Waimea Landing

Inspired to head to Waimea for Jo Jo's famous shaved ice, my family got in our rental car armed and ready to eat as big of a snowcone as humanly possible. Of course, we were also prepared to walk the short distance to Waimea Landing and shoot like crazy. Here are a few of my shots from the day.

Before you ask, I don't know... I don't know what it is with me and rusty objects. I just can't help myself. I see one and I'll drop everything to get a picture. I'm actually adding a tag for this because I see myself doing much more of this in the future.

Hold Your Own

I'm in this sweet funky mood because I've been listening to "Details in the Fabric" by Jason Mraz and James Morrison all day. Something about the song captures the beautiful reflective place in which I like to write. My brain is working twelve times faster and writing eight times more stories than normal, and it's all in the back, just sitting, cooking...

It's been months since I wrote anything I was proud of, but tonight, every thought I think feels like the deep inhalation of a breath... not just any breath, but that breath you take when you're inches away from a person you love deeply, drinking in--not the scent, as books always describe, but the moment, as if the longer you breathe in, the longer the moment will hold in your memory. I've never done drugs, never gotten high, never had a desire to... but I realise as I sit here that this feeling, this breath, is like that. I feel nothing and everything at the same time. I feel hopeful and quiet. I feel awake and still. I feel raw and paralysed. I feel like I want to breathe this in forever, because in this moment, I see clearly. I know differently than I've known.

Sometimes, these things aren't stories--at least, not traditionally. They are pictures--snapshots, just as much as any photograph I've ever taken--or portraits of an insight, a dream, or something more. They are images burned into my eyes, tattooed on my heart, imprinted on my soul. I did not put them there; they are a gift, but not for me, not always. Today, I don't know.

I see white feathers swirling up from the ground in a city full of busy people, making magic and seemingly freezing time for a perfect second... The crowds pause and look around... Where did they come from? For a moment, they are in a fairy tale, they are friends, or, better, family. They have dreams and not duties, faith and not fear. Where they once were enslaved to responsibility, they are now offered free salvation. The burdens they carry drop to their feet; they lift their hands and faces toward the sky, and they twirl, rejoicing in the glory of this frozen moment.

Then, in the space of a breath, from the start of one inhalation to the complete exhale of air, they drop their arms and eyes; they dust their burdens off and hoist them onto their backs, not noticing how their shoulders hunch as they carry a collection of hurts and wrongs... both those they've received, and those they've handed out. Where enchanted smiles had been, a flat line now reflects the holes in their souls. Faith fades; dreams die. They move on, pretending the feathers don't exist. They keep walking, brokenhearted, having experienced truth but without any understanding of what to do with it. They whisper to themselves, "Hold your own, know your name. Go your own way. Everything will be fine."

Oh, I know your pain! Hold your own... my mantra from childhood. You keep it locked in your chest until you feel like your insides will explode out into the open, like you'll be unable to keep still for a moment more. You think about what to do with it. You want to scream, shout, fall on the ground, you want to cry--yes, cry, heaven forbid! But instead, you close your eyes, you inhale deeply, you drop your eyes and your arms, you dig a deeper hole in your soul and bury it a little deeper this time. Exhaling, you open your eyes and tell yourself, "Everything will be fine."

But it's still in you...

I don't know if this is for you or for me. Maybe both. Tell me. Tell me if it's for you.
megan@megan-beth.com

Whining

This post is intended purely to spread the word about how irritable I am right now. I've been up since 5:21 am Hawaiian time (8:21 am PST) yesterday. I went shopping with my mother, which is similar to running a marathon backwards, blindfolded, twice; I packed, unpacked, then packed again. I stood in line for forty minutes at American Airlines check in, only to be cut in front of by an unsuspecting Christian surfer there from Chicago for a wedding. I stood in line with four hundred other people to pass through airport security. I sat next to a squirming pregnant lady and her overly-attentive husband (okay, fine, I admit... they were really cute) on a sixty degree five hour plane ride. My plane got lost in the fog, making us land late, instead of early like we usually do. I barely made it to my doctor appointment on time. I came home to discover that my dog, who hasn't chewed shoes in years, ate my favourite pair of stilettos while I was gone (just the same... I'm giving up heels, anyway). And I've been lying on my couch for five hours now, trying desperately to sleep. The sweet bonfire I was looking forward to tonight might be canceled, one of my friends is really upset with me and it's breaking my heart, one of my friends is leaving for a year soon and I'll barely get to see her before she leaves, my best friend is out of the state on her birthday, and I received some unexpected, interesting (in a not-cool way) news about an hour ago. I need to shower because I smell like gross LA air and gross American Airlines airplane. I have a pounding headache. And I'm no longer in Hawaii.

