 2009 is here. And then the 2010 effort. And, 2011 looked like this. Then, I finally figured out that it made more sense to not start a whole new blog every year, so 2012 is here, on One Day | One Image.
It’s been an interesting five years, and I am looking forward to five, or ten or fifteen, more. I’m not going to get all introspective or anything, other than to say this: the very best part has been making friends along the way, a delightful unintended consequence of that late-December decision to start a blog.
Lubbock, Texas
photographed 7.16.2011
PS: Those photos from 2009 and 2010 (and, let’s be honest, 2011) were not that great, were they?
Who are the villains here?
Is it odd to have a favorite kind of graffiti? Probably.
But, still, I think train-car graffiti is my favorite.
I understand that it’s vandalism. And that probably the only way to paint a train car involves trespassing. But I still like it.
(My dad recently told me, in sort of Stern Dad voice, that I “needed to make sure to stay off the train’s property” when I was shooting. Because no matter how old I am, I’m still his daughter.)
Lubbock, Texas
photographed 2.20.2009
Ice storm
The winter of 2009-2010 was bad, by our rather lax Texas standards.
There was a big snowstorm on Christmas Eve that left 7″ of snow. (I know. Those of you who get actual snow are laughing at me right now, aren’t you?) But for us, it was a lot.
Then at the end of January, we got snow and ice. And it stayed cold for a while, with just enough sun during the day that all that frozen stuff could start to melt a little bit. But not much: in the morning the trees had icicles that looked like the prisms on a chandelier. It was pretty.
But it was also cold, and I was glad when summer arrived.
Lubbock, Texas
photographed 1.30.2010
To be sold eventually to strangers, 8
One.
The first thing I noticed, nearly, when I started cleaning out my dad’s house was the huge number of toothpicks lying about. On the breakfast table. On the metal tray where he kept the toaster. On the lamp table beside his TV chair. By the sink. Next to his computer. On the nightstand. On the lavatory. On the kitchen counter. In the junk drawer in the kitchen. On top of the clothes dryer. Next to his briefcase.
I don’t think he’d thrown away a toothpick in years.
Where he lives now, in an assisted living center, I don’t think he has toothpicks in his room.
I wonder if he misses them.
Two.
My dad wore braces on his teeth when he was a kid. He’s 90 now, so he was a kid a very long time ago. And it wasn’t like he lived in a city, where even in those early days of orthodontia, braces would have been easy to obtain: he lived in a small town in the Texas panhandle.
His teeth are crooked again now, having found their way back, over the decades, to the places in his jaw where they started out.
Three.
My mom was always self-conscious about her teeth, which were very crooked. She finally got braces, as an adult, and seemed to smile a lot more once her teeth looked better.
Four.
I wore braces twice. Once for six years, spanning all of junior high and a good part of high school.
Then, I got them again about 15 years ago, and wore them for a little more than a year.
I was a much more compliant patient when I was paying for the braces myself.
Five.
I dream about teeth. Broken teeth, mostly. Broken teeth like shards of glass in my mouth. Broken teeth that I keep spitting out, over and over; there’s never an end to these tooth-shards. I often have vivid dreams, but this is the only one that recurs. What in the world? Well, the Dream Encyclopedia* has this to say regarding the symbology of dreams about teeth:
Loosing the teeth may reflect a loss of power as well as a grasp of life circumstances.
I suppose I concur with that assessment. The past year and a little more has been a time of great upheaval, a time when I often felt as though my grasp of things was slipping. But I try to remember that no matter how much upheaval I’ve felt and had to deal with, it is a tiny drop compared to what my dad has gone through. In a short period, he went from owning a home full of his life’s possessions and living on his own and on his own terms, to holding a couple of checks after the house and its contents sold. Everything he owns now is compressed down to what fits into that efficiency apartment, and he has to ask me to run his errands.
He’s never asked for toothpicks.
Lubbock, Texas
photographed 8.23.2013
*The Dream Encyclopedia, James R. Lewis
Angel
The sculpture, known as the Umlauf Angel, keeps watch over the front section of the City of Lubbock Cemetery. The Angel, by internationally known sculptor Charles Umlauf, was commissioned by the City in 1958.
By 1994, things were looking bad, as she had developed cracks due to weathering. Restoration in 1995 and 1996 was successful. Sort of: only a few days after the restored sculpture was complete vandals (two high school boys, later arrested) chipped away at the wing tips, causing $1,200 in damages.
She’s fine these days, casting her gaze skyward amidst the gravestones.
The City of Lubbock Cemetery
Lubbock, Texas
photographed 2.3.2009
One Day | One Image 