Washed Ashore

I am a great collector of photography challenge lists on Pinterest, and every time I discover a new writing prompt book I have to buy it and add it to my ever growing collection. What I have yet to find is a book or list that combines both a prompt for words to write and photographs to compose in one neat package.

Last week I bought this book after looking through a few pages and liking the prompts that were listed in it. I can tell that I haven't been writing much lately, because I am overusing words like beautiful, wonderful, fabulous, and joyful. As a creative who enjoys writing, I can do better than that. So I bought the book with the intention of getting back to a daily practice of fifteen minutes of wild writing. If you are wondering what wild writing is, you can read my post about it here. I am not good at too many long term sustained practices, but I am good at returning to practices such as wild writing, photograph class lessons and such.

The prompt I chose to write about on Tuesday was this one: Washed Ashore - Write down five objects that might be found washed up on the seashore lakeshore. I have spent enough time photographing at my local state park where a plethora of items wash up on the shore in any given season, to have a pretty good idea of five things I could write about. But...I am someone who would rather be out adventuring than sitting at my wintertime desk and thinking up found items to write about. I wanted to go out and find those five objects.

Since the tile guy was coming on Wednesday to put up my new kitchen backsplash, I figured that Wednesday would be a good morning to go to the beach and photograph washed ashore treasures. Once a level of trust has been established with your tradespeople, being in the house while they work is about as uncomfortable as sitting in your underwear watching paint dry. You don't want to talk to them, and they don't want to talk to you. That level of trust has been reached with my kitchen people, so I left Dave to cut and apply tile, while I went to the beach.

Tuesday, after I had written for fifteen minutes on Washed Ashore, and decided that I wanted to go to the beach and photograph the five items, I remembered David duChemin's photography class The Compelling Frame. The last time I worked on a lesson was December 10, 2017. This knowledge is easily obtained when you date your homework.

I had left off on Lesson Six - Perspective and Exploring POV. It wasn't that I didn't want to do the lesson. What I wanted to do was the lesson outside. In December, January and February it has been too snowy and cold to be outside for any period of time long enough to photograph objects from at least six different angles. Wednesday's forecast was partly cloudy and mid-40's. With the proper clothing and gear, I could easily spend an hour or more at the beach laying on the ground, shooting from above, from a distance and up close.

I have also learned to throw my expectations to the wind. What I want to find and what wants to find me are often two very different things. I am always blessed when I let things find me.

With some clever creative thinking I have been able to make my own exercise combining words and photographs in a refreshing new way.

Scene & Story - April 2017

Everybody's doing a brand new dance, now.

(Come on Baby, do the loco-motion)

I know you'll get to like it if you give it a chance, now.

(Come on Baby, do the loco-motion)

The song comes on the radio and I can't help singing along. Not out-loud of course, but mouthing it with all my might.

Today feels like a good day for antiquing. The rain has finally stopped, the sun is shining. I am on the hunt for things that make me happy. 

I am wandering the aisles of our local antique store. Fascinated by the items that find their way to vendors' booths. There are the objects I remember from my childhood; the avocado-green bun warmer my mom always kept our hamburger buns in, the black metal lunchpail with the silver ribbed thermos that my dad carried to work everyday. I wonder how these memories can be antiques, but then I remember that I am almost fifty, and these items were around before I was. 

I am on the hunt for a couple of specific treasures. First is a table for my daughter's dining room, we just finished painting the room, and now she is extra aware of how empty the space is with the much lighter color on the walls. She is anxious to get a table so she can stop eating her meals on top of the cabinet that covers the radiator. There was a time when I couldn't drag her into an antique store, who would want to buy something old and used. But now she understands the quality and craftsmanship that went into those old pieces. Her Pinterest boards are full of timeless antique objects. With age comes wisdom.

The second treasure I am hunting for is something I am always hunting for: green depression glass plates. I saw some once being used in a coffee shop and I fell in love with them.

There are a couple of table possibilities here, so I snap pictures with my phone and text them to my daughter. There is nothing else to do with that now, except wait. 

I am in the last aisle at the last booth and there in the open display case are two green, oval depression glass plates with matching cups. I lift them out and hold them in my hand, they are perfect. I look for a price, both on the plates and on the cups, no price. Then I see six more oval plates on the bottom shelf of the case, maybe they have a price, no such luck. One of the owners walks by, I stop her and ask about the price. She says, "Oh that gal is here today, I'll go get her for you." Hallelujah!

The booth owner comes to her space and I show her the plates and cups. She says, "I was just using those for display since there are eight plates but only two cups, I didn't think anybody would buy them." The cups are a bonus to me, I want the plates. She says, "I will gladly sell them to you, if you don't mind not having all the cups. How about $20 for the whole lot?" Sold!

Come on, Come on
Do the loco-motion with me

**In April I participated in Susannah Conway's April Love. I am also doing the #the100dayproject - This year I am doing 100 days of writing prompts. This photo and story were from the April Love prompt Patterns.

An InLinkz Link-up

Make A Wish

Can you make a wish in a fountain that has no water? Is it the water that makes a wish come true, is it the penny, is it the fountain? Or is it the person who believes in magical things.

Standing with penny in hand, ready to throw, I ponder this thought.

The fountain in front of me is filled with last autumn's leaves, crumpled candy wrappers, and pennies from the past, but no water. Will adding my penny make any difference?

What things will I wish for if I throw my penny?

I wish...
--to stop trying to figure out either/or and be content being both a photographer and a writer
--for a long and happy marriage
--for my daughter to find someone who cherishes her. Don't we all deserve that?
--to travel near and far
--to have a dog like my dear Scout again someday
--to have a cottage on a small lake with a dock, where magical things happen
--to be involved in art retreats for women

We don't get all our wishes, and some of our wishes will change over time, but we must keep collecting those pennies and tossing them in fountains, whether they have water or not.

I Remember...

This week in my writing class one of our writing prompts is I Remember... This is intended to be a free writing prompt, meaning write down anything and everything you remember from any point in your life. At first I glossed over this prompt and moved on to the second one, Write About the Family Dinner Table. But when that prompt wasn't going anywhere I went back to I Remember... I thought the prompt would be too vague for me to focus, but once I started thinking about it I realized I could come up with a lot of things. To help narrow down my focus I picked a topic to remember about. Since it is cold and flu season, I chose to write down things I remembered about being sick as a kid.

I remember my dad making me hot lemon water laced with a little whiskey when I had a bad head cold. I don't remember my dad being a drinker, an occasional tall can of Schlitz beer on a warm summer afternoon was the extent of his drinking. Maybe he kept the bottle of whiskey just for my colds, I don't remember him ever making this concoction for my younger brother when he was sick.

I don't remember throwing up often as a child, but when I did have the flu, my mother would place the Farberware stainless steel 6 quart stock pot along side my bed for those just-in-case moments. The funny thing is, that was the same stock pot she made soups and stews in, the even funnier thing is that I repeated the same pattern with my daughter.

I remember my chest being smeared with Vicks Mentholatum, I hated the warm, burning sensation it created.

I remember being dressed in my flannel granny nightgown, my arms wrapped tightly around my loved-to-death brown teddy bear.

I remember how I loved the citrusy orange flavor of Bayer Children's Aspirin. I would sneak into the bathroom medicine chest to find the bottle, I figured out quickly how to align the arrows and pop the top off. I enjoyed one or two of those orange treats even when I wasn't sick.

I remember my mother coating my nose and lips with Vaseline. She would smear it on so thick that it would clog both my nostrils, no wonder my lips were so chapped, my mouth was the only orifice left to breath through.