More Grandson pixs

If you aren't family you may want to skip this post. I posted a picture of Maxwell and his missing tooth so for friends and family here are pictures of the rest of the Grandsons.

Jack and Will have been in Hawaii on vacation. They are both getting ready to start baseball. Both of them are really good baseball players.

Dexter is 10 months old, crawling and as you can see he is a busy boy.

Tooth Fairy

Maxwell lost his first tooth while eating pizza this weekend. The tooth fairy came Sunday night. Doug had to leave for work before Max woke up on Monday but Doug wrote me about the phone call he had from him.

We gave him 6 quarters. He had to call me up this morning to tell me. He
said, "Dad! The tooth fairy was here. She gave me lots of quarters."
I said, "How many?"
He said, "Six!"
"Do you know how much that is?"
..."Uh, what?"
"That's a dollar fifty."
...
...
"Dad! The tooth fairy gave me six quarters!"

"a dollar fifty" didn't compute. The boy is a concrete thinker.

Pat Brown's Pear

At Christmas Time I look forward to receiving special holiday cards made by my artist friends. This gorgeous pear is the work of my friend and fellow photographer, Pat Brown from Austin.

I also received a couple of other cards made by artist. They are special and I save them every year. But what I find interesting is that back in the "old days" when we had to make each image in the darkroom, then cut and trim it and paste it on the card stock....very labor intensive....I received more artist/photographer made cards than I have in the last couple of years when so many of us have switched to inkjet printing. Now we can load up the printer with paper and let it do it's thing with the file. But what can I say. I'm guilty too. I didn't make any holiday cards this year either.

But isn't it interesting, now that it is easier, we are doing it less.

Shutter Time

One of my favorite blogs posted an entry today referring to Seth Thompson's photography exhibition in New York. Just click on one of the images to the side of the press release. The images are of interior spaces in homes in villages in central Mexico. Typically Mexican houses are small and dark and so to gather enough light to make these images required long exposures. As I looked at them I started thinking about some of the projects I've worked on that required long exposures....mainly the interiors of 16th century Mexican churches.
Some of the exposures were a minute long...some even more. When the shutter is open that long, the shadows open up and reveal things that even the eye didn't see. The stillness of the camera on the tripod is translated to the image. Call me a little weird but I also feel that the ghosts or spirits of the interior space are revealed.

I find Thompson's images very meaningful and beautiful. The one fault I have with them is that photographing real Mexican kitchens is on MY "To Do List for 2006." However I know that two people can go to the same place to photograph and come away with very different images. I just hope that my open shutter will find as much beauty in the mundane as Thompson did.

Cooking Intuition

You know how sometimes you just want something different to eat. Well, I've had that feeling. I wanted some Texas food. So we had barbecued chicken, potato salad and a big green salad. We can get barbecued ribs here but I've never seen barbecued chicken and never potato salad except at a gringo party. Simple food but food from my childhood and food from Texas.

While I was preparing other things for dinner, Ned wanted to help so he started chopping up some celery for the potato salad. He kept wanting to know how big to chop the celery and was this enough. It was irritating because I didn't know how to answer and it started me thinking about how many things you just cook....no recipe....you just put it together. You don't think about 1 teaspoon of this or that or 1/2 cup of something else. You look at the potatoes and start chopping and somehow you just know when you have chopped enough onion....or celery. I don't know how to explain how much mayonnaise. I open the jar and take out a big spoon full.....mmm...maybe it needs a little more.

I'm always just putting stuff together for a meal without any recipes because I've been to the vegetable markets and meat markets (note I'm using plurals because I can seldom find all that I want at one place) and I've bought what looked good that day. Then I have to put it together.

Recently I was thinking pasta for dinner. I had pasta in the pantry and I had Parmesan cheese and two chicken thighs in the fridge. I bought greens for a salad and some Mexican crema. I'm not sure that the sauce I made to go with the pasta was a true Alfredo sauce but it was delicious. Ned told me that it was good and I should write that one down. Well, I didn't photograph the pasta dish and I haven't written it down. But I should.

