light

It's about light.

The news ran a story today talking about the final beam that they, CAMC, added today to the new hospital clinic. They made a big deal about it with doctors, staff and workers signing the beam. You can see it in the lower left hand corner. Won't make much difference to us. All manner of obscene noise is heard starting right around 7:30 in the morning. Quite a way to start the damn day.

It was a dream to see this cloud hovering over the crane that has been a favorite photographic subject of mine.

[I would suggest that you click the picture to really see the details of this.]

If you look carefully, you can see my hand. Rather ghostly I'd say....

My friends Boots Shelton, who now works for HBO, and Bill Grey taught me a lot about film and photography while I was living in Baltimore. Perhaps some of those ideas are finally sinking in. They always talked about making the camera see what you see or "seeing with the camera." The camera is just an instrument. A powerful instrument for sure, but nowhere near as powerful and versatile as our eyes.

I've learned a lot since receiving the camera. But, to be honest, sometimes when a photo comes out half decent, it's just dumb luck on my part. The camera, while capable of excellent quality pics, still has many automatic features that get in the way. Maybe one day I can invest in a good camera with a telephoto lens.

It's about light. Speaking of light, two musician friends of mine called to tell me Derick Kirk passed away this morning. That's real light passing out of this world. (A Gazette slideshow of a benefit for Kirk is here. ) It's rare when our community comes together in such a meaningful way, but that night was a huge success.

I really didn't know Derick very well, but there are things that kept coming up about this guy: his huge talent and his humility. His light leaving makes the world a little darker and we are definitely a lot poorer in spirit today.

Go in peace, brother.