Flaming

My first camera was a Minolta XG-1 that I bought with the money I earned from my first summer as a lifeguard. Although by today's standards, it's a laughably simplistic design, it was a wonder to me the first time I pried it from its box and cradled it carefully in my hands.

Between its myriad dials and displays and its balanced heft, it was light years removed from the instamatic 110s that I had inherited from my parents. I learned to hate the limitations of those little boxes even as I became ever more fascinated with the possibilities of film.

Yes, film. This rapidly-disappearing medium of photography was my stock in trade for a whole lot of years before digital came along. In some respects, it remains a part of my photographic history, for it forced me to plan every picture, remember how I obtained the shot, then wait patiently for the folks in the photo lab to do their thing.

The first few years that I had my camera, I was often disappointed when I first opened the envelope. The pictures never quite seemed to snap or pop out at the eye as I had originally envisioned. Sure, I had dialed in the right settings and done all the technical things a photographer should do, but something was missing.

While the composition was pretty much what I remembered from the viewfinder, the prints didn't make me feel that emotional twang that I felt in the nanosecond before I clicked the shutter. I had failed to capture the tone or atmosphere of that moment.

Tone. It's the difference between a by-the-rules piece of work and one that stands out just enough to stick in someone's mind. It's the piece of work that helps create a response that is felt as much as it is thought. It's what allows the creator of said work to establish a unique style in the eyes and minds of everyone who reads and views the resulting work.

I started to ignore many of the proper lessons I had read in the years since I began to shoot. I tossed out a lot of the common sense advice like never shoot into the sun, always use a flash indoors, sharply-focused pictures are always better than soft-focused ones, etc. I deliberately ignored my metered settings and trusted my gut instead. And if I blew it, then I could always toss another roll of film into the camera and try again.

I figured I'd never get that snap, that feeling, if I didn't try - and fail.

I took this picture in Montreal earlier this month. My wife had just lit the Passover candles with our kids. They had gathered around her in silence while she lit the candles and said the blessing. Then they each leaned in for a hug and a kiss when she was done.

It was a soft, glowy moment that I knew wouldn't last forever. They're growing every day, and there's no telling how many more warm holiday moments we'll have before they begin to head off in their own direction and make their own memories.

I turned off the flash, deliberately soft-focused the image and crossed my fingers. The result takes me back to that one moment in time far more effectively than a technically-perfect yet emotionally-empty image would have.

Your turn: Please tell us about one picture that takes you back to one particular moment. If it's posted online, please paste a link here, too.

Reflective pattern

We took well over a thousand pictures during our winter vacation to Florida. I've been slowly dropping them onto the blog ever since. But at the rate I've been shooting and writing, it would take until the next century before covering them all on Written Inc.

So in the interest of remaining on speaking terms with extended members of the family, I posted the entire lot of them to my Flickr site. The specific set from this trip can be found here.

The picture above resulted from my not-very-evolved strategy to wade into the surf, point the camera down and keep shooting until something decent-looking came up. Of course, the sun was so bright that I had no idea what I had captured until long after we got home (call it the curse of having blue eyes: I'm virtually blind in bright sunlight unless I'm wearing shades. And even then...)

I ended up with a few neat ones. I've previously posted and written about Shadowed layers and Lightning strikes. This is yet another view of something that ceased to exist a fraction of a second after I took it. I'm already looking forward to our next visit. I'll point my lens down again, and I'm sure I'll come home with entirely different views of a scene that most folks would just as soon not know ever existed.

Your turn: Do you do Flickr? If so, let me know. Add me to your contact list and let's get more photos seen by more people.

Incongruous menu

I spotted this when I was in Dallas recently. I assumed that whoever owns this particular establishment had difficulty deciding where to specialize.

The result, I think we can all conclude, leaves us with one question: why?

I felt nauseous all the way back to the hotel. No, I didn't partake of any of the cuisine - if you dare call it that - at this restaurant.

Your turn: What weird food combinations have you ever come across?

Stacked

I had to keep the kids away from the dining room table so they wouldn't eat the subject before I had a chance to take a picture of it. I know that wafers are crumb-producing, bland-looking, bland-tasting excuses to drink more tea, but I liked how they were sort of jumbled on the plate and thought the scene would make for an interesting shot.