Some people seem to have such a hard time cooking here in San Miguel and one of the things on my "To Do" list for 2006 is work on a little cookbook for friends here. I wonder if they will be able to cook the recipe if it says:

Boil enough small red potatoes for two in salted water
chop up some celery and onion and a bit of dill
Throw in some mayonnaise and a bit of mustard............

Do you think I'll have to actually measure what I put in?

Rain

Tiny taps on the window pane
Muffled splats on leaves outside the window.
My eyes open and look from a warm bed
A gray sky, a light rain.
Rainy season?
No, it's January.
No rain since September.
Little expected until June.
A lovely surprise this morning.

Preventative/preventive

While writing today's blog on Crime in Paradise, I started wondering if I was using the right word. "Preventative" Police. I looked it up via google.

preventive or preventative
The words are often used interchangeably to denote whatever prevents something else happening or occurring, especially when it is undesirable. However, preventative is often applied to an actual object, especially in noun form, while preventive is mostly reserved for an abstract concept, and remains an adjective: Preventive medicine regards vitamin C as an effective preventative against colds.

Mmmm.....I think I've been using the wrong word. So any English teachers that read my blog, please don't put too many red circles around the word on your monitors. Remember that the "preventative and preventive" are also used interchangeably.

The dreaded red marks of English teachers may have kept me from writing for a long time. And I like to write. I've gradually overcome the fear of a grammar or spelling mistake. Now that I'm not writing for anyone but myself in my blog or journal, I just write. Sometimes when I go back and read I realize that I've mixed tenses of verbs and I don't always write a complete sentence and sometimes clauses are in the wrong place. You know what, sometimes I just leave it. It just "feels" more like the way I talk.

Crime in Paradise II

No there hasn't been another rape but I wanted to write a follow up to my story on Monday.

First of all my friend is doing okay. Much better than I would be doing. The afternoon after the rape she went around on her street to warn other women to take all precautions and she is doing all that she can to help the ministerial police as well as the community. She is a quiet woman of courage and common sense.

On Sunday there were four ministerial police at "Sue's" house to investigate the crime. We later found out that the ministerial police have four investigators so they were throwing all their resources at the problem. They were there for a long time and brought in some other people that they wanted to interview. They are developing evidence.

Prior to this rape, a meeting had already been scheduled in our Colonia to talk about the other two rapes and what we could do to protect ourselves...like a neighborhood watch program. Once the word got out that Sue had been raped on Sunday, many people from all over the city decided to come to the meeting. What had started out to be a neighborhood meeting with Miguel Kegel suddenly became a huge meeting with television and radio coverage, with the Mayor's representative, the Preventive Police Chief, two representatives from the State District Attorney's office and translators. I had thought that it would be pretty much a gringo meeting but there were many Mexicans too. And what surprised me is that they are as angry or maybe even angrier than we are that once a crime is reported nothing else is ever heard. Was the criminal apprehended? Is he/she in jail? Is the investigation progressing? Nothing!They are angry that crime is increasing not just against the gringos but Mexicans too. Originally the meeting was scheduled to take place in the Spanglish Cafe but there were so many people that it quickly moved into the street and the afternoon sun. Someone said that there were 150 people there and I would have guessed about 200 people. The facilitator was Bill who is the adult son of one of the women who was raped. Bill and his mother have lived in San Miguel for 30 years and he is fluent in Spanish and English. He opened the meeting by saying that the investigations of the rapes could not be discussed and he did his best to try to focus the meeting on what we should do to help the police and protect ourselves. But the crowd, Gringo and Mexican, weren't buying that. They wanted to get some answers. Still for the most part people were polite and diplomatic. Well, except for some of the Mexicans. One had a large sign that she displayed that said something to the effect, "Enough already, Police Chief, do your job."

What I found interesting is that neither of the representatives from the Ministerio Publico (District Attorney's Office) said anything. Nada. I would have thought that they would have at least made a statement that they were going to do all they could do to apprehend the rapist.

The crowd stood in the sun for about two hours. It was obvious that nothing was going to be decided at this meeting but it did make a statement that the public wants something done about crime.

