Whale Warning.....

It was 2005 on the far outer coastline of Resurrection Bay...the Kenai Peninsula extending out from southern Alaska. We had left Seward 100 miles behind us early that morning.

Late August is the very end of the Whale season in Alaska...the weather turns cold and the water rough in early September. That is when the whales leave for Hawaii until late Spring. As we rounded the point of the barren rock jutting out of the water we were greeted with thousands of seafaring birds...the sky almost white with flight. This was a sure sign that whales were feeding nearby. The ancient whalers always new that when the birds gathered together....they were feeding on vast schools of fish in the nearby waters and where there were large schools of fish...there were also whales.

The air was already crisp and with the spray of the water and the dampening of the fog rolling in...the signs of an abrupt change in the season were all around us. For one brief day...we were transported to a different world...so alien to a Midwest boy but so grateful to be there.

That late Summer in Alaska was a time of reflection and revitalization for me...I have to return someday.

Dan

Nature's Hummer

By now we have...as many of you probably have...gotten to know our hummingbirds. We have three that visit each day...two females and one male. This is one of the females.

I am taking the pictures this year with a green wire web fence behind them as they visit the feeder and that is what makes the lined background. I then black out the greens of the yard and replace it with black in order to complete the picture. Each bird I have photographed reflects it's own personality. I am still waiting to get a picture of the male and will post it when I have it. I presently have a 20x33 picutre similar to this one exhibit at our local museum until mid August.

Dan

Nature's Waterproofing

Not far from here...about 10 miles is the Twin Swamps Nature preserve. It is known for it's Bald Cyprus Trees. This is the upper limit in the United States where they will grow. They thrive in water. The wood from the Cyprus...due to it's natural waterproofing is usually used for wooden shingles on roofs.

The swamp area is a unique Eco system in this part of the Midwest...regretfully it is also home to water moccasins or cotton mouths. One of the most poisonous snakes in the U.S. As a matter of fact one visited me while I was taking this picture! I was standing on an old log...as I looked down...the snake was about a foot from the log in the water. As you might imagine...I wasted no time getting the h...ll off that log and didn't even consider sticking around to get a picture of it. There are some things I will not do to get a photograph....the two that come to mind has to do with snakes and spiders.

Dan

East Meets West

Two different cultures separated by continents and 1000s of years found each other in a small Midwest town. The sight of a very contemporary lady walking with a far eastern monk caught my eye as they passed by in deep discussion.

Two so very different people must have so much to talk about...to care about...to inquire about. And how did they end up in a small community of about 600 people? That is the payoff often times with photography...to capture a moment in time that at least on the surface holds such contrasts. The downfall of photography is that many times the image leaves unanswered questions. On the other hand, sites like "Write with Pictures" gives us the opportunity to project our own lives, our own answers to the images such as this.

If you haven't tried before...go to one of the sites such as the one above sometime and try your hand at adding your own narrative to images. It will often leave you with a sense of accomplishment after laying your reality on top of someone image.

Have a great Sunday and maybe you will have the chance to interact with another culture today??

Dan

To Create

A watercolor artist creates in two dimensions...a photographer....as best we try...also works in two dimensions even though we often attempt to simulate a third.

But a potter can take a mound of mud and translate a three dimensional concept in his mind to the spinning potter's wheel and mold a creation you can hold. Unlike photographs or paintings...the added sense of touch comes into play with the potter. It takes a special mind to be able to translate a concept into reality in three dimensions....I envy potters.

Have a Great Saturday

Dan

Klusmeier

Klusmeier...probably a local family name...like so many family businesses proudly displaying the name...a business that provided a living for a father or grandfather during better times before there were interstates.

Like other small towns before the 1950s...main street was part of the highway. If you were headed from point A to point B....you would undoubtedly pass by Klusmeiers. Now only the occasional lost traveler or a local resident sees stores like these...not enough traffic to keep the doors open. The buildings still stand however to remind us of a lost era that only those who are 60 or older even remember today.

Dan

1970 Flashback

"Our House" flashed through my mind as I drove through Lynville...a small town off the interstate in Indiana.

It was once of those moments when we pass by a scene in the car and the image remains yet a mile down the road. So much so , we turn around and return to the image to capture it. As I set up the tripod for an HDR triple exposure...Crosby Stills and Nash was echoing in my head.

We often hear the cliches...white picket fence, 2 kids in the yard, a dog and small town America. There are so many scenes like this in small towns but each house has it's own family, it's trials and hardships along with the family memories of "the home place".

