steel drums, sand, coral reefs, and cerulean blue waters, oh my! next week, i will be out of the country until march 2, 2012. even saying that makes my heart race just a little bit. next week, i have the pleasure of second shooting with a friend of mine in the caribbean  and it’ll be my first time out of the country since my honeymoon and while my suitcase is still not packed, i’m a bit giddy.

photo courtesy of the foncia cap caraibes website

i cannot wait to get my own collection of photos, however photo geeky that sounds. did i mention that my heart is a bit aflutter!

dwell in possibility…

there are quite a few broken things around our house right now. thankfully, the homeowners curse, you know, the one where everything breaks right after you buy the house, thankfully, it didnt occur for the first year of home ownership. and thankfully, the things broken arent anything important…you know, like the roof, or the air conditioner. yup, the home ownership curse. thankfully, it’s a mild case and despite the prognosis, it all feels like home. the  broken garage door that requires manually opening and closing and has caused our cars to sit outside for quite awhile now, and caused our recycle bin to sit outside collecting some water during rain showers. the front door you have to kick in the lower right corner to open from the inside and the keyhole that attempts to eat your key, every. single. day. the leaky mailbox that in a fierce rainstorm, causes the mail to get all soggy…though luckily, mass mailers and promotions arent all that mourned for. the sliding screen door in the back has an rip from where andrew tried to walk through it, nose first – needless to say, the screen door lost. the washing machine that decided to spin it’s last cycle and has caused us to spend many much time at our parental units well, units. the closet that gave in to the weight of andrew’s clothing…and yes, i said andrew’s clothing, not mine – please take note of that. the garbage disposal that’s clinging to it’s last breath of life that has tried to go to it’s death on more than one occasion. the towel rack that requires pushing back into the wall every time you take your towels off it. it’s a little broken at the moment, our house. but we love it. and it feels like home.

my eyes slowly opened as i listened to the rain. it was saturday morning, a dreary, windy, rainy saturday morning. garland was snuggled up in the small of andrew’s back, twitching under the covers as she dreamed, andrew’s breathing steady as he clung to the edge of sleep for a few more moments. there were things broken around our house, same as every other day these last few months, but it didnt matter. and frankly, it still doesnt. our life is a little different than most. our priorities are a little different than most. there are things broken around the house and we dont care. sure, they’ll get fixed, eventually. but we arent in a rush. life goes on, and we’re thankful. homeowners curse, soggy mail, difficult key eating front door, andrew imprinted back door, manual opening garage door, broken washing machine, sad sounding garbage disposal, barely hanging towel rack, half a closet and all.

dwell in possibility…

they repaved since i was last there. the gym had newer bigger lettering on it’s exterior and the baseball and soccer fields now have a decent fence now. i dont know what possessed me to visit there. after all, it wasnt exactly a happy point in my history…well, that’s not entirely fair, some of it was actually happy. but for the most part, it was…well, let’s just say unpleasant.

i cried in the parking lot. it caught me by surprise at first. there i was, sitting in my car in the parking lot of the school i attended for most of my middle school years, and without warning, i was crying.

at the end of eight grade, i left that school as quickly as my mother would allow. i spent about four years there, maybe five, i cant remember exactly. there was so much pain from that school…the few people i went to school with that i called friends werent there long and saying i didnt really fit in would be putting it mildy. i was weird and nearly every situation where my life could be made uncomfortable, was made uncomfortable. i wasnt exactly bullied in the sense that kids in school now days have to deal with, but mentally, it was torture. the last year i attended there, i cried nearly every day. but there i was years later, sitting in the parking lot with tears in my eyes wanting to go inside. i wanted to walk the halls as an adult. from my car, i could see into the hallways that were the bane of my existence for so many years and i cried a little more. for a moment, i felt myself shrink the way everything would wrench up inside me as my mom pulled into the drop off point every morning and i would want to just go home sick or crawl under a rock for the next seven hours…and then i remembered something.

i’m not that girl anymore. i’m not the same girl that dreaded every moment of school, that hated when the bell rang cause it meant walking the hallways alone, trying to look small and not be noticed. that girl that had to block out everyone around me to get by, to hide the things that i liked because they were weird or childish. that girl that sobbed to my mother nearly every afternoon she picked me up and begged that i didnt have to come back. that girl. i was her. but i’m not anymore.

as i sat there, taking in that place nearly twelve years later, i wished i could go back and tell that girl that everything would turn out okay. that all her fear, her tears meant something. that her misery turned into something incredible. that she would be loved, accepted…that she would have a joy filled life with people who genuinely wanted her. i just wanted to tell her that it would all turn out okay.

there are days when that girl from my past comes into my present. there are days when hiding and fear and tears seem to undermine my confidence, my drive and my passion. its those days when i remember that it’s not who i am. it might be where i came from, it might be familiar, but it’s not who i am. and everything will turn out okay.