After the meeting, Ned went to the two men from the Ministerio Publico and told them that they needed to have the people in their office better informed about what should be done when a woman who has been raped comes in. And he related the confusion about seeing a doctor for testing to confirm a rape. They told him that the woman was in shock and that she needed to go to the hospital. Ned told them that wasn't the case. He was there with her and she just wanted to know how to get the proper testing done so that the rape could be confirmed and prosecuted. The people who were in the office did not seem to know anything about seeing a doctor. It is obvious that there are no procedures in place in the Ministerial police office for certain crimes. Maybe for any type crimes.

One thing that really bugged me yesterday was the representative from the Mayor's office said several times things like, "You must remember that Mexico is a Third World country. We do not have all the things in place that you do in the States." Excuse me, I don't think Mexico is a third world country. Maybe a second world country but why would he say that about his beautiful country. I was embarrassed for him that he would describe his country that way and I felt that he was using it as an excuse for nothing being done about crime.

It will be interesting to see what happens. Rapist are hard to catch. Sometimes in the United States it can take months and months before one is apprehended. But here where the laws are so strange that even though they have a sketch of the rapist, they can not show it to anyone....I doubt if even the preventive police have seen it; where, we have heard, there is no extradition from one State to another so the criminal can cross the State line and avoid being arrested. Here with all the inefficiencies, lack of communication and coordination between City and State law enforcement, with laws that make the investigation so difficult, I don't know if the rapist will be apprehended.

And if he is apprehended, I wonder what the penalty is for rape.

Juice?

Crime in Paradise

At 6:00 AM the phone rang. Ned answered. Our friend was on the line. She was calling to ask us to come. She had been raped and the man had just left her house. Thank God, although she had been raped she had not been beaten and battered or cut. This is the third rape that we know of in the last 4 months. All single gringas living alone.

Helping our friend (who for the rest of this report I'll just call Sue) was a lesson in the Mexican justice system. We knew that there are different kinds of police, the preventative police, the transit police and the ministerial police. The preventative and transit police are a part of the city government but the ministerial police who investigate and prosecute crimes are a part of the State government.

We immediately reported the rape to the emergency number that you call for the police....this is the preventative police. So far as we know there is no way to call the ministerial police. When we reached Sue's house, the preventative police had arrived. Apparently they did not get any information on what had happened from the dispatcher because they asked her, "You have a problem?" They did not take any notes and when we asked for their names, they only had small pieces of paper to write on. They wrote down the address of the ministerial police and said we should go immediately to report the rape to them.

The preventative police do not do any investigations when they come nor do they report anything to the ministerial police. In order to file a crime report the crime must be reported in person in Spanish to the ministerial police and you must go to their office in order to do that. If you are injured and can not go, I guess the crime goes unreported until you are well enough to go.

When we arrived at the ministerial police station, Sue asked if there was a doctor so that she could be examined to prove that she had been raped. From what we had heard about one of the other rapes, this was necessary for them to be able to investigate the rape. They told us that there wasn't a doctor. Our friend said she wanted to see a doctor and asked if she need to go to the hospital. They said yes. She could go to the hospital.

At the hospital, everyone was nice but there wasn't a gynecologist there and they had to call one in. It took a while for him to arrive but he did a thorough examination including photographs. We waited for the report which they told us might not be official and that Sue might have to see a doctor at the police station to "verify" the rape. By now we are confused. We don't have any idea how there could be a place at the police station where an examination could be performed and besides the police seemed vague about a doctor.

From our first experience at the police station, we realized that neither Sue or Ned's Spanish was going to be up to the task, so we called another couple who are friends (we'll just call them Ann and Mel) and they speak better Spanish. They joined us at the hospital and after we got the typed report and photographs all in a neat file folder, we went back to the ministerial police headquarters.

First, Sue and Ann meet with someone who interviewed them but didn't take any notes. When asked why he wasn't writing anything down he said he had to know about the incident to decide what to do. From that, we assumed he meant that unless they could convince him that a crime had taken place they would not be able to file a report. Finally he brought Sue and Ann out into a large open office where other people were close by and Sue was asked to give her "declaration" about the rape. At one point children were sitting within about 3 feet of Sue as she was trying to describe the details of the rape. She protested and the children were moved away. Not only did the clerk need to know about the rape but they also needed to know her parents names. Parents names are very important in Mexico even though we are not talking about a girl who was raped but a mature woman.

