From my work as a contributing photographer to Cary Citizen: https://carycitizenarchive.com/
I made this photograph a dozen years ago. The performance was part of a music festival headlined by the Brussels Chamber Orchestra. My enthusiasm and Cary Citizen Press Pass allowed me to spend a lot of time in Cary Arts Center with them. A collaboration with NC Opera brought this Countertenor to a performance.
I’m a rough old cob but I had no idea a human voice could – you had to be there.
Goin’ to Carolina, it won’t be long and I’ll be there
Disclaimer: The previous post is a predicate to making any sense of this one.
It was December in 1998. Driving on I-77, from northern Ohio to my new job with IBM in Research Triangle Park. I was excited and hopeful.
Ohio was my cradle, where I achieved escape velocity with a Navy Enlistment. And returned to, seeking refuge from a typically poor, youthful marital decision. And left, following the death of both my and my wife’s parents.
North Carolina was my choice. Oxygen for the spirit. As Mary Oates Spratt Van Landingham described it on 6 Mar. 1900: “A Vale of Humility between Two Mountains of Conceit”, referring to North Carolina’s location between South Carolina and Virginia. I was far too familiar with South Carolina.
Twenty five plus years later, I’m at peace. Like at the Coda of a Ballet. As a Widower, the Pas de Deux is necessarily spiritual but still, genuine. I wish that was so for all.
Photographed for Cary Citizen
Another excuse to get outdoors on a sunny, early spring day. Like today!
It was a Town of Cary sponsored “Kite Festival” at Bond Park. And I was surprised to get a request from “Our State” Magazine to run this -which they did – in the March 2014 issue. My first published photograph! Yeah, yeah, they had pages to fill.
Which doesn’t diminish my delight in being outdoors now, watching the top of a Long Leaf Pine, sway in a gentle breeze in a Carolina Blue sky.
The Allman Brothers explain in this freebie at the Internet Archive: “Blue Sky”
Kids Together Playground Cary NC, 16 October 2010
I was floundering in the Spring of 2010 after an earlier than planned exit from a corporate career (as Yogi so eloquently expressed, we “agreed different”). I was trying to figure out my place in the Sun. Got a Wake County “Certified Pool Operator” Certificate and earned a modest paycheck, running our HoA Pool that summer. But it was sort of a “Lady of Our Perpetual Responsibility” guilt avoidance – “Yes, I have a job.” Another I/T job would’ve had me in counseling.
Money wasn’t the immediate issue, we’d put away enough acorns in mast years to get along. The real issue was, I was 60, burned out on corporate I/T (IBM/Lenovo) and had no clue about where I’d lived for a dozen years. Life had been commuting on I-40 to RTP and conference calls. A highly paid bubble.
I’d been learning the craft of photography since a Parisian pickpocket boosted an obsolete Point&Shoot in 2007. That was my “justification” to buy a robust DSLR and a good, non-kit lens. The Art part or “Why” was latent (wife #1 did not want to be married to a Painter & Teacher). I was learning the Craft of Photography or the “How” part. Read the manual until I understood the tool. But I had zero clue how to make any kind of business from that.
Looking for kindred spirits, I joined Cary Photographic Artists. Which led me to a new, hyper-local, online publication where they advertised their Open Competition – “Cary Citizen”. Which led me to a coffee at La Farm with the Editor, Hal Goodtree, where I pitched me being a “Contributing Photographer”.
So armed with a legitimate Press/Media Pass, I asked to cover small events, with heart. It was a raison d’être to explore my community. And I’d have to figure out how to tell stories with photographs – no excuses.
The above photo is from my very first assignment at Kids Together Park “Fall Foliage Walk”, not five minutes from my house and which I didn’t know existed. I began to learn about where I lived. That was Saturday morning.
That afternoon was my second assignment, “Children’s Celebration of The Arts” at Cary Ballet Conservatory. Which I also didn’t know existed.
And there, I found what I was looking for. My photograph, below, had nothing to do with the event. And everything to do with the next dozen years.
Until I wore out. But it’s a really good worn out.
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