So... DC Blogs is having a Photo Contest.

I'm all about having a real reason to take pictures, it makes me feel more justified in wandering around with a giant camera in my diaper bag and making my husband stop the car on the side of the highway so I can run out and TAKE A PICTURE OF THAT TREE BECAUSE IT IS THE MOST PHOTOGENIC TREE EVER AND I JUST CANNOT LIVE WITHOUT TAKING A PICTURE OF THAT TREE, I DON'T CARE IF THERE IS TRAFFIC! Yeah... I'm a chore to live with.

The theme this year is: What inspires you?

Here are my entries:

By Dawn's Early Light

I'm not sure that the contest requires a description or an explanation, but I'm still working on that NaBloMeSomMo thingy, so this gets to count as a writing exercise too.

Much to my husband's chagrin, because I am not this way in any other context, I am hopelessly romantic when it comes to my nationalistic tendencies. I alternatively believe and want to believe that America is the greatest place on earth. Sure there are problems... lots of problems, but I still think that this country is one of the few places on the globe where it's possible for just plain folks to get together and solve those problems. If that sounds ethnocentric, sue me. I love my country and I love living in its capital.


Hanging On


When I was a teenager, I took my first photography class and was blown away by Ansel Adams and his nature photography. I desperately wanted to be like him (if only!) and go live in his house for the summer as his intern and camp out in the Tetons all night long to get that perfect shot at sunrise. I am totally and completely inspired, as he was, by things in nature - if it hasn't been painfully obvious from the rampant photo posting as of late. Mostly, nature astounds me in its ability to constantly die off and then regenerate... over and over; its one of the reasons I love Fall and Winter so much. If only we could do the same, right?