After the "declaration" had been typed into the computer, Sue still had to talk to a ministerial policeman and then she was directed to go to yet another place on the outskirts of town to see the doctor who would also examine her. He was the "expert" who could testify in court if the rapist should ever be found. At this location they also had a psychologist there to talk to her. Finally she came back to our house at 2:00 PM to have "breakfast" and coffee. Mel met the ministerial police at 1:30 PM at her house to open it up so that they could conduct their investigation.

There is crime in Paradise.....right here in San Miguel de Allende and it isn't easy to report a crime. Sue has done everything that we understand needs to be done to file the report. She did it for all the women in San Miguel because we often hear that the ministerial police don't know about an attack or robbery because a "proper report" had not been filed.

We'll see what the ministerial police do now. The rapist in the other two cases hasn't been apprehended. But maybe there will be more action this time. The Mayor of the town lives in the same Colonia that Sue does.

Colors of San Miguel

I recently wrote about the seduction of color and how I've been shooting a lot more color images than black and white. I put the blame on the digital camera and the fact that when I shoot with digital I see the image first in color. But then I read an article in the Washington Post about a group of artist who came to San Miguel to paint. As I read their descriptions of the colors of San Miguel and about the luminous light they found, I found justification in my seduction.

From Susan Harb's description of San Miguel in the article perhaps you will be able to see why for so many people, it is love at first sight. We have friends here who came to visit for a week and bought a house before they left town. Definitely, wild, passionate, reckless abandoned love at first sight.

May I Take a Photograph?

Digital cameras are everywhere. In cell phones, pockets, briefcases, purses, hanging from wrists and necks. And we are using them. In my opinion, we are using them more than we ever used film. But at the same time we are hearing more and more about places that are prohibiting photography.

This week in USA Today, Andrew Kantor wrote an article about what rights one has with a camera. In general he says that if you can see it, you can shoot it. There are limitations such as being on military bases or in government buildings but if the property is open to the public such as the lobbies of buildings, then you have a right to shoot. He also says that you can refuse to give someone your film or memory card unless they have a court order. And he makes distinctions between taking the photograph and publishing the photograph.

But it all gets a little murky when you are banded from a place of business for taking pictures, like a mall, and you come back into the mall, then you are trespassing. So it would seem that although you have the right to photograph, the owners of a property also have the right to refuse to let you on their property.

It is an interesting article and while it seems to be on the side of the rights of a photographer, I think that he is sweeping some of the issues under the rug for the professional or fine arts photographer.

What is your dream?

I found this quote at the end of an email I received today. I haven't been able to quit thinking about the truth of it......and asking myself, "What is your dream and what are you doing about it?"

"It is not true that people stop pursuing dreams because they grow old,
they grow old because they stop pursuing dreams."
Gabriel Garcia Marquez

A Place to Read

Doesn't this look like a good place to curl up and read a book. Another photo from a recent shoot.

Welcome

From a recent shoot.

No More Baking Failures!

My regular readers know of my complaints about baking in San Miguel....altitude of 6700 feet above sea level. I came here from Houston (basically sea level) and had never given a thought to any problems that might occur when you bake at higher altitudes. Well I learned very quickly that it is a problem. Cookies spread, textures change, cakes rise then fall. Gradually I've found a few dessert recipes that either I adapted or weren't affected by the altitude. I searched the internet and found conversion charts for how you adjust recipes...the adjustments never worked for me.

I have just bought a new book..................

Pie in the Sky by Susan G. Purdy. While I haven't tried any of the recipes yet I know they are going to work. Purdy actually went to places that were 3000, 5000, 7500 and 10000 feet above sea level and cooked these 100 recipes over and over until she perfected the adjustments to make the dessert. What she found was that a linear progression of adjustments didn't work. So much of what we find in the conversion charts is wrong. She also gives explanations of what you can try when you are adjusting your own recipes. Her recipes are laid out in a chart with the adjustment for each ingredient.

Her adventures in each of the altitude locations adds a "good read" to the book. This cookbook is a welcome addition to my San Miguel bookshelf.

Morning Light

The morning light on the roses from the dinner party last Thursday.

Psychic Dog

I think Taylor, our cocker spaniel, is a mindreader.