Your turn: Should I try something similar with chocolate chip cookies? What other snack foods deserve their time in the photographic sun?

Publish Day - Ink Blog - war comes home

It's an on week for me at the newspaper, so I'm publishing column entries through Saturday. This piece is in direct response to the bombing in Afghanistan this weekend that killed four Canadian soldiers.

One of the victims was from the town of Wingham, which is a relatively short drive from where I live. As a result, a story with major national impact has had significant local impact as well. I could almost anticipate the knee-jerk responses to get our soldiers out of Afghanistan, so I thought I'd write something that at least tries to inject a bit more balance into the discussion.

Deaths offer no easy answer - or exit
Published Tuesday, April 25, 2006
The London Free Press

The deaths of Cpl. Matthew Dinning and three other Canadian soldiers in an Afghanistan roadside bomb attack makes it easy for Canadians to say now is the time to bring our soldiers home. If only it were so easy.

The 16 Canadians who have died in this mission to Afghanistan won't be the last. Expect more small towns to grieve their lost sons and daughters in a war whose boundaries remain unclear to those of us who don't serve.

Our soldiers are in Afghanistan to help rebuild the country and establish a foothold for democracy. That's easier said than done in a region wracked by generations of war, tribal conflict and poverty. Afghani drug-growers, warlords and terrorists thrive on this chaos, and won't easily be cowed.

Dinning died for a mission that he believed in. Turning tail and running would betray the dreams of those who have died. Yet sustaining open-ended losses won't realize that dream any sooner.

Canadians must begin discussing how to quantify our successes in the region, and how much we're willing to lose before we've decided enough is enough.

-30-

Your turn: Do we bring them home or do we keep them there? At what point does the global community of nations' obligation to help those in crisis cease? How do we define justified and unjustified sacrifice?

Rental car hell

Just got back from my quick trip to Canada's largest metropolis. The trip is 200 km each way, which gave me ample time to ponder the lessons of renting a car in the new millenium:

• The car they give you is never as nice as the car you actually want.
• Your vehicle will lack certain key features.
• You will wind your own windows (Wayne's World anyone?) adjust the passenger-side mirror with your fingers, and almost lock the keys in the car thanks to the state-of-the-art manual door locks.
• The stereo will eat your carefully-burned CDs.
• You will be reminded why you hate radio so much.
• You will learn to appreciate the sounds of silence. Well, relative silence, anyway. It is, after all, a Chrysler Neon (SX 2.0, rattletrap, whatever.)
  
• The gas pedal will feel as if it's attached to an industrial-sized spring that exerts twice as much back-pressure on your foot as it should.
• Your car will have no cruise control.
• Your leg will, as a result, start to throb about 20 minutes into the drive.
• The brakes will squeal. Loudly.
• You will wonder when they will fail.
• You will keep your hand on the emergency brake lever, just in case.
  
• The wheels will need an alignment. Badly.
• Consequently, you will exceed 120 km/h at your own peril.
• You will also enjoy inadvertent slamoming within, and sometimes outside, your lane.
  
• You will eventually pull off the highway and take the regional highway the rest of the way home: the lower cruise speed dramatically improves your chances of getting home in one piece.
  
• The ventilation system will have two settings: sub-arctic springtime cold, and Soviet-era gulag cold.
• You will wonder why you left your mittens at home.
  
• The fan will begin to howl like a banshee just after your leg goes numb from that crazily-sprung gas pedal.
• Your fellow traffic-jammed motorists will stare in your direction, wondering where the banshee noise is coming from.
• Yes, that is pity on their faces.
• Funny smells will come from the vents, prompting the classic mind game where you try to figure out it it's coming from the outside, or from the inside.
• That last stench was definitely an inside job.
  
• The vehicle will consume fuel like a drunken sailor. The fuel guage will do its dive whether you're feathering it or kicking the bejeebers out of it.
• So you take the bejeebers route. It's more fun that way.
  
• The engine will almost stall at the most inopportune of times: in the middle of packed intersections, when slowing down to get off the highway, when the big semi grows ominously in the rearview mirror.
• When idling - which you will do often because this is Toronto and it invented the all-day traffic jam - the engine will tick like an Iraqi roadside bomb.
• You keep the door unlocked (manual, remember?) just in case you need to bail out quickly.
  

