AKA Abraham Bacoln

It’s a strange feeling when something you do regularly, something you do for fun, turns unexpected and affects you more than you intended.

I received a new lens for Christmas and I spent a good portion of the day shooting pics like crazy just trying to get a feel for it. I haven’t checked how many pictures I took, but it was definitely more than necessary.

I shot the tree, I shot the examination of gifts, and I stood there and documented every step while my mother made her pecan pie. I took pictures of everything.

When I finally got home and reviewed my pictures, the one of Mom’s hands holding the eggs caught me by surprise. I actually had to skip over it because I was confused by what I was feeling, didn’t know how to deal with it. I left it alone for a day or so.

I finally went back and took a long look at it. It’s a spur of the moment capture – she just held out the eggs for a second, I snapped, we went on in our conversation and pie-making. It wasn’t posed in the traditional sense, I didn’t ask her to hold them a certain way. It was just in the moment.

The more I looked at it the more I realized I’d reached a new thing, a new place. I was looking at a picture that actually moved me – one of my pictures. That had never happened to me before. The emotions were what confused me the first time I saw it. I’m used to making images, some kind of tiny art perhaps, not feelings.

I have memories of being a child and sitting in church, not listening to the sermon, just holding Mom’s hand, looking at it, feeling how soft her skin was. It wasn’t so much thoughts of “these are the hands that cook for me, that comfort me, that put on the bandages when I scrape my leg,” but more strange realization of detail, how just one part of the human body can sum up the whole of what they mean to you.

This picture just made me realize that I hadn’t really looked at my mom’s hands in forever. It made me remember what it was like to be a kid. It made me think about who my mom is, and how much she means to me.

Somehow this picture just says more to me about my mother than any portrait ever could. I never expected to do this to myself. I could never have set out to do it on purpose.

I’m grateful that it happened the way it did.

This post started out full of details, but those get boring, and quick. Instead I’m just gonna say that the past two weeks have been full of works, weddings, finals, houseguests, and everythings else. I’m pooped.

I had the ENTIRE day off from everything today, though, and was able to spend it doing whatever I wanted to, which really boils down to a whole lot of nothing. Best news: I finally get over to see the doctor, and that constant nagging low-grade pain I’ve had in my side for almost a week and a half is NOT a kidney stone, and is NOT intestinal parasites, but apparently just some pulled muscle that I am (for whatever sadistic reason) not allowing to relax and heal. Better that than the gut worms, I say.

MMmmmmm. Worms.

Anyway, I’m just very excited about finally being truly relaxed. It feels so good. In fact, it’s time to go relax some more. Amazingly enough I’m making progress in all the books I wanted to read. Funny how free time allows that.

I hope that every single one of you had a day just as good as mine. I wish you all the best. Should I forget to write again before Christmas, I wish you all the happiest of December Twenty-Fifthsths.

EDIT! I totally forgot to mention that once again I’ve had someone (an out-of-towner co-employee) tell me that when I speak I sound just like Jeff Goldblum. I couldn’t be more pleased.

EDIT EDIT! Ah-HA! I’ve finally found my favorite Jeff Goldblum / Apple commerical. Someone has uploaded it since the last time I went looking for it. This is …

you know, for you this is probably totally boring. But for me? Sometimes I stand in the mirror and talk normally and pretend that I am indeed Jeff Goldblum.

He even rolls up his sleeves like I do. I think … this means something.

I was listening to music this morning using earbuds plugged in to my laptop (which in turn was plugged into a power outlet) and occasionally as I’d shift in my seat I’d get a strange crackle sound. I kept jiggling the cord, trying to find a short, but none was becoming obvious. Still, every time I fidgeted I’d get that crackle-pop again.

I finally realized what it was when I warmed up enough to take off my fleece jacket. As I pulled it off I felt the familiar tug of static cling between my jacket and my shirt, and then immediately got static electricity shock in both ears simultaneously.

Let this be some sort of strange lesson to you. May you learn from my experience.

This picture represents the fifth time that I have challenged my Cookeville peeps to identify or locate a local … um … thing. Guess I can’t really say place or building ’cause sometimes it’s neither of those things.

I’m constantly surprised and amused at how rapidly the answers come back. Either this town is exactly as small as I think it is, or my friends are just as observant as I think they are, or maybe it’s a combination of both.

Regardless, the activity amuses me to no end, and I’m always thinking of new places or things to photograph and use to quiz my degenerate Flickr friends. The first two were a bit hard and the last three a bit easy, so I’m going to try to think of something a bit more in-between for next time.

Oh, yeah, I forgot to mention I’ve tagged them all with ‘trivia’ so it’s easy for me to go back and relive the fun. Thanks for playing, everyone – I’ll try and think of a new thrilling adventure for you all soon.