Welcome back to real life, self. This is what you asked for.

Commercial Photography

The other day, I was out shooting, having a good time, but my Storm and room keys kept getting in the way. So I planted them on a rock and kept shooting. Later, though, I looked over at them and saw some sweet photos waiting to be shot.

I kinda like this commercial photography thing! I could definitely do this for a living...

Local Sighting!

Okay, so. Here's the thing. I'm a little bit of a lot of things. I call it gypsy, because that sounds cool. With dogs, we say "mutt." Whatever you call it, it's definitely not 50% of this and 50% of that. My mamasita is English and Swedish. My dad is Hawaiian, Arabic, and lot of white stuff like (German primarily, we think). So I'm definitely not any one particular thing...

But everywhere I go, I'm told I look local. Years ago, at the age of fifteen, when I first visited southern Alberta to work with Native American youth through NAIM, they thought I was "brown." Every time I've visited Hawaii, I've been asked for directions or where the best eateries are, had my picture surreptitiously snapped, and been nodded at by other locals. Even the island mosquitoes won't bite me... something only natives can claim.

This year has been like all others... Two nights ago, while on a sunset photo excursion, a guy stumbled upon me as I sat overlooking the ocean. I was contemplating God and his glorious creation when, out of the corner of my eye, I saw him turn toward me and take a picture... Of course, this would have been much more subtle if he'd remembered to turn his flash off... Oops.

I can't lie; I revel in this. As a child, I told everyone I was Hawaiian. No, really, everyone. The clerk at the grocery store, the mailman, the pastor, my parents. I even told my younger brother that I was and he wasn't (though it may not be far from the truth... he tans to the colour of a strawberry). When filling out the bubbles on standardised tests, I always filled in the "Pacific Islander" spot, and the same on college applications.

This year, I think I've brought my native-ness to a new level. After six years of fighting it, I decided that the humidity and my hair just don't get along. So the moment I step out of the shower, I pull on an elastic hairband and let the curls fly loose. Depending on what I'm doing, sometimes I pull them back in a hair tie, but most of the time, my untamed hair dances in the tradewinds... and more than ever before, I've been treated local. I've even had Hawaiian boys have checked me out (locals don't deign to glance at tourists; it breaks some cardinal rule for them).

To add to the fun, my silly brother and sister-in-law scream, "Local sighting! Local! Look, a local!" every time they see me. Ah, this is the good life!

Glorious

(Do you need any words to go with this post? I didn't think so.)

Perspective

I'm a macro shooter. I like to get up close and personal with my subject... every person, rock and tree I've ever shot can tell you this. If you doubt me at all, take a look at my post of the aftermath of December's fires. I think the textures, the details, make the subject. You can never get to close (I regularly bump my 10.5 mm fisheye on my subjects trying to get juuust a fraction of an inch closer), you can never capture enough colour, depth and texture.

But sometimes, this is to my detriment. This morning, I hiked out early to shoot a place I'd visited a few days ago. I found interesting subject after interesting subject... through my macro shooting. Please excuse the unprocessed images below. They forgot to bring any editing software with them...











Here's the big picture problem, where my perspective needs a little tweaking. I stepped back after TWENTY MINUTES of shooting (twenty minutes... 125 photos... do you understand how much that is?) this ONE subject... only to learn something entirely new about it.


This is the shot I want. The beauty of the big picture. The whole thing. Those other photos mean nothing. This means everything. They are pretty and interesting. This is glorious. How much more beautiful would those first photos have been if I had first recognised what I was shooting, if I had taken a moment to step back and breathe in the whole thing... not just the patina on the metal, not just the interesting shape of the tip of the protruding bar, not just the way I could focus on parts of the misshapen head? What if, from the start, I had seen the beauty of the cross in my subject? What if my perspective had been a little different?