The good news is I somehow made it safe and sound and will be returning this lame excuse for a motorcar tomorrow morning. The trip was otherwise a huge success. Global VP of a really big company. Briefing. Informative discussion that should lead to more dialog. Yadda, yadda...all cool stuff in the life of an analyst.

I just wish I had a car that didn't make me fear for my life en route.

Your turn: I'll let you guess how the conversation at the car rental place will proceed. Anyone want to venture some choice dialog?

Protection

I don't have anything witty or pithy to say insofar as this image is concerned. I simply wanted to pull something happy from the archives after a decidedly ridiculous day during which I accomplished precious little.

Correction: I actually did accomplish something today. I drove two hours away from home where I'm staying in a smoking room - didn't you know I'm starting a new habit? - of a hotel in downtown Toronto. It was either that or reload the rental car and look for another place to stay. Not gonna happen.

This image reminds me that there are nicer places, nicer times and nicer experiences than the one I'm having now. It takes me back to the day on our vacation when I took it, when nothing else mattered beyond making sure we had enough sunblock on the kids. That alone is worth a smile.

Your turn: What is it about Mondays that makes 'em such depressing days? I usually don't subscribe to the whole "I don't like Mondays" maxim. But today's been a pain and a half. May it end soon.

Unreal color

The color parade continues...

As soon as my mother dropped this cake onto the dining room table, I knew I needed to remember it somehow. The colors don't, to the best of my knowledge, occur spontaneously in the natural world. At first, I refused to even consider eating a slice of this thing for fear it would mess up my insides.

I eventually had to bite the bullet when the kids' unfinished plates made their inevitable trip to Daddy's spot. Yes, I eat my children's leftovers with frightening frequency. No, I have not gained any weight in the process. No, I have no idea why that is so. Lucky, I guess.

But back to this cake. I haven't photoshopped the colors. I haven't punched the light levels. This is as it appeared when it first emerged from its cake cozy. Nuts, isn't it?

Your turn: Would you eat this? Can a weirded-out culinary color scheme make you shy away from certain foods?

Aquatic color

Yet another color-related photographic perspective. Third in a series. Click here and here for previous entries. Let me know if you're getting sick of them.

When you walk into a restaurant and it has one of those giant aquariums in the waiting area, do not be intimidated by the dinnertime crowds. Do not be afraid of the hostesses who give you dirty looks for spending just a little too much time staring at the fish.

I grabbed this image while waiting for a table on a recent work-related trip to Boston. The place was jammed with people, and it took them a while to seat us. So to make the time go faster, I took out my camera and explored the aquarium. This one gets to me because of its subtle colors and textures.

I didn't think any of them would come out. Aquariums are notoriously difficult to shoot well. Frankly, my hit rate was way down because I spent so much time hoping the fish would stand still. But the still-life stuff came out pretty neat.

Your turn: Anyone who's been reading me long enough is likely familiar with my belief that beauty exists in the most unexpected places. Where else can it be found when you're out at night? I'm looking for inspiration, and I know you'll be able to share some in a comment.

Right?

Tea. Earl Grey. Hot.

Continuing my musings of color from my previous entry...

Anyone who knows me knows that I've become a bit of a tea drinker in recent years. Now that my career is firmly built around writing, I take comfort in a great many little rituals to help inspire the little voices in my head that do the heavy lifting.

Tea is one of these rituals. It gives me a few minutes to carefully prepare the mug and make sure it's just so. It allows me to get away from the keyboard, to think about how I'm going to structure that next block of prose, to toss some phrasings around my head and decide which ones work, which ones should be tossed and which ones can be tweaked before I get back to my computer.

It also allows me to wrap my hands around something warm. When I type, my fingers tend to get very cold. I have no idea why this is so: perhaps I type too quickly, or perhaps this is nature's way of saying I need to gain a few pounds. Either way, a warm mug of tea is just the ticket to keep my mind and my fingers limber.

This image came about by accident. My Mom had made me a mug, and I was letting it sit - as I always do - so that it would gradually cool from just-too-hot to delightfully warm. As I chatted with everyone else around the table, the sun did its thing in the sky and placed a little sunbeam through my mug. The low-key color and shading caught my eye, so I quietly eased my way out of the conversation and waited for the right moment to shoot.

