Back in the early to mid 70's, in the middle of the Hippy era, my school had an anti drug program. Granted, the drugs of yesteryear were far more simple and weak compared to what I hear about the drugs of today. But, along with the drugs was sex. Unbridled, uninhibited, wild, free sex that we called 'free love.' It was right after Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin overdosed on heroin when people from this drug program came into the classrooms to act out getting high and either having a 'bad trip... Read Full Story
Today was not a typical Monday. First, I was asked to go out and take photos of a golf tournament fundraiser to benefit Special Olympics. It was a nice day, good to get out of the office, and I looked forward to it. Before I could leave the office for the golf tournament, the Sheriff's office called to say that there was a bad accident with a fatality, and since I was the only photographer, could I go get photos, then go to the golf thing. I arrived at the scene about 15 minutes after the... Read Full Story
In a little town called Carlisle , west of Little Rock, in a very flat area of the state, one of the many tornadoes that touched down today bored a three-block wide path straight through the middle of the community. It's an old town, quaint with old buildings and the feel of history, and those old buildings were built strong. I got a call to go down for photos and to find out the particulars for a news story and arrived a few hours after the tornado hit. The chief of police said that they... Read Full Story
There is an 'angle' here, a way to translate the devastation of a natural disaster into something that can't be captured by a camera. Or so I thought until I went through yesterday's photos again, this time with a new eye. If I were able to go up in a helicopter to take photos of the path of that tornado, then perhaps I'd have a visual of the extent of the damage done, the whole picture. A shot here, a shot there, a hundred shots of what your eye falls on when you go through the area creates... Read Full Story
For the last week or so, I've been reading and reading (and reading and reading…) to try to come up with a way to define "be-ing." I've read psychology, philosophy and spirituality essays and books, and sifted through numerous self-improvement type sites. They all seem to point to the same thing, yet it still seems as though something vital is missing. I'll present a few things I've come up with so far. It's all pretty rough and more or less my interpretation of a lot of different sources... Read Full Story
Stress is a part of life, but not all stress is bad. There is stress in any relationship with each other, and in the roles we play in a healthy, good life: mother, wife, husband, father, brother, sister. A certain amount of stress is necessary to keep us together. People who are devoted and committed to their work, for instance, are more capable of producing stress than others who take a more casual approach to their work. Often the lack of stress is a stressor in itself. If correctly... Read Full Story
The Day After the Tornado Top photo: The Carlisle, AR fire station. The mayor said he believes it will have to be torn down and rebuilt from scratch because of bent support beams. Photo 2: Of all the photos I took, this one shows the severity of the tornado. It had to have been a monster to pull that tree up by that huge root system. This home was in the area of town hardest hit. Photo 3: The power company subcontracts tree services to clear out the downed trees after they say it's safe and... Read Full Story
Most people ‘get it’ but don’t know how to move from this to actually ‘doing it’. We get it intellectually, we know in order to create what we want there has to be some ‘doing’ on our part. We understand why we cannot stay where we are or why we can’t keep repeating old patterns of behavior. Trust me most people ‘get’ this.
Yet we all sit in judgment saying if you know it why don’t you do something about it? The most annoying people on the planet are the ones constantly chanting the Nike... Read Full Story
Many people see our problems and feel that society is slipping out of control, that the ability to cooperate for the good of our communities has been lost, and our willingness to abide by our long-standing social contracts is compromised. It's true that an entire generation of young barbarians has grown up for whom the way to deal with others is to grab whatever you want. But it seldom occurs to us that our nihilistic system supports ruthless abusers, from back-street hoodlums to Wall Street... Read Full Story
No, I’m not going to talk about The Lion King ! Instead I am going to introduce a common self improvement tool, called the circle (or wheel) of life. I’ve always found it to be a very clear-cut, visual approach to analyzing how satisfied you are with different areas of your life, something that is not particularly common in the self help field. Oddly, it’s not a technique that seems to have much explanation on the internet. Hopefully this post (and potentially the mini-series that will... Read Full Story