Top 10 Things You Must Know Before Visiting Kauai

I don't know if you've ever had the pleasure of coming to Hawaii, but there are some things I'd like to share with you if you haven't.

10. Under arms DO sunburn. Just today, I've spotted about 849 tourists with red, swollen armpits. In the future, Cameron and I plan on creating a deodorant with SPF to prevent such horrors. Until then, please consider keeping your arms at your sides while tanning.
9. There is such a thing as glow-in-the-dark. This afternoon, while reading poolside, I looked up only to be suddenly blinded... by the skin of a Midwestern child, who will be the first in many case studies about children who are whiter than albinos. My favourite reaction to this phenomenon was Cameron's, "He should wear an umbrella!" closely followed by Kat's continued laughter at my white jokes. Moral of the story: Parents, please... spray tan your children.
8. Everything here is expensive in a completely ungodly, unlawful, sin-against-humanity sort of way. Internet for a day: $11; Cheeze-Its (small box): $8; gallon of milk: $7. The list goes on and on, people. Even if you have a full kitchen like I do, it will likely cost you just as much to eat in for every meal as it will for you to fly here.
7. It is illegal to touch a sea turtle. And if you do, it will bite you. Neither the fine nor the hand puncture is worth it. For further reading, see Cwerwiak, Matthias.
6. It's probably cheaper to Priority Flat Rate ship your acquired items home than to pay $25 to check a second bag.
5. Don't fly Hawaiian. Please. Don't do it. Stick with Delta, United, or American. These airlines even offer non-stops to the smaller islands, and Delta planes have the convenience of personal TV/movie screens in front of your chair.
4. Leaving the sliding glass doors of your bedroom/living area/kitchen open will result in sparrows invading your food/suitcase/other items.
3. All the beaches are public. To prevent you and other tourists from invading their favourite surf spots, locals will sometimes (read: often) move "Danger" signs from one beach to another... just to scare you off.
2. Wearing Hawaiian print anything should be banned. It makes you stand out like a sore thumb as a tourist, no one looks good in it, and it almost certainly comes only in tacky colours. Please avoid.
1. Best way to lie out: bring a blow up raft to the pool. You can kep cool while tanning, and if you're tricky, it's even possible to balance a book and a mai tai.

Morning One

My toes are squished in the sand. There are probably stars out tonight, but through the cloud cover, I can't see them. The only things awake are the ocean--waves pounding onto shore ten yards in front of me--the lunula of the moon, and me. There is no lightness in the sky in one direction, telling me that the sun is ready to wake up. It's just me, Poseidon and Selene.

I would send you a picture, friends, but there is nothing to capture. I found my way down here by the glow of my cell phone, and will have to wait until the sun peeks over the peaks behind me to walk back.

It is a glorious morning. Humidity is low, probably in the sixties. The breeze can hardly be called cold, whipping through my bed head hair in the mid seventies. Did I mention that there is a chorus of palm trees singing with the waves? They whisper quietly, heard only in the rare moments that the tide falls out, away from my toes.

When Sun comes up, he will be on my left, though the morning clouds will almost certainly block his rays. Not that it matters. The sky will blaze into a fire of colour--pink, yellow, orange and blue--and the tiny world here will fall awake.

I don't mind that I'm a little premature. This time n the sand is good for my soul and every moment is breathtaking.
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Relationship by Technology

A week ago, I walked over to my desk after being in a long morning meeting to find a stuffed animal elephant waiting for me. He looked friendly enough, and he was wearing a name tag from Presbyterian Hospice. Now, I wasn't sure how or why this elephant--Herman--had come to be waylaid at my desk, and I wasn't really sure what to do with him, but I let him stay...

For about thirty minutes, until someone came over and dumped six binders of reports from 2006 on my desk, and then my desk was full, with no room for Herman. At this point, I had to make a decision: do I stash this cuddly creature under my desk until his owner comes by, or do I find out who left him here, and why?