There are some things that he seems to know but you could say that it is just his routine or that he knows our routines so he anticipates what is going to happen. But a few other things make me think he can read my mind.

He knows when it is Saturday because he gets a cooked egg added to his food on Saturday. So on Saturday morning he is always right by the stove watching every move and making dog noises to let us know he is anxious for us to get his breakfast. Oh, you might think that he sees us get out the skillet or hears the crack of the egg shell and that tells him he is about to get his special Saturday breakfast. Fine...that could be a sign but what about the other days of the week when we make eggs for us and not for him. He doesn't behave in this way. He KNOWS it isn't Saturday. He KNOWS that we are thinking about giving him an egg on this day.

He always seems to know when I'm going to brush him and he will hide so I decided to put him to a test. Find out if he really could read my mind. For several days when I got up from the computer in the morning, I would say, "Come, Taylor. Let's go downstairs." He would get up and stretch and follow me down. On Monday, I had decided that I would brush him but I didn't say a word about it. I got up from the computer and said, "Come, Taylor. Let's go downstairs." I started down the steps. He didn't come. I looked back and there he was, sitting by Ned's feet. He was shivering. His head was lower and he was kind of looking away. Like if I don't look at you, you can't see me. I had to pick him up and carry him down the stairs.

How did he know that he was going to get brushed if he wasn't a psychic mindreader?

Seeing the World

At one time I wanted to travel to many places. I mean I really wanted to go places. Wanted to go enough that we got up and went. England, Italy, Australia, New Zealand, Belize, Mexico....almost all the States in Mexico. I read travel books, the travel sections of the Sunday papers. Clipped articles and saved them. We hoarded Frequent Flyer miles. We had a trip on the books for the English Countryside one May. A trip to France in the Fall to see an exhibition that included some of my work. I wanted to see Prague. Always ready to go.

But something happened. We bought this house in Mexico. Oh yes, I still read about someone else's adventures but I'm not clipping articles and saving them. I'm content to just read.

I'm content to be here. To wake up to the roosters crowing in the morning....and lots of other times too. To see the kids in their school uniforms running down the street to school. To hear the church bells ringing to announce mass or processions. To sit on the terrace and watch a full moon come up over the hills. To walk through markets of vegetables, meats, poultry, flowers, food booths, clothing, shoes and CD's. To walk down the street for a comida of a gigantic shrimp cocktail. To sit at a dinner table and talk with the most amazing people.

I guess I don't need to go anywhere else. I'm living an adventure everyday.

Cost of Living

One of my favorite blogs on living in Mexico is Rancho Calypso. Juan wrote a long blog yesterday about the cost of buying groceries. He got several replies including my rather long one. I started to write something about the cost of living in Mexico too but I decided it was all covered in his blog and the comments.

Darkroom vs. Photoshop

I'm getting ready for a show during FotoFest in March. So I'm spending some long days in front of the computer. These images were made with a Holga Camera on Ilford Delta 3200 monochrome film that was exposed mostly at 400 ISO but in some instances at 800 or 1600 ISO. The negatives were scanned and now I'm working on them in the computer. Not the darkroom. So I've been thinking a lot about the differences.

There are some things I can do on the computer that would be very difficult if not impossible in the darkroom. In the computer it is easier to select specific areas to dodge or burn and I can blur a part of the photograph easily if needed. I can push the contrast in a specific area as well. While I could bleach or intensify a part of a photograph in the darkroom, it isn't an easy process and it is quite possible that you might overdo either one and ruin the print that you have been working on for 30 minutes. Another piece of expensive paper for what all darkroom workers say is the most important tool in a darkroom, the trashcan.

When I go into a darkroom to work, I have to mix chemicals. The chemistry doesn't stay fresh for extended periods so when you make them up, especially when you are making up large trays of chemistry, you plan to spend the day in the darkroom. Sometimes it is hard to set aside 6 to 8 hours for printing, and when you finish printing you still have print washing and then toning of the print and more print washing. Once you get started it is hard to find a place to stop until the prints are totally finished and on the drying racks. So your day of printing can easily extend to 12 hours. It is physically demanding. You are on your feet and you are using your arms and shoulders as you rock trays and lift 16x20 prints from one tray to another.