dwell in possibility…

it all began with a house party. spying that perfect boy across the room- isnt that how all good house parties begin? somewhere between picking out an outfit, finding a comfortable room to stand in, getting drink to occupy yourself with and playing coy with the flirtations around you, it happens. a smile, a whisper, a giggle, a dance… that night, a boy fell in love with a girl. that night, a girl fell in love with a boy. and it all began with a house party.

jennifer and tyler…they began at a party. and now, now they wait in the hope of their wedding day when what began with a smile, a whisper, a giggle, and a dance, blooms into something incredible.

dwell in possibility…

the good: valentines. i know this next statement is going to sound pretty anti girl…anti wedding photographer…anti human in love, but i dont really like valentines. yes, yes, i know, that collective gasp i just heard, i’m aware – valentines lovers everywhere just wrote me off as crazy. but it’s never been a time i enjoyed. growing up, i didnt have a boyfriend. other than middle school cards, the boxes of candy hearts and one instance where an acquaintance from my youth group gave every girl he knew from church a “anonymous” carnation for valentines, i never had someone to “be mine”. valentines day just seemed like a day when people without someone to love felt lonely or like they werent good enough. valentines day felt like a requirement…a mandate to show the person you love just how much you love them. i just never enjoyed valentines day. my dad was and is an incredible father. every year, he would include me in whatever he did for my mother. the morning of valentines, i’d had confetti leading from my room to my bathroom where there would be flowers or blueberry muffins with strawberry icing waiting for me. my dad was great like that, he made sure that i knew that i was loved beyond measure. and he still does. i suppose i expected for my dads valentines day surprises to stop once andrew came into the picture. but they didnt. i suppose that once i got married, my dad expected his valentines day surprises to stop…but when he saw my disappointment that first year andrew and i were married when my dads confetti, blueberry muffins with strawberry icing didnt miraculously show up, he probably realized then that those valentines day surprises would never stop. when andrew came into my life, he knew my dislike of valentines. he knew that the story of st. valentine was heart wrenching for me and that because of it, marriage was held even more as a thing to be cherished. he also knew that the day we decided that our online chats were something more, that they were leading to a lifetime together, that day was february 14th 2005…and because of that, andrew smirks at my dislike of valentines, because despite my indifference and desire to treat valentines as any other day, there’s no denying that the day is a reminder of love. the love that came into my life “officially” valentines day seven years ago. despite my protests, he still makes sure he reminds me just how much i’m loved to this day.

the bad: pandora. limited song skips, cant go back and listen to the same songs? please pandora, you underestimate my love of music. and yes, i realize i could pay for your upgrade, but free would just be so much more awesome. yes, so much more awesome, i said it…i went there.

and the in between: itunes. {hmm..you’d think there was a music theme today or something?} i love itunes. like, love love. no no, you dont understand. i love itunes like …well, the only analogy that came to mind was a crack reference followed by a fat kid loving cake…cause i love me some cake. but moving on! i love itunes but itunes and i have a love hate thing going on. whenever my itunes stores opens, i’m usually looking to buy one specific song. i click buy and then suddenly, i find myself on another song i’d never heard of clicking buy. and again, buy. suddenly i’m clicking buy and buy and buy and organizing and listening and then suddenly i realize i paid for these things. “um, how many songs did i just buy? and an album, two albums? holy monkey what did i just put on my credit card.” this is a usual occurrence between itunes and myself. like i said, it’s a love hate thing.

it’s the little things in life…whether it be the good, the bad, or the in between. whether it be something you dont really like that brings so much good or something you think is the worst thing that ever happened or something you’re just not sure what to think about. who’s to say what makes up the best things in life?

dwell in possibility…

communication. it’s something we do every day. it’s something that books have been written about, speakers have spoken on, and relationships can be made or broken by it. communication. it’s complicated.

given the opportunity, i would much rather communicate via an email or text message versus a phone call or face to face meeting. i realize in this industry, that can be a deterrent…not being great in person – rambling accidentally on and on often offering way too much information, saying words out of turn, getting your information jumbled, seeming like a scattered idiot. like i said, communication, it’s complicated. if i could, i would write letters every day with a quill and ink and deliver it via pigeons, the pony express or even an old bottle a cork and an ocean. there’s just something about writing that i prefer. maybe it’s the way i can order my thoughts…thoughts that usual race so fast it’s hard to verbalize them all in the correct order with the correct importance values applied. it’s difficult. and while every day i try to become better at communicating verbally, i’d rather write.

this year, one of the things i promised myself was that i would write more. i removed the pressure of blogging so often from 4 to 5 times a week down to 2 to 3 times a week. also, i removed the requirement that nearly every post have a photo. this is a photography business, yes, but it’s also me, it’s my blog, its a reflection of me and i enjoy writing and sharing…with or without a photo. i also started two other blogs on tumblr solely for the purpose of writing without guilt and without approval. it’s been a strange adjustment, not opening this blog every day and trying to write something of importance or something quirky. yet by doing that, i’ve noticed a change in my content. it’s freer {weird word}, it’s better {in my opinion}, and it’s more…well, it’s more me.

so, a question: what gets in the way of your communication and what are you willing to do to change it?

dwell in possibility…