If you think back to your childhood...your house will look different but your home place will probably echo the familiar emotions felt when you look at a scene such as this.

Dan

Picking Lilies....

There were folks speckled among the field of lilies...admiring the different varieties.


The last picture above was the only type of day lilies I was familiar with...these usually grow wild along the country roads this time of year. The hummingbird was a welcomed visitor as was the fly in yesterday's post. However the fly was a surprise...I followed this hummingbird to several blooms until he let me take his picture.

Dan

The world up close is often like an alien world to us humans but is just another day of gathering pollen for the insects and birds to unknowingly spread to other flowers and guarantee their survival for another year.

Pistils and stamens are proudly displayed for the insect world to see and be drawn to. The center image shows a pollen laden attraction just waiting to be brushed against and transported off to others.

We often think of bumble bees as the main transporter of pollen but all flying insects join in and help as well.

Dan

1400 Species of DayLilies

This time of year day-lilies grow wild in the Midwest.


I always looked forward to their return in the early summer. However...I stumbled across a person who raises daylilies....I mean hundreds...probably 1000s of daylilies. He has over 1400 different species planted around his lake and in beds ...everywhere you look this time of year!

This was a great opportunity for me to captures some macro shots of the flowers...something I often forget about. I am so busy usually trying to take in the big picture...I forget about the world seen up close.

Tomorrow and the the next day I will be posting some macro shots of the lilies.

Dan

Happy Father's Day!

Your career status isn't important to a 5 year old. Your investments are not the reason your small daughter adores you. When you become unemployed...your young twins still look to you to fix their matching bicycles they crashed into each other.

Being hip isn't a prerequisite for your 40 year old son's respect. Workplace colleagues for the most part fade after you have left the company. What seemed so important years ago fades with advancing age and priorities change...not for better or worse...just different.

You are respected and loved as a father just because you are you. That is pretty neat. No experience necessary...being there year in and year out gives you the experience you need. This day I take unabashed pride in being a father...I guess one day a year we dads can bathe in the limelight!

Hope you have a great Father's Day today. By the way...if fatherhood has not come into your life...that is ok too. I went for 14 years of marriage without being a father so we adopted. Believe me...that works just fine!

Dan

Honest and from the heart.....

I was going through my photos while a bluegrass station was on.

I like all kinds of music...I really do...from Mozart to Bob Dylan to Led Zeppelin. But as I listened to the mellow strings of a Dobro guitar, fiddle and 6 string I was taken back by the raw honesty and heartfelt harmonies of bluegrass music. I could hear relics of country, folk, Celtic melodies all rolled into a free flowing stream of music from somewhere deep inside the artist.

This was a group we enjoyed last summer at a bluegrass festival in Kentucky. There is nothing like a guitar lick from Jimmy Page or the sound of an Oboe bringing to mind the dawn but....The honest picking of bluegrass leaves one knowing that the artist truly believes in what they are laying down for the audience.

Have a great weekend....and try out some bluegrass for a change of pace!

Dan

Usefullness passed....

Items found on the wall of an old barn.


Once these items were shiny metal attached to a new barn. Now the weather has eaten away the newness and replaced it with wormholes and pitted rust marks. They serve as a reminder that all things are useful...even though they may seem now that their beauty has faded....the strength lies below the surface sheltered from the elements.

Dan

Neighborhood Gathering Place

I have posted several pictures from the "Old Part of Town" called Haynies Corner. It is almost a town within a town with it's own architecture and subculture....coffeehouses, art studios and an old movie theater under renovation. In the center of town the fountain serves as a gathering place on summer nights for conversations, catching up or people watching. This photo was taken just before sunset as the sun was settling to the horizon over the Ohio River not far away.

Dan

The Jungle

An eclectic combination of middle eastern, Victorian and a Rain Forest Cafe. Yesterday's post took place in the basement of this restaurant called the Jungle. It was late at night after a photographic shoot in the near downtown area. I found myself outside looking in. I struck up a conversation with a gentleman just outside seated at a table. He later told me he was the owner of the cafe and invited me in to take pictures. It was then that I found the blue lit nook down in the basement hid from the noise and activity above. I am going back for dinner or coffee...there is something about this place that draws me in.