The result isn't bright yellow. It doesn't jump out at the eye and scream for attenion. Instead, it just sits there, interesting in its own right, waiting to be discovered by the eye, to be enjoyed quietly while the rest of the world churns on. Which pretty much confirms the whole tea ritual thing in the first place.

Your turn: Please tell us about one of your rituals of life. Why does ritual matter to you?

The cure of color

While nursing this nasty cold from home today, I've been thinking about how a quick jolt of bright color always manages to lift one's mood.

I captured this while on a walk last week outside my parents' apartment. It's a lovely neighborhood, tucked on an island among other islands. It's got water, trees, ducks, and a never-ending collection of pretty views.

Of course, leave it to humans to muck it up. A nearby set of buildings surrounds a courtyard that must be one of the worst examples of 70s-era landscape architecture. It's little more than a concrete canyon that is as welcoming to people as a bureaucrat is to change.

I kept the camera tucked away until I came across this chain barrier beside the road. It had been freshly painted, and as a result it stood out from the sterile, monochromatic environment. I thought it was worth remembering.

Passers-by stared at me as I snapped away. I was able to fling one-liners at them in French, which is always a joy. Now they think us crazy Ontarians are about to invade with our lenses.

Maybe we are.

Your turn: Do you have a bright swath of color - or a colorful experience - to share here or on your own blog?

The circle begins anew

Arriving home after being away for any length of time is always an exciting time. One set of eyes in our van - the driver's - stays glued to the road as we navigate the last few kms off of the highway and up the main boulevard to our neighborhood. The other eight eyes scan outside and look for any changes since our departure. Little voices pipe up from the peanut gallery:

"Hey, the Burger King closed down."
"Why is the gas station being dug up?"
"Ooh, there are tulips growing in our garden? Where'd they come from?"

When we left London last week, the landscape was gray and barren. The snow had already melted, but nothing green or colorful had yet sprouted.

The world at home changed in our absence. The trees along the main road toward our house were decidedly green-tinged as we picked our way through traffic. My wife pointed out each tree that had seemingly exploded with life. The kids chimed in with their own observations of new flora.

Not wanting to plow into someone's rear bumper, I resisted joining them. So I mused about it instead. It's not as if life's starting from scratch, I thought. It's simply been dormant for a few months, lying invisibly below the surface. Spring's seeming rebirth is more a continuation of the circle of life than the beginning of something brand new.

I quicklly banished the logically technical train of thought as I enjoyed the singsong chitchat. My kids were excited about the changing world around them. Nothing else mattered.

Your turn: What does spring look like where you are? What does it mean to you?

Let them eat cake

Family is a wonderful thing. My wife and kids make my world go around. No one else on the planet understands my peculiarities as well as they do. No one else quite gets what makes me predisposed to shooting the craziest vignettes of modern suburban life. No one else quite appreciates the weirdness that is me, and lets me get away with it day after day.

So we've been spending time visiting extended family in Montreal this past week, and one of my not-quite-immediate family members really ticked me off (yes, dear readers, I do get ticked off on occasion. Please don't be shocked) when he uttered this unforgettable phrase as I bent down to take another picture of another piece of cake:

"Don't you ever think you have enough stupid pictures of cake?"

Maybe it was the choice of words. Maybe it was the condescending tone of voice. Maybe it was both. Whatever, it bugged me.

I shrugged it off at the time, but the phrase stuck in my craw for a while. So I'm writing about it now - as I share another stupid picture of stupid cake.

Hindsight is always 20/20. We always come up with the brilliant retort hours or days after the events that incited them. Here's what I wanted to say: I guess I'll stop writing about things that interest me once I think I've got enough in the archives. I guess I'll put away my camera for good once I think I've taken enough pictures of the kids. I guess I'll stop recording the world around me because small-minded doofs would rather criticize my own pursuits than engage in their own.

Yeah, I'm ranting. Sorry.

Thinking rationally now, I will, in fact, never stop recording these seemingly "stupid" things. Film is cheap. Digital memory is infinitely cheaper. Come to think of it, so is a stack of pens, a lifetime's supply of ink, a cupboard full of paper pads, a laptop and an ever-bulging hard drive.