Because I'm a naturally curious human being, I opted to send an email out to the whole company via work BlackBerry:

From: Megan
To: Hospice Care
Sent: Tue Jul 07 11:21:39 2009
Subject: Elephant

Who left the elephant on my desk?

---

From: Anita
To: Megan
Sent: Tue Jul 07 11:28:27 2009
Subject: Re: Elephant

Bereavement. Can you make him a Hospice Care badge?

---

Okay, so, mission accomplished. I took Herman's photo, popped his picture into the database, created a name badge, and delivered him back to the bereavement department for... whatever use he might have.

Today, I walked upstairs to grab a new load of laundry. On my bed, there was a plastic raft. I know what the raft is for--pool hang out in Hawaii. I know that it was left for me by either my mother or my sister-in-law. But I reach for my Storm to find out who the culprit is...

And that's when it hits me. I have traded in personal, face-to-face relationships with people for virtual, technological relationships. My sister-in-law was across the hall. My mother was downstairs. It would only take a few steps to figure out which one of them left it for me... but my first (and errant, because my mother can barely pick up a text message, and hasn't read her emails in years) reaction was to grab my phone and use that as the go-between.

It's not that I'm suddenly against texting, emailing, Google chatting, BlackBerry Messangering, etc, etc. I LOVE all those things. I mean, do you know anyone else who will be chatting with someone by google chat AND by text... just because? I'm just awed by my instinct to avoid human contact. I want to have personaly relationships supplemented by technology... not defined by and lived through it.

Top10 Reasons (Today) That I Love Kat

10. When we go shoe shopping, she gives me her shoe boxes.
9. She's not afraid to do the hard thing, even when it means she loses someone or something because of it.
8. She dedicates herself to something, and goes after it 100%. And then she perseveres.
7. Even though she comes off as composed and steady, which she is, she is overflowing with compassion for the people she loves.
6. She's worth not fighting with, and she makes it easy to do that.
5. Her awkward laugh and constant pursuit of awkward situations just makes me really happy.
4. She's super honest, which is a rare thing to find.
3. She lets me call her sister, and even calls me that in return. She's just as much family as the brother I grew up with.
2. Whatever distance there is between us--a few hundred miles or a few thousand--our relationship continues to grow and blossom. It never suffers.
1. She's Kat. She's irreplaceable. She puts up with me, for who knows what reason.
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Beautiful Moments

Timing is everything. In the grand scheme of things, in the small, day-to-day tasks, in things work-related, in things personal. It's all about timing.

Today was a really trippy day for me. The morning started off well with a coworker asking me to do head shots, faded into another great marketing meeting (and though I'm often sarcastic and dogmatic about meetings, I do really love my marketing meetings), and then nosedived into troubles I cannot recount publicly. I have two new knots in my back, both with names of people from my office.

At 1:30, I gave up, threw in the towel, decided to head home. It seemed like the wisest decision overall. I'd already driven two hundred miles for the day, and heading from Santa Ana to Downey in an hour of traffic to do just one more hour of work... No thanks. So I headed home, discouraged, deflated, angry and frustrated... tired. On facebook, I proclaimed it to be the "worst day ever."

And ten minutes later, an old friend texted me, commenting on that--a friend who once shared a piece of wisdom with me, a piece of wisdom that I'd passed along earlier in the afternoon. Through a series of perfect timing (and "coincidence"), I was able to meet up with my friend in time to take in some rays of sunshine poolside, sip a perfect summer day drink, and catch up on years of things unsaid.

It was beautiful. Moments that perfect are rare, few and far between. I would take ten horrible mornings for one afternoon like today's. I drove away with the sunroof open, a smile on my face, and my heart feeling light... realising that, were it not for a bad morning, I would never have left work early, never have had a great afternoon. Timing is everything.

Community

"Who cares about Africa? Give us poetry," my Starbucks barista Adam said this morning, making fun of my complaint that there are no longer witticisms on their coffee cups.

And, yeah, Africa is important, but I do miss the poetry. Of course, I don't visit Starbucks every morning for clever cups, or even for my venti chai tea latte with three pumps of mocha and no water.