Dan

Conversation, Espresso and a Croissant

I found this small nook in the basement of a restaurant / coffeehouse ...a place to re-connect, to actually talk...to have a conversation without the distractions of mall traffic, laptops or smart phones. A place to have those types of conversations again...like the ones we had when we were dating. Before all the responsibilities when we were still innocently idealistic and could open up at the drop of a hat. Those places and opportunities don't resurface much anymore.

Dan

A Country Morning

I often post my thoughts and photos of Chicago or New York...places I love dearly. However it is scenes like this that keep me tied to the country. Last week one morning ...this was the scene across a field where we live. The sun had just begun to warm the countryside with it's golden hues and later spread all across the valley. Quiet, except for the birds and a far off occasional "moo" reminded me of the time I spent in Switzerland at the base of the Jura mountains near Geneva. Only the it was an occasional far off sound of bells tied around the necks of the herds of cattle grazing on the foothills of the Jura.

Have a great week!

Dan

Sunsets and Water Always Calm

I was drowning in emotional turmoil this past week and found myself at this sunset by the Ohio River at just the right time.

During the past week my father had a heart attack, a close colleague gave in to her battle with breast cancer, my cousin passed away and an 18 year old child (friend of the family) was hit by a drunk driver and killed instantly.

I woke up this morning and heard on the news that a wedding party of 40 were killed or injured by a bomb blast in Afghanistan. I realized upon hearing the news that I had to move forward and pain is something that we all must deal with.......

The wonders of life and all that comes with it must be taken with balance and perspective.

Have a peaceful Sunday and re-connect today with someone from your past.

Dan

Find an Adventure This Weekend

"May the wind take your trouble away!" Words from a song by Son Volt......a song about taking to the highway.

I hope you have a great Saturday and find a whole new perspective this weekend.

Dan

Most Colorful Corner in Town

This week I re visited a house I photographed last year in the old part of town.


Often an area that you have photographed is worth re visiting during different seasons of the year...the sight you see may be quite different than before...even though it is familiar ground. I always like this old house because of the whimsical color scheme and gingerbread on the house. But this year when I turned the corner I had a pleasant surprise....Hydrangeas everywhere adding to the already bright colors...flowers that I didn't even know were planted here the last time I visited.

Interesting enough, I learned that Hydrangeas are one of those flowers that Mother Nature allows us to change it's colors! By changing the ph of the soil we can have pink, blue or white at our whim! Thank you Mother Nature.

Dan

Conversations

I suppose if I had to pick...the color photo above would be my favorite of the day.

I noticed that the common ground for both photos was the conversations taking place...strategies....complaints....concerns? The realism of the day was breathtaking. These reenacters took their passion very seriously. In both photos you can see the serious nature of the conversations in the faces. The color photo is one of those captures that I can spend a lot of time on just looking at the different pockets of activity within the photo...the "dressing down" of the commander by the female, the vigilance of the soldier to the left, the attention of the line of combatants behind the the commander...awaiting his instructions, and the "fog" of battle in the background...smoke from the canons and rifles.

Dan

Big Frank and Lil Frank...

A tale of big Frank and Lil Frank.

I earlier posted a photo of Lil Frank with his Grandmother at a livestock fence. I spoke with big Frank after he saw me taking so many pictures of the child and learned that he was a Park Ranger at the Vincennes Memorial grounds. Also that several generations of his family were involved with history and this time period. As he walked from the shade to the early afternoon sunlight I took this picture. The dark murky background offset by the bright sunlit robe and shirt of the two almost makes this look like a studio portrait.

I sent this picture to Ranger Frank and I hope it will be great memories of the day he spent with Lil Frank in 2010.

Dan

The Storyteller's Wife

This couple was at last year's Rendezvous but they are so unique I photographed them again this year.

This year I had more time to watch them and could see the "method" to their madness. As I walked by I didn't see them at first but heard the rhythmical sound of tin bells. Turning to see the origin of the sound I saw the storyteller's wife pounding the ground with the bell ladened rod she was holding. In the eighteenth century...we didn't have billboards or bullhorns to advertise our wares. The entrepreneurs of the time knew that in order to get attention...something had to be done to draw in customers. Thus the attention getter...the bells. Drawn by the whimsical monkey and other magical objects in the cart...children would flock to the couple. Once they had an audience...the storyteller would commence a tail about Indians or Jack and the Beanstalk or other ballads of a time and land far far away.

I have to say that they were the most unique couple ...at least in my opinion...at the event.

Dan

Fire!