Working on files on the computer has a big convenience advantage over the darkroom. You can sit down and work on your file for an hour or two. Make some notes on it about things you want to follow up on when you bring the file back up, save and leave your workstation. You would think that making a digital print would be much faster but I can seldom make more than 2 to 3 digital prints per day. It was the same in the darkroom. Although in the darkroom after a satisfactory print was made you still had to wash and tone prints, but the actually time of making a print is very similar.

Still there is something magical about making a darkroom print. You know what I mean if you have ever done any printing in a darkroom. You are moving around in a low light and quiet, unless you are working in a community darkroom. There are no distractions...just you and the negative, the enlarger light and the smell of the chemicals. You put the exposed paper in the tray, rock it gently and the magic happens, an image is gradually revealed on the paper. Sometimes you take a deep breath and say, "Wow!"

There is also something luscious and sensual about a silver print on glossy paper that up until now I haven't seen from a digital print. Don't get me wrong, I've seen some absolutely gorgeous digital monochrome prints but they don't have the same surface qualities as the silver print....at least not yet although I'm getting a sample of a new paper to try that may narrow the differences. It is hard to explain because I'm not saying the silver print is better, just different. It is like comparing fabrics....I've also been a good seamstress in my day. A fine linen can hold beautiful colors and have a wonderful crispness and drape but that will be different than a fine satin fabric. Both fabrics are beautiful in their own right, just different. A platinum print, a silver print, a digital print.....all different but all can be exquisitely beautiful.

It really all boils down to a photographer lucky enough to have a darkroom and a digital workstation has two choices in presenting their work. I'm printing this project via digital because I think this is the best way to interpret this work. And I have to admit that sometimes as I make a curve adjustment in Photoshop, I will have to stop and take in a breath and say, "Wow" so maybe the darkroom magic is in Photoshop too.

Frank Just Made My Day!

I just had a Skype call from Frank. Frank is a friend but originally he was a mentor....well, I guess he is still a mentor in many ways photographically.

He was working in PhotoShop on images for his show at Clark University and he had a problem with PhotoShop. He couldn't get the brush size for tools to change and he couldn't figure out why. It was driving him crazy. I immediately asked, "Do you have Num Lock, Caps Lock or Scroll Lock on?" Yes, he had Scroll Lock on. He clicked it off and he was back in business.

As little as I feel I know about PhotoShop, at last I've reached a point that sometimes I can help someone else. That makes me feel very good. Proof I'm making progress!

The Seduction of Color

Since I first went into a darkroom and saw a print come up in a tray of chemicals, I photographed with Monochrome film. I learned to see light. I learned to see in black and white. I learned to use my modified version of the zone system. I learned to make a good black and white print with the right balance of rich shadows and delicate highlights. I learned the craft and had control so I could make images that mattered to me.

But everytime I used color film because the place was so colorful and I thought maybe color was the way to capture the image, I was disappointed with my results. For a little while I tried carrying two cameras one loaded with color film and another loaded with monochrome film. My mind wasn't capable of switching back and forth and I didn't get good images in either medium. When I only took a camera loaded with color film, I didn't see in color. And I didn't have control of the process. I had to take my film to the lab and then get them to make prints which most often came back looking rather blah. I didn't know what to tell them to do to fix it. I tried color printing in my darkroom but the effort was a total failure for me. I couldn't or wouldn't spend the hours in the darkroom to learn how to color balance and make a good color print.

So for many years, I lived a very happy black and white life.

Then digital cameras came into my life. I have shot mainly with a digital SLR for almost three years. It took a long time but I finally started seeing in color and I finally got color management/computer/monitor/printer together. At least enough together so I feel I have some control over the craft. When you get control over the craft and techniques then you can start making your images instead of just taking images.

But COLOR is seductive. It has become a demanding lover and I've just realized that Color keeps whispering in my ear, "No, no, you don't need to convert that image to Monochrome. It looks good just the way it is." That ain't necessarily so.

I've been lazy but since I've been working on the black and white prints for a show during FotoFest in Houston I've been enticed by my first lover to come back to black and white images. Somehow, I have to find a way to balance the old love and the new love and figure out which images should be in color or in monochrome.