I visit because Adam and Alex make my day happy. Every morning, I get a friendly start to my day. They smile at me, talk about random events in their lives (Alex slept through his alarm today and Adam had to cover for him until he got in; Adam wants a dwarf to pop out from underneath his fiancée's wedding dress on the big day), and give me this temporary feeling of belonging in a world where I feel I never have a place. They give me community.
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Preparing for Hawaii

I know, I know. No pictures? Again? When am I going to post those wedding photos I did? Why even bother posting without some photos... any photos.

Here's the thing. My editing software is down right now. Also, my hard drive is down right now. So. That leaves me with very little to post. And while both problems are on fix-it-now radar, the fact that I will be IN Hawaii in nine days makes it less of a priority. Right now, I'm trying to focus on:
1. Getting my laundry done. I haven't done laundry in almost two and a half months; it's time.
2. Packing. Generally speaking, I don't pack ahead of time, but this year I have to be more strategic because I'd like to bring only one suitcase (so as to avoid the extra fee of bringing a second--pay $750 for an airline ticket, and then on top of that, they charge you for BOTH bags? Really? I mean, really?).
3. Not checking out of work, entering vacation mode early. This is important, and so far, I'm not doing well.
4. Hanging out with all the people I'm not going to see for a while. This means that I actually have no more free time until... well, technically speaking, I'm booked through the first two weekends in August.
5. Making lists.

I love lists. Here is a list of the lists that I am making for Hawaii:
1. Things to do before Hawaii that have nothing to do with actually being there
2. Things to do in order to have clothing in Hawaii
3. Toiletries to bring to Hawaii
4. Types of clothing to bring to Hawaii
5. Pieces of clothing to bring to Hawaii
6. Books to bring to Hawaii
7. People I am seeing before Hawaii
8. Camera equipment not to take to Hawaii
9. Assorted other things not to bring to Hawaii
10. Assorted other things TO bring to Hawaii
11. Things not to do in Hawaii
12. People who will be on Kauai at the same time as me
13. People I want to see on Kauai
14. Must-do's on the island this year
15. Things it's okay to spend money on at Shopping Horn
16. People to bring back souvenirs for
17. Ways to get to the airport day-out
18. Ways to get to get home day-in
19. Shoot Sheet for Bear and Tracy's Day After shoot in Hawaii
20. Restaurants to eat at in Hawaii
21. Ways to trick Russell Miranda into marrying me (I'll have to post some pictures of my cowboy crush Russell from last year's Poipu Rodeo. If anyone can think of things to add to this list, I'd be most appreciative...)

Clearly, my neuroticism is outstanding and worthy of note.

To satisfy your want of pictures (I mean, I guess this is, technically, a photoblog), I'll post some of my favourites. A little grace; these are just from my Nikon S1 point & shoot.

Wedding Love

I was meant to do weddings. Do equals gaze at, attend, photograph, plan, everything. Since late 2003 I have been an avid reader and collector of bridal magazines. I guess it's no wonder that half of my internet surfing is devoted to wedding photography.

I love to sit and talk wedding. Who's doing your flowers? That cake looks fabulous! What a supremely perfect dress... Can I do your pictures?

The thing of it is, I'd rather "do" weddings than most anything else. I'm setting a goal right now, and making it public: by this time next year, I want to be a full-time photographer, specialising in weddings.

See below, part of my collection of wedding magazines. The file case beside it keeps wedding ideas, clippings, photos, thoughts, and other such things. I would venture to call myself a wedding guru. I live and breathe church bells and chapel trains.

Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry Storm

Brotherly Love

So, per usual, I have been a slacker on the blog front. The good news is that it comes from editing lots and lots of photos (as well as doing lots and lots of shoots). The bad news is that... well, there haven't been any blog posts of late.

Yesterday, my brother and sister-in-law moved in. To honour the fact that we are living under the same roof once again and now must become rivals, here's a video to entertain you while I finish up some editing.



In other news, my sister-in-law Tracy and I had a fabulous shopping day on Friday. (Paid holidays turning into shopping days... I mean, really, I was literally getting PAID to buy the two pairs of Joe's Jeans I bought from the Rack. Can life get better? I submit that it cannot!) We were joined by a good friend, spent lots of money, and planned out a shoot for our two weeks in Hawai'i coming up!

More later! Happy Sunday everyone!