My Shadow

MY SHADOW

I have a little shadow that goes in and out with me,

And what can be the use of her is more than I can see.

She is very, very like me from the heels up to the head;

And I see her jump before me, when I jump into my bed.

The funniest thing about her is the way she likes to grow—

Not at all like proper children, which is always very slow;

For she sometimes shoots up taller like an india-rubber ball,

And she sometimes gets so little that there's none of her at all.

She hasn't got a notion of how children ought to play,

And can only make a fool of me in every sort of way.

She stays so close beside me, she's a coward you can see;

I'd think shame to stick to nursie as that shadow sticks to me!

One morning, very early, before the sun was up,

I rose and found the shining dew on every buttercup;

But my lazy little shadow, like an errant sleepy-head,

Had stayed at home behind me and was fast asleep in bed.

pome by robert louis stevenson

King of Death

To the thoughtless youth, deceived by the vanity of earthly possessions, the path that leads to the eternal abode is not revealed. This world alone is real; there is not here-after - thinking thus, he falls again and again, birth after birth, into my jaws. 

The secret of immortality is to be found in purification of the heart, 

in meditation 

in realization of identity of the self within and Brahman without. 

For immortality is union with God .

- The Upanishads: Katha 

Siblings

The everlasting bond between siblings is nurtured from the beginning. 

Texas Wind

Anyone who tells you these are ugly, harmful to birds or load are lying to you...

Editing

In the digital age of photography snapping a photo with your camera is only the beginning. I have a bad habit of holding onto pics that I qualify as 'almost there'. These 'almost there' pics are images that are not perfect but can become so in the editing room. Sometimes I will edit a pic and it will still be an 'almost there' pic. So I will leave it and come back a few months later and it will become a completely different image. 

There are many different types of editing programs out there to help you make your photographs look like pieces of art. You don't even need advanced programs to make unique and stunning changes to your pics. 

Here are some of my favorite edited pics from the original shot to the completed image.

Original image taken in Jacksboro, Texas.

Edited image with Iphotos. 

Original image taken at the Baltimore Aquarium. 

Edit image with the Black and White setting in Aperture.

Original image taken in Annapolis Maryland.

Edit image with Iphotos. 

Original image at the Baltimore Aquarium.

Edit image with Aperture.

Edit image with Aperture. 

Abortion

Just recently there was a bill set to be presented to the House of Representative by New Jersey Republican Chris Smith entitled ‘No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act’ or H.R. 3. Due to the uprising of men and women around the country the Republicans supporting the bill have back down for now.

However lets consider this act and what it is.

H.R. 3, if passed would not allow taxpayer money to be provided for any type of abortion with the exception of forcible rape. It would also no longer required the Hyde Amendment to be reviewed yearly and would ban privately funded abortions also.  

For those of you who do not know much about the Hyde Amendment it was introduced by Henry Hyde a Republican from Illinois in 1976. The amendment was to put restructions on Rowe v Wade and tacked onto the Department of Labor and Heatlth, Education and Wlefare Appropriation Act of 1976.

Within the Hyde Amendment it prohibited government funds to be used for abortion with exception to the mother’s health. Yet, the Hyde Amendment is reviewed every year and Congress has gone back and forth as to what should be added to the list of “acceptable” abortions. This list has included rape, incest and sever and physical heath damage.   

Now consider the magnitude of this for a moment. If the H.R. 3 were to ever pass the government would be deciding what a women could or could not do with her own body.

If you ask me it is an odd piece of legislating for a party who hate having the government interfering with their lives…

Staying Motivated

One of the hardest things to do in life is to stay motivated. Since I have started seriously taking on Alithea Inc I have tried to complete at least one task a day to keep myself motivated and moving. While one task a day may not seem like much consider how much time you have after a full day’s work, making dinner, social events and spending time with a significant other. I have found it leaves me somewhere between one hour and thirty minutes a day. This is enough time to complete at least one task.

This goal has surprisingly been working wonderfully and it is a great experience. It has kept me motivated resulting in my creative pallet expanding and has lead to ideas of what I want to do long term. This in the end has been the most inspiring aspect of my work so far.

However, I have to admit I have failed in my goal of one task per day for the past two weeks. This is simply because life has gotten in the way of my daily goal. Now life will inevitable get in the way of any tasks one is trying to complete. Yet, it can be so dame depressing.  

It often seems that when you succeed in a task time begins to fly by and everyday you wake up stronger and more energetic then the day before. But when you don’t succeed for a significant time you begin to forget what it felt like when you succeeded and begin to assume you can’t get back to the way you felt before.

Like I said, dame depressing…

Now it is time for me to begin a new. My hope is that I will learn that when I don’t succeed for a length of time it is not a failure, simply a diversion that is often unavoidable.

What the hell is Alithea Inc?

The idea of Alithea Inc came from a need for me to create an outlet to express my passion for the world. I wanted it to also be a way for people to discuses issues from all around the world with the hope that I can create change and educate others and myself. The reason I chose photography is because it has been one of those “back burner” hobbies for many years. As I have grown older, my life has taken many new twists and turns, some bad and some more wonderful then I can ever describe, and I have realized I needed to revaluate whom I was and who I will be.

What better way to rediscover your self then returning to a hobby that has always been there and trying it out again?

The decision to pick up a camera and invest my life in it came from two distinctive moments in my life. The first was a wonderful gift from a brother-in-law of his old Nikon. I had not picked up a camera since High School and when I began to play with this Nikon I remembered the joy and satisfaction I received from the clicking sound as the shutter closed and opened.

The second moment occurred while I was watching the tv show Bones that follows four researchers from the Smithsonian and a FBI agent as they solve mysterious murders. Watching the characters in their fictional lives where the spent every moment in their jobs I realized I wanted that. Now I understood that the show was fictional and Forensic Anthropologists probably do not have as much fun as the lab rats in the ‘Bones’ series do. However, I wanted the feeling of being truly excited about my job and desired that adrenalin rush you receive when working all night on something that is so important to you. I was spending so much of my life wanting to be away from work that I was left constantly with a bad taste in my mouth.

This is when the dreaming began… over the next year I would sit with my boyfriend and dream up ways that I could find a ‘career’ to follow. My ‘next step’ in life would change literally every week. One week I wanted to travel all over the world for a year discovering different cultures and immersing myself, the next I wanted to study business so I could open a green flower shop and yet still I wanted to go to school and get my doctorate in… well something.  Some of these ideas I followed through partly and had fun pursuing them but they still left me confused and slightly empty.

That is when it happened… one night I was sitting on my bedroom floor complaining to my boyfriend yet again how I felt lost and confused about what to do in life. Then an idea formed, very small at first, but it grew. Why don’t I use photography to pursue a career! We then proceeded to dream many dreams and talk about all of the wonderful things I could do with photography.

Over the next few month’s ideas swelled up and fumbled around until I came up with the idea of starting a company called Alithea Inc. There were two major reasons for creating a company that did not have my name. First, I was and still am to an extent very unsure of my ability as a photographer so I needed to hide behind something. Second it just sounds cool!

So the long and the short of it is my company, Alithea Inc. means “truth” in ancient Greek. It seeks truth, knowledge and understanding through photography by attempting to capture people, animals or objects in moments where they reveal their true nature, purpose or ability. I hope to gain a glimpse into a greater understanding of what it means to be on this planet.

There you have it. I am taking on a new challenge that may succeed or it may not. But, hopefully you can follow my journey through this blog and find some sort of enjoyment out of it