This isn't as simple a decision as it was in the old days. Then you made your decision; color film vs. monochrome film before you ever went to make an image. There was no looking back. But with the digital age, you can take the digital file and go either way. There can be a lot of looking back, questioning, indecision. This is one of the things I've got to work on in 2006.

Arrival of the three Kings

Arrival of the three Kings, originally uploaded by BillieS.

Last night the Three Kings arrived at the Templo del Oratorio church. There were many children to greet them and they followed them into the church showering everyone with confetti.

Neighbors

Next door neighbors. They sell tripe tacos and menudo.

Neighbors in the next block. They sell great tamales and atole

Templo del Oratorio

We've Been Counted

This tag was put on our door after we were counted in the Census here in San Miguel de Allende.

Some of the questions were:
How many people live in this house?
How many rooms are in this house?
What kind of floor does the house have? concrete, tile, dirt?
Do you have city water?
Do you have electricity?
Do you have plumbing?
How long have you lived here?
No questions about race or nationality.

Just before the census taker left, he said to Ned, "This is a big house for 2 people. Some houses have 20 people living in them."

I'd write about this comment but I still haven't sorted out how I feel or what I want to say. I'm afraid if I start I'd have to write a book. So many political, international, social and economic issues...........

Photograph - January 4th

Out with the Lensbaby this morning.

Shopping, cooking and photographing

Since I stopped partying the afternoon of January 1, I've been cooking. And doing a bit of photography. This image is across the street from the house. And this is the neighborhood telephone booth. A lot of my neighbors don't have telephones in their homes and this one is well used.
On the 2nd while buying brussel sprouts and carrots to go with a milanesa de res, we noticed that the eggplants were looking good. I was trying to think of how I might use them. I checked out some of the recipe websites but nothing appealed to me. Still I wanted eggplant and thought I would use it with pasta with or without a recipe.

First stop was El Tomate for the eggplant and a wonderful loaf of a sourdough bread. I also paid dearly for a small jar of "Greek Olives" that I felt I would have to have for my eggplant dish. Then into Espinos. I wanted to see if they had a canned pasta sauce. They had Prego at $4 a jar. I was going to pass on using a pasta sauce but then I saw a Campbell (made in Mexico) Italian pasta sauce for $2. Unless you like sweet pasta sauce, you can pass on the Campbell sauce. I think you could add some eggs and put it in a pie shell for a tomato pie dessert it is so sweet. At the vegetable stand outside of Espinos, I bought a big beautiful portobello mushroom. This dinner is beginning to come together.

I stopped at La Cava deli to see if they might have any Italian sausage. No, no sausage. I don't know why we can't get Italian sausage here. I seldom ever find it at any stores, even over in Queretaro. So Italian sausage won't be part of my recipe.

From there I walked down Umaran to the San Juan de Dios Mercado. It is a steep street. Not only are you going downhill at a steep rate but it also has steps at places along the sidewalk. I'm sure glad that I don't have a house at the bottom of that street. Going down is bad enough but up.....I don't think I could walk up that hill and talk at the same time.

I wanted to check out the San Juan market because in Atencion, our English newspaper, there had been an article about January 6 and all the toy booths selling toys around this market. This could be another photo op. So far only one or two toy booths. Probably another case of mis-information from Atencion.

In the vegetable markets you will find the vendors chopping up vegetables and putting them in sacks. Your ready soup mix....except these vegetables have not been disinfected and they are not sealed. I'll chop my own soup mix, thank you. I bought tomatoes, zucchini, carrots and tangerines. By this time my backpack is full and I'm happy to run into Ned who has been out shopping for a small pair of scissors. He takes on the backpack for the walk up the hill to Casa Mercer.

While the veggies are disinfecting I started a pot of soup with leeks and some bony pieces of chicken I've been saving. The zucchini and carrots will go into the soup base today for a hardy chicken vegetable soup. I might garnish it with some chopped tomato, avocado and Ranchero cheese. That should give it a Mexican flavor.

This was our pasta dinner. Tomato and Eggplant. These are approximate measurements. I just chopped and cooked.

