it's leap day

In case you had, you know, forgotten. Since it's the last day of the month, I thought I'd just post pictures and stuff from February that I haven't already. And also because I just wanted to be able to post on Leap Day.

This is what winter looks like a lot of the time here. (Mostly the first one.)

The spectacular sunset came for another visit.

Things are starting to come back to life. The beginning of spring is beautiful. I forget it, every year, but it is.

//After yesterday, I don't think I ever want to eat anything sweet again. It was my friend's birthday so we all brought desserts and I had two cupcakes, some German chocolate cake, some lots of apple pie, at least two cookies, and a lemon square. That was my lunch. I felt so sick afterwards.

My eating habits are, admittedly, strange. It's gotten worse with this no meat thing. My dinners have become smaller and I've kind of been substituting desserts for meat. Not to mention the fact that I've had two bowls of cereal today already. This is not really what was supposed to happen. Ohhh....ohhh well. I'll work on it.

Back to my essay and worrying about the future

paradise

when she was just a girl 
she expected the world
but it flew away from her reach
so she ran away in her sleep
she dreamed of para-para-paradise
every time she closed her eyes

That song is so apt to my life right now, you know? On lonely nights near the end of winter, there's nothing I long for more than summer. And not just a different time, but a different place, too. I found these pictures of Hawai'i from last year and had to bring them out of the archives. It's kind of hard for me to believe I was really there. It's like another world. Paradise. Whereas the one I'm living in now is more resembling Dante's Inferno...but we're done with that book, so I'm going to try to lay those allusions to rest. Hawai'i is the closest place to paradise I've ever been, though what I want now is not just some place beautiful. I want some place where I can get away from all the expectations people have of me, all the work and all the people who bicker and complain and bother me. That's the paradise I dream of. And that's the one that always slips away before I wake up.

And now back to your regularly scheduled posting.

january/early february in film

So I got my first roll of film back! I decided this time just to get the prints and not the CD with them scanned because I can scan them at home. Only I didn't realize that regular scanners are pretty dumb so everything is more grainy and the colors are pretty jank. (Jank is like the best word ever, by the way.) Ah, well. Here are some of my favorites.

Look, it's the moon!

Grass. Unexciting.

Pasta from a vegetarian restaurant. 

Berries. That are probably poisonous. 

Light & windows.

My room. 

Mayrose! From this shoot a while ago.

Claudia!

That's all for now. I'm still figuring out what I'd like to do with film, like, as opposed to digital. I think I'd like to shoot more people and places with film, more intentional stuff, and keep digital for the stuff I do every day, like still lifes, nature, self-portraits, and silly things. I'm not sure, though. Something to mull over.