Entitlement

Here's the true definition, or one of them.

Entitlement:  belief that one is deserving of or entitled to certain privileges.  

Anyone who knows me well has heard my disdain for this personality trait.  I truly believe that it is the worst human characteristic we have within ourselves.  Remove it and all evil doings will disappear as well.  Think about it.  You only have to change the meaning of "privileges" and you'll cover most injustices.  From the larger, more awful ones to the lesser thought of ones like disrespect, ungratefulness, or spoiled behavior.  

I am here to officially announce that I too have succumbed to the entitlement pressure.  I have become increasingly rude and presumptuous over the past 6 weeks and would like to henceforth apologize to anyone I have mistreated in my recent pedestal climbing ways.  

My Privilege?

As a law abiding, tree planting, hard working citizen of this world, I demand that warmer temperatures return immediately.  Looking out our windows into a brown, lifeless forest is no longