Paul Lester Photo

I want to start off saying that I am not a religious person. I don’t like religions and there “I’m right and you’re wrong attitude.” Now, on to better things that that is out of the way. This year, for me, has been an incredible year of spirtual growth. I’ve been reading a lot and observing even more.

Now, I firmly believe in synchronicity and certain facets of quantum physics that say that we alter reality by our thoughts. Basically, we get what we expect. To put this into perspective, I would like to share a couple of “coincidences”. I don’t believe in coincidences anymore.

I’m a software developer by trade. For the past 2 years I’ve worked for Bank of America and became seriously burned out. I finally took some time off at the beginning of June. At that time, and all through the summer, my most ardant and heartfelt wish was that I would be able to work at home. Notice, not that I would not have to return to the office (negative), but that I would be able to work from home. I took no action on this, only made my most fervant wish. I imagined how happy I would be if that happened.

1. On July 11th, I got an e-mail from a guy that I used to work for in Texas. He offered me a project that would last an estimated 6 months and that he would be ready to start in September and best of all, I could work from home. I was nonplussed, to say the least. I went to Georgia to visit him, we discussed the details and everything was ready to roll.

2. On August 22nd, I received another e-mail, this one from a manager who used to work with my wife’s best friend. Another project, this one paying even more, and to work from home. However, it was done in a technology that I have no experience in. I told him this and hoped that they would change their mind about the technology.

3. August 30th, I got an e-mail, in reference to item #2, that they had decided to go with Java, which is what I do, and wanted to know if I was available to do the contract! Now, I had two contracts and wondered how to swing them both. Contact #1, 6 months, Contract #2, 1 month.
4. Contract number 1 got put on hold and contract #2 just got extended today and may last for 3+ months.

My wife asked me what I really wanted to happen and I said: “I want contract #2 to last until at least January, or longer and I want contract 1 to immediately follow on afterwards and continue all the way through next summer”.

Today’s call: “Contract #2 will continue until at least December 15th and looks like there will be one or 2 more to follow.”.

I do believe, and am very, very, very, thankful for these gifts, that I am creating my own reality (Sure, Paul, lots of New Age blah, blah). Well, you can call it luck, the power of prayer, quantum causation, etc. It works.

I could go on and on about numerous things that have happened, but I only wanted to give an example. All I can say is that however it is happening, I’m thankful and appreciative.

Paul

I’m so excited!!! My workshop starts on Thursday morning. I can’t wait. Even though this workshop takes place at the beach, I’m still excited.

Now, the reason that I say “even though” is that I’ve been to the beach a number of times this year and have taken a great number of images and I’m ready for fall! I’m ready for richness, the smell, and the chill of fall. The beach, well, I could wait until next summer!

That said, what I’m really looking forward to is the teacher and some of the assistants. I’ve met them before and am eager to have time to spend talking with them this time. There are only 12 students and it will be all about photography every day (Thursday->Sunday). Total immersion. I’m really looking forward to it.

I’ve already queued up shots for the whole week and, even though I will have internet access, I am not going to post any workshop photos until I return. I will, however, continue to visit other blogs in the evening before going to sleep.

I will leave Wednesday after dropping Tony off at school, drive to Savannah, GA. Take photos there for part of the day, then continue on to Jekyll Island, GA, where I will remain for the rest of the time.

I’ll post my daily exploits to this blog, if I have time.

I remember as a child that my mother forced piano lessons upon me. She, like other mothers of the time, thought that it was good for a child to learn to play the piano, for some reason. I never wanted to learn. Instead, I wanted to learn to play the drums. My parents didn’t encourage this, so I had to learn on my own, which I did.

One of the things that I remember vividly was that if you wanted to get any good at it, you had to keep practicing the fundamentals over and over and over again. For piano, this meant playing seemingly endless successions of scales. For drums, it meant practicing 3 stroke, 5 stroke, 7 stroke, and 9 stroke drum roles, paradiddles, double paradiddles, and the rest. The former, I hated, the latter, I loved.

Photography is the same, but just like the drums, I love to practice. This morning I went out, after dropping Tony at school, and went to my favorite park. I had no shots in mind. I just sat there in the cool autumn air and waited for inspiration. I took a few close ups, etc. I was just there practicing my seeing.

I stayed for about 45 minutes and just practiced. What a great time.

I was just reviewing some of my photos and noticed that my style has gone nearly completely vertical. For some reason, this just seems to be my taste right now. Perhaps none of the subjects that I photograph seem, at least to me, to fit in a horizontal orientation. Hmmm, go figure.

I guess, to me, nature just seems to be vertical.

The rain has ended. After some 30 straight hours of rain, it is finished. This morning I went for a walk in my favorite place, Reed Creek Nature Preserve. Naturally, the trails were exceptionally muddy, but the scenery was glorious, as usual. Since the trails were muddy, there were few people in the park and therefore, it was very quiet.

