summertime

...and the livin's easy


Short weeks of blissful langour unhindered by deadlines, and unencumbered by dates or hours. That has been my summer, and though it will soon change form with the approaching blocks of time cut out for work and school, I plan on keeping the breeze about me- that breeze in my step that only summer brings. The ease is what I love.
I've had freedom to take pictures, have long conversations, watch countless movies, read a little, sit and listen to music, dance around my room to music, and just experience life in its daily form with the one I love-all of this with no raincloud lingering overhead, waiting to end the fun and holding me captive with a tight squeeze of responsibility. During the school year, there is always something I should be working on, and I have found that it is difficult for me to compartmentalize work and fun, because the work overwhelms. Even when I have fun, no matter how deep I bury it, there is part of me thinking about the fact that I have plenty to be doing, or that I will be doing, or that I should have been doing already. Horrible bondage. Perhaps if I take the ease of summer into my schooling in the next 10 weeks, I will learn to carry it over into the year.

plans:
10 hours of summer school (genetics+lab, polysci (puke), abnormal psych)
working at Sweet Eugene's
working in the lab- starting thesis research
hopefully taking various roadtrips

I took this of lovely Nicole (my roomate) on her birthday. I love this picture- for the color and the composition...but mostly for the feeling. Those, to me, are the best sorts of pictures. Ones that speak to you on a level deeper than your eyes. I like pictures that invoke a feeling or an emotion, or just capture it in its moment of existence, however fleeting. I enjoy photos that make you stop, pause a second, and look at a snippet of life a little closer. I appreciate the purely aesthetic photos too-photos that make you see ordinary life and commonplace objects in an artful manner. I always prefer art over crisp documentation.
That is the beauty found in photography. Not so much what is does for other people, but what is does for the photographer. Maybe it is a selfish art- but then maybe all art is selfish in some respects. The eyes of a photographer can see objects, places, and moments in ways that no one else can. Whatever the viewer gains from the photo may be similar, seeing that viewing other photos always gives me inspiration, but it is always a graded, secondary response.
I remember back when I was in my photography class, ALL I saw was framed in pictures. Driving home on 21, everything around me was a landscape worth saving, and it was all I could do not to sweep my eyes along the scenery instead of fixing them on the road. (Mom, don't worry- I am past that phase.) I haven't had a chance to take pictures for the sake of mere art lately, and I think some of that has faded in me a bit (along with all my other creativity). My love for it is still there, and hopefully I will reignite it over the summer. I will stifle its effects while driving, though.