–It is New Year’s Day, 2015. Happy New Year! May this next year bring us all the best that life has to offer. I am sure there will be uncertainties, enough for all: jobs, businesses, pursuits of all colors. The best thing I have found is to be active and know when to let go of something that simply will not budge. It is better to walk away from the brick wall than to keep banging your head against it.
–Sometimes the best gifts can be those that have been worked on and constructed by the giver. I gave some of my family photographs this year. This past autumn I was lucky enough to be in Paris for a week and photographed the Parc de Bagatelle with my Voigtlander r4M using Rollei 400s film. The negatives were lovely and I chose three specific images for presents. I worked carefully on the pieces, choosing specific papers for the right feel, adjusting the developing chemistry to activate the proper tonal scale and contrast. They are lovely. I was happy passing them on to good homes where they would be appreciated.
–I return to Greece this week. If all goes well I will be back on Paros by Tuesday lunchtime. My name day is January 7th, which is also the birthday of a close friend, mentor and colleague. I hope to cook her and her husband dinner that night. Probably pork chops.
–The real gifts are non-material. I no longer live in an imagined world of fear, where people are out to get me, shaft me, or otherwise take advantage of what I like to think of as my good nature. I no longer play the victim card. I no longer need to open up my Bag from the Past to show people what-tough-time-I-have-had-and-if-you-had-my-life-you-would-be-like-this-too! I am so happy I found a way up and out, have been able to let go of so many bad ideas and open my heart, embracing change as a positive force. Yes, I have days that are not perfect, but that is OK. That is the gift of being right-sized: I am a person among people, a worker among workers. I am emotionally secure among grown-up people.
–I heard a good quote the other day…
“You know what the big problem is in telling fantasy and reality apart? They are both ridiculous!”
–JDCM