Chop up 3/4 cup onion, 3 cloves of garlic 3 roma tomatoes, 1/2 a large eggplant. Saute the onion, add the tomato and eggplant. Cut up 1/2 a large portobello mushroom. Add red pepper flakes, salt and pepper. Add about 1/2 cup canned pasta sauce. Cook Rotini, spoon sauce over the pasta and top with grated parmesean. Serve with a green salad.

And people ask me what I do in Mexico!

Thoughts on Where I am Today, Photographically Speaking

I read Tommy Blogs. Tommy has made three simple but very challenging New Years Resolutions. One of them is making a photograph everyday.

I've played around with this idea myself but I've never been able to stick to it for very long. But after I started thinking about it again for 2006, I started finding all kinds of encouragement from the "universe." I read this quote by Somerset Maugham (although I haven't been able to verify it.) Just substitute the word Photographing for Writing.

"Writing everyday is no guarantee that you will make a masterpiece. But you will never make a masterpiece if you don't write everyday."

I picked up an old copy of Lenswork magazine (No. 47 June-Jul 2003) to thumb through before going to sleep. There was an article by the Editor, Brooks Jensen, titled Photography as a Verb. In the article Jensen says that he became a better photographer after he learned the secret for success. Make lots of photographs. He learned this from Ted Orland and David Bales in their book Art and Fear.

Art and Fear is one of my favorite books too and this made me remember one of the stories from the book. A pottery class was divided into two groups. They were told that one group would be graded on the amount of work they turned out and the other group was told that they only had to have one perfect pot. At the end of the semester the group that had made the most pots also made the best pots. Orland and Bayles were telling the readers that producing lots of work usually also produces better work. Certainly taking a photograph a day keeps you working consistently.

So just when I'm thinking that I should be doing a photo-a-day I also read in Jensen's article, "Making random artwork on a random schedule for random purposes ends in random results." Is that what I had in 2005? Random Results? I made a lot of photographs. I looked back over my digital files. I have 127 folders of images. Some folders may only have 10-15 images but some are large folders with more than 70 image files. On average I shot about every third day of the year.

I'm asking myself, what did I learn? What did I accomplish? I learned a lot about shooting with a digital camera. I learned a lot about using Photoshop. I learned a lot more about shooting food, shooting at night and shooting the interior of houses. I put some of this work in galleries on Pbase or Flickr but that doesn't seem like an end result or an accomplishment. I learned from it but the work seems to be just hanging there in cyberspace. Suddenly I realized that I have unfinished business from 2005. The circle isn't closed for me until I have made prints. So in 2006, I will make some portfolios from this work.

This doesn't mean that I'm not going to be carrying the camera with me most days though. Because the learning experiences in 2005 came about because I had the camera with me and I made images. In a sense they were random images, with random results but they opened my eyes to new possibilities.

The Party is Over

One party, two party, three party, four..........
The New Year has been welcomed!

On Saturday afternoon, I went down to Anna and John's for a short visit. We had already accepted other invitations but I had to see them before they left for the States and to see what they had done to their house. Oh, my but Anna was serving a feast in just a little while, Shrimp on a skewer, quesadillas, sausage, guacamole, Queso fundido. It was very tempting.

I went back home and we dressed to go to Darlene's and Tony's. They too had a feast with people dropping in before heading on to other parties. It was so nice to get to meet Tony's Mom who survived Katrina in New Orleans. She had fascinating stories to tell about how she escaped. We also met people from nova Scotia. I'm always amazed at the variety of people we meet here and the stories they have to tell.

From there we were headed to another party where we would see the New Year in but Ned's back was being cantankerous as it can sometime be so we decided to go back to the house and get him on his "drugs." We were already in bed when the town came alive with fireworks and bells to bring the New Year in.

On New Year's morning the medications had really helped Ned's back, so in the afternoon we headed off to Rick and Deb's place out near Atotonillco. We have been to a lot of parties at their house but this may have been the biggest one yet. They served the best tamales and then pozole with all the "fixin's." It was the greatest. I don't know how they manage to do it but they bring together the most amazing groups of people, feed them simple but delicious food and you feel like you can just hang out there forever.

The parties have been great. It has been wonderful to see all our friends and meet a lot of new people. But it is time for the party to be over.....
well, at least for a few days!