Memories, on the other hand, are precious and fleeting. What I choose to capture is pretty much up to me. Thank goodness I ignored this person's similar advice when I was younger. To think of all the fun I would have missed had I actually believed that creativity must come with a box around it.

Your turn: Do you let the opinions of others shape what you choose to capture and how you choose to capture it? Oh, and while you're at it, does this picture make you hungry?

One more thing: Expect more pictures of cake in future. And dogs. And little people. And flooded rivers. And...

A little man's question

Five-year-old boys have incredibly fertile and inquisitive minds - so much so that I often have difficulty keeping up.

Our little guy was playing with some stuffed animals today when he suddenly stopped, looked up at me and asked how dogs and cats hug each other.

Your turn: How does a parent answer that one? What other doozies have your kids flung at you? How did you respond?

Guardians

I left the car in the driveway this morning for the walk to my parents' house. I had a bunch of things to finish off, and the wireless cloud and blessed child-free silence at their condo was too much to resist. The weather was just this side of cool, and I thought the clear air would do wonders for my mood.

Along the way, I crossed a couple of bridges and had to stop to admire the view. As a child, I would often ride my bike through this part of town, pedalling too quickly to appreciate the vista. As an adult, I'm usually driving our kids through here as we shuttle between parents and in-laws. I never seem to stop and stare. This morning, I did.

The river is running a bit high these days thanks to the spring runoff. It's nowhere near the flood levels that other parts of the province are experiencing, but it makes for interesting perspectives: like trees completely surrounded by water. Come back in a few days and it'll likely look completely different. Think of it as mother nature's ever-changing mind.

My wife's first thought when she saw this picture was that the trees are guarding the water. Wise woman, she.

Your turn: On your next walk, what scene will stop you in your tracks? Why?

Spilled water

We all ridicule our mothers for putting plastic over everything in sight. Who among us doesn't have a memory of a living room virtually encased in the stuff? It kept the furniture looking brand-new for pretty much forever, but only because our little-kid grubby hands never actually touched the fabric. And I won't even begin to talk about what it did to the back of our shorts-clad legs on a summer's day. All together now: ew.

The other night, I noticed some water on the table - plastic-over-embroidered-tablecloth, of course - and decided to have some middle-of-the-meal macro fun before wiping it up. Needless to say, my extended family now has yet another reason to look at me funny. Oh well.

Your turn: Was your parental or grandparental living room wrapped in plastic? Do tell.

Publish Day - Reflecting on Passover

Sometimes, this writing thing allows me to do some very neat things with a pen.

For the second time in a few months, I was asked by my editor to submit a column covering my thoughts and perspectives on a major Jewish holiday. The first piece, The puzzle of passing down faith, was published on December 24th (read it here). My column on Passover was published in today's London Free Press.

The column is entitled Passover marks journeys old and new, and it can be found here. I've also pasted it below:

Passover marks journeys old and new
Published Saturday, April 15, 2006
The London Free Press
Byline: Carmi Levy

MONTREAL, Que. - Passover, like so many Jewish holidays, is ultimately about a journey. It is a story that, although its roots are thousands of years old, continues to resonate in the lessons we teach our children today.

In its most outward guise, Passover, which started Wednesday at sundown and runs through next Thursday, commemorates the exodus of Jews from generations of slavery in Egypt.

It is perhaps best known as the holiday during which we're not allowed to eat bread. Instead, we eat matza.

During the Jews' hurried escape into the desert, they did not have time to wait for their bread to rise.

To keep one step ahead of pursuing Egyptian soldiers, they ate it flat and crisp. We remember their flight by eating matza today.

The Jews wandered in the desert for 40 years before finally making it to the land of Israel.

Passover commemorates the journey on a number of levels: the physical journey, the spiritual journey from an oppressed to a free nation, and the personal journey we take as we lead our own lives within our community.

Passover's rituals and rules are rich with stories like these. Our modern-day, tech-savvy kids are fascinated by what life must have been like for their ancestors, and how the learnings from that time are remembered in their actions today. It allows us to reinforce that these seemingly dry traditions of their heritage really do mean something to them.

Our children have been looking forward to Passover for weeks. After learning about it in school, they've come home virtually every day asking my wife what she's going to make them when Passover arrives. Visions of Mom's "Famous Sponge Cake" have been dancing in their heads.