Long Rifles were the weapons of choice. If you look closely at the picture above...you will see the rifle of the middle infantry man with a blaze of fire out the end of the barrel. Yet the two on each side have no blaze but only a flash at the hammer near the trigger.

This photo shows the two step method that these types of long rifles use to fire their payload. What happens after the trigger is pulled begins with the ignition of the gunpowder as shown by the two outside riflemen. The the explosion forces the lead ball out the end of the musket as we see with the middle rifleman. So by the photo above we can tell that the middle man fired his weapon a fraction of an instant sooner than his two partners. If the shutter was clicked a fraction of an instant later...we would see the fire exiting out the end of the two shooters on the outside.

Dan

Learning from "Big Sis"

One of the categories of the photo contest was "Interaction of the participants".

I watched from a distance for quite a while. The girl was obviously "an experienced woman"! She handled the bow as if it was part of her. She spent the better part of a half hour showing her younger brother how to hold it and aim it . He was soaking up the instructions like a sponge.

Finally both of them scurried off to another adventure. To be a child of that age at this event must be such an immersive experience. When the imagination of a child is unleashed...the world around them can be what their imagination tells them that reality is. To have that innocence back for just a while would be the greatest thing.

Dan

The Oxen and their caretaker

Among some of the most interesting characters at the Rendezvous was the keeper of the oxen. I entered a photo contest for the day and this picture was chosen for Honorable Mention.

This team of oxen were seen along with their master at various venues throughout the day...the battles, pulling a Conestoga wagon , an open topped wagon for transporting passengers etc. He was truly one with his oxen. He told me that pairs of oxen team up for life. He had another team that he dearly loved but one of the oxen passed away last year. He knew...as he told me...that if one of the pair dies...the other will follow shortly after. He slept for a week in the stall with the remaining oxen hoping to help it through the stress of separation but to no avail...within 2 weeks both of his oxen had died.

This new pair will hopefully be with him for a long time to come.

Dan

A Tradition spanning generations....

An entire family...multiple generations walked by me and between them was the most gorgeous little boy in a white robe. Later as I was talking to the family...I asked about the cord coming off the robe. This was authentic 18th century attire and just as today...we see mothers keeping track of their toddlers in malls with the "leash"...the idea came from our predecessors. A good reason for them to have a "leash" to the little ones was to keep them from wandering under fences and under the hooves of oxen, horses or cattle.

I will have more pictures of this little boy...Frank...later in this week or next week but his grandfather was also in the 18th century attire...his grandfather is a park ranger for the historical site.

Dan

I am back...at least for a while!

EVERYONE...I want to thank you for your thoughts and prayers for my Dad and also for sticking with me even though I have not been responding to your comments...I have read them all however and I was laughing at some of the comments on the ladies escaping the mayhem!! My wife had the same comment..."Was she crying because one of her lovers was shot...or because she was afraid something was going to fall out"???? Also thank you for the kind words about the other posts as well...I didn't think about it but the Indian at dark with the face paint does look sort of Braveheartish! From here forward I will begin again with the narratives on the photos and some explanations of what is taking place. I will be posting photos from the event through next week as well...many more interesting photos to come. They are of different aspects of the day so hopefully they won't get old.

I know I am stuck on this topic but for my type of passion and my taste in warm colors, person to person interaction and interesting scenarios...I just can't resist!

As far as Dad goes...he is out of the hospital and on the road to a long recovery process. We are taking it day to day for now...keep us in your prayers if you would.

Thanks so much for visiting and commenting if you feel like it...YOU MAKE MY DAY!

Your blogging friend....

Dan

Escaping the mayhem....

Watchfull by night....

The Soundtrack of Battle....

Good Morning Folks...it is about 7:00 am on Tuesday morning. Thank you for all of your thoughts and prayers for my dad. He is still in the hospital and may undergo surgery...he is not out of the woods yet. I will keep you posted.

Meanwhile I have loaded a picture for each day of this week but there will be no narrative with it at this point...I am spending the days at the hospital. What I intend to do is go back and add narratives to the pictures ...at least some of them because there are interesting stories about some of the people at the re-enactment. But for now there will be a new picture each day. Thank you so much for your understanding...there have been very few days in the last year and one half that I have missed on the blog but this situation is taking all of my time at the present.

Also, I will not be responding to your posts unless I get a break with internet access. That doesn't mean that I am not reading your comments because I enjoy them very much. So don't think I have "skipped town" if I don't respond immediately.

I will keep you posted on events here as they roll out.

Dan