Current State of Affairs

I'm just chilling with KitKit in Takoma Park.

Bliss

post-earthquake, pre-hurricane comfort food

Seven Snakes On Saturday

I've seen snakes at work before but last week I flipped over a rock and found a Surprise Snake. It was pretty much the most exciting thing to happen to me all summer! (This is seriously what my life has come to.) I've been talking about this incident nonstop and suddenly it hit me; I dig snakes. They're just.......really freaking awesome. I mean, they're kind of scary and wiggly and they like hanging out on/under rocks. I'm totally down with that.

Last Saturday, I went walking at Natural Bridge and decided to document my day in snakes. Here they are:

Cat In Bar

Al is the chill feline that runs the Red Palace in Washington, DC.

Bittersweet Feelings: Olivia Mancini and the Mates

Yesterday was a whirlwind of feelings; waking up at home, eating at a favorite restaurant, going on a date, having that date go ridiculously sour, having drinks at a bar with a cat, being social at a friend's stand up comedy event, and finally, topping all that off with an Olivia show. Seeing Olivia is always both comfortable and awkward at the same time but since all the bad stuff with grad school and relationships occurred last year, there are also feelings of sadness and bitterness. Maybe that's just a testament to the music, though; terrible things can happen but they don't seem to keep me away. I can feel awkward -- and gosh, I know I look awkward with my books and camera -- but I just deal with it and translate what I'm feeling into something slightly more tangible.











































A lot of people associate music with bad feelings and things; that's normal. Thing is, music for me is people. I feel bad that I put so much meaning on music as a whole -- the music, the places, the roadtrips, the people, the experiences -- because the negative associations bleed into all of it. I guess I'm just not comfortable talking openly about it but Olivia reminds me of my various identities, what it was like to be happy, and what it looked like to appear normal (or at least socially acceptable).

The rest of the photos can be found here.

Milagres

Last week, I signed up for Google+ which somehow turned on my Gchat messenger. One of my old show buddies from up north messaged me to ask how I was doing. As we chatted, I found myself trying desperately to recall how we actually met but I couldn't. Shows, yeah...but what shows? How the heck did I end up staying at her house in Boston? It dawned on me that not only have a lost a huge chunk of my identity with show-going, but now I have forgotten so much of what I used to dwell on and meticulously document.

My musical intake has slowed to a trickle these days and it's probably not just me. I'm living in the post-hipster world of soccer fans and attachment parenting. The Arcade Fire won a Grammy; a sure sign that whatever you want to call the culture that I tried desperately to be a part of has now been dispersed amongst the normals.

I've been swept away from show-going and photography by adulthood, academia, and The Economy. I find myself grasping for people and things I think I might enjoy but nearly everything feels artificial to me. So.....what a blessing it is that sometimes little things come through my inbox, twitter feed, or even Flickr that I don't even have to question.

Milagres are people making music and photographs that bring me joy. I saw them randomly three years ago when they played at the Velvet Lounge in DC as the Secret Life of Sofia and they're one of the few bands I've kept on my radar but haven't actually had any interaction with. Earlier this year, I saw that they would be putting out an album in the Fall and I lived vicarious through Eric's wonderful tour photos. By chance, I discovered they were opening for someone at the 9:30 Club in DC last night so for the first time in a very long time, I took show photos.







I need to do things like this more often.

Unemployment: Photo Essay

Two days in, I found myself knee-deep in the Rappahannock River in Fredericksburg, Virginia. What shows used to do for me -- shut my thoughts off and allow me to peacefully live in the moment -- is now being done by nature. I find myself particularly attracted to moving bodies of water. And rocks; lots of rocks.





















The few sad thoughts that permeated the peace were the following: One, this ultimately would have been more enjoyable with the children I had most recently been employed to look after and two, everyone else is back at school except for me. And okay, three; where did Olivia end up? I could just ask but I'm afraid to; I don't want to find out that the last active person that I associated with an amazing music scene in DC is gone.