The switchover to matza means no bread in the house for the entire holiday. It means our kids get to eat foods that wouldn't otherwise make it onto the menu the rest of the year. Our normally-picky children seem to step out of character as they eat things they normally wouldn't touch.

We had plenty of time to discuss the meaning and lessons of Passover while driving to Montreal earlier this week. The strength of family sits at the very core of Jewish life, and my wife and I have tried to use holidays to bridge the physical distance between our kids and their grandparents.

The kids bubbled with excitement all the way here, wondering what their bubby (grandmother) had cooked for them. They needn't have worried: Pretty much every food in my mother-in-law's kitchen made it to the table that first night.

Much of the holiday's focus revolves around the Seder, the ritual meal held the first two nights of Passover. Seder is the Hebrew word for order. By following the story of Passover through the Haggadah, we retrace a ritual that hasn't changed in thousands of years. Everyone takes turns reading passages from the book as we gradually work our way through the story of the holiday. Our kids' eyes light up when they realize Mom and Dad and their grandparents have been performing the Passover Seder since they were children, too.

This year, our eldest son, Zach, 11, participated in the reading for the first time. Although he is normally quite reserved, he came alive as he shared in the experience with his family. Dahlia, 8, also jumped in, carefully reading the sometimes-arcane ancient language.

My wife and I watched them with pride, knowing that this marked another step on their own journey to adulthood, to staking out their place in a chaotic, difficult-to-navigate world.

The Passover Haggadah offers them the structure and guidance to make it through the Seder in a phased, methodical manner. Not every holiday comes with a ready-made manual, and certainly few things in life are so well documented.

But for this phase of our children's journey, they had all the guidance and help they needed.

-30-

Your turn: No matter what holidays you celebrate, how do you get your kids excited about them? How do you ensure traditions are successfully passed down to the next generation?

Shades of blue

I'm shameless whenever I stay in hotels. I take pictures of the shampoos and other doodads that they leave for guests. Some establishments are downright artistic in their packaging - I guess there's only so much you can do to differentiate a room, a bed and a dresser, so you turn to the toiletries to make your mark.

Score one for the Hampton Inn: they know their consumables. That, and they offer free wireless in their rooms (bless them.) A pox on any hotel that continues to charge for it. Or, horrors, charges for basic wired access. Or, horrors-cubed, doesn't offer Internet access at all.

Your turn: The neatest hotel I ever stayed at was...? And that would be because...?

Look up, way up

For as long as I can remember, I've had this habit: I stand on the sidewalk, tilt my head way back, and stare up the sides of tall buildings. The differential sense of scale seems at once awe-inspiring and humbling - an interesting combination.

So when I was in Dallas a couple of weeks ago, I found myself doing a lot of looking up while walking to and from the various conference events. Note to self: this behavior is potentially injurious to life and limb; ensure you are NOT moving before looking skyward. Stay away from traffic, too.

I like this image because it suggests otherwise-anonymous examples of post-modern boxes can actually be interesting to look at if you take the right perspective. There's just something captivating about the geometry of these two forms.

Your turn: What do you see when you look up?
Your turn: Can you place the childhood television show roots of the title of this entry?

Shuttle era + 25

Do you remember where you were when NASA's first space shuttle orbiter, Columbia, launched? I was a kid, and I remember vividly what it felt like to sit on my parents' living room floor and watch the otherworldly sight of an all-white, asymmetrically-powered rocketship rise into the heavens. I remember the late, great ABC news anchor, Frank Reynolds, repeatedly whispering, "Go, baby, go" under his breath as Columbia cleared the tower and pitched into the roll program that oriented it for its climb to orbit.

That day, April 12, 1981, was 25 years ago today. And the rose-colored promise of the space shuttle era on that morning a generation ago has since been somewhat grounded by failed ambitions, two disastrous failures and a general sense that none of this matters to the public as much as it once did.

The remaining fleet of three orbiters is now grounded while engineers try - again - to solve the flyaway foam problem that doomed Columbia. The shuttle has a dozen and a half flights or so left before the winged birds are retired for good.

Yet whenever I think of the shuttle, I take myself back to that magical Sunday morning in my parents' house. The chills ran to the base of my spine, and the future seemed wide open with promise. I often catch myself wishing every day would hold similar promise.

Your turn: Why does all of this inspire us so?