I did meet a few people along the way. For some reason, there was a girl’s cross country track team running about in groups of 4. My guess would be that they were either college freshman, or high school seniors. They weren’t exactly quiet. You could hear them from quite a distance, laughing, giggling, and having a great time. Just being girls. They were all quite polite as they passed, each one greeting me with a hello.

There was much to see this morning. Lots of rain drops on the plants, making some of them look like crystal chandeliers. Reedy Creek itself, normally just a trickle, had a bit of a flow this morning. Mind you, no Mississippi River, but respectable for Reedy Creek. There was the occasional brightly color leaf in a hurry to show off its fall colors.

Since there was a lot of rain, the mushrooms and toadstools were popping up everywhere. All in all, I spent 4 hours just strolling through the park. It’s wonderful to have that kind of time to stop and smell the roses.

This morning, about 7:15, I was heading out for my morning photo shoot. Usually I go to Reedy Creek, or as of late, to the UNC Botanical Gardens. As I was leaving, I saw two of my neighbors. I usually will stop and talk to them for a few moments before I head out. Nothing unusual this morning.

I stopped, rolled down my windows, said hello to both of them. The converation went a like this:

Paul: Good morning, guys.
Guys: Good morning.
H: Where you headed? Out to take pictures?
Paul: Yep! You know it. Every single day.
H: Man, you sure are dedicated.
Paul: Thanks. I love it.
S: You know you should do? You should do something worthwhile, like go to church!
Paul: I don’t do the church thing.
S: Yeah, I know. But you should.
Paul: See you guys later. [drives off]

To say the least, I was insulted, but he’s just the type of guy who turned me off of religion long, long, ago. Self-important, arrogant, know-it-all. No thanks.

Unfortunately, I let it throw me a bit off kilter and I had to do a bit of meditation (focused breathing) to release my anger so that I could “see” when I was taking pictures.

I don’t know what could be more worthwhile than going out and showing appreciation for everything that I have, everything that I’m able to do, everything that I see, hear, smell, etc. What could be more worthwhile than that. No thanks, I think that I’ll skip the self-rightiousness and piousness of the church members who are thankful, holy, etc. on Sunday and then thanklesss wretches the rest of the week. I’ll pass.

When I first saw the news about the Wildlife Photographer of the Year show I was very much interested in seeing those 84 images chosen out of 17,000 submitted and especially that 1 image chosen as Wildlife Photographer of the year for 2005. I was very eager and couldn’t wait. Today, my curiousity has been satisfied. My wife joined me on a journey from Charlotte to Raleigh, about 160 miles. Just under 3 hours. This morning, about 11:00 we north headed up I-85. After enduring the ever-present construction that’s been going on for about 2+ years, we made it Raleigh at about 2:00 PM. The exhibit was being displayed in the NC Museum of Natural History. This was a double bonus, as I had never been here! The excitement was building. We saw signs indicating that the show was on the second floor. So, we made a beeline straight for it.

My wife and I walked the entire exhibit and looked at each of the 84 photos. It wasn’t quite as I expected. The photos were divided into about 12 categories, each displaying 7 photos. 1 Grand Prize winner, 1 1st place, 1 runner up, and 4 Highly Commended. I reserved judgement until the very end.

After we had perused all of the photos, I asked my wife what she thought about the photos and she said that, for the most part, they lacked emotion. Yeah, they were well executed shots of some interesting things, but they lacked emotion. This was my feeling as well. I just thought that there might have been a twinge of envy, which is why I let her tell me before I opened my mouth and offered my opinion.

Overall, I wasn’t impressed. In the end, they took all 12 categories, lumped them together, and picked a best of show, which became the Wildlife Photographer of the Year. I just couldn’t believe the one that they picked, which depicted a flock of birds flying in one direction with a single bird flying towards them, in the opposite direction. I just didn’t see how that met the criteria to surpass all of the others, at least in my eyes.

My favorite was that of a leopard in a cage. It was quite haunting. Here is a shot of my wife looking at the image. She said that it was the only one that had any feeling to it and it was her favorite, as well. The caption reads:

The World in Our Hands, Winner
Alessandro Bee, Italy

Behind Bars

While visiting a zoo near Turin in Italy, Alessandro caught the gaze of this old leopard. Only a few months before,Alessandro had been in Tanzania’s Serengeti watching leopards being leopards in the wild. The contrast couldn’thave been greater. He was amazed how its eyes expressed so much emotion – aniety, confusion, and even fear.Worst of all was the leopard’s defeated posture.

His website is: http://www.alessandrobee.it/

All in all, not a wasted trip, but it was somewhat disappointing. Perhaps I’m a bit jaded as I’ve seen so much great photography through various blogs. All that I can say is that they picked the best of what they had. There are so many more out there that they didn’t see.

The exhibit returns to the UK after closing here on Sunday at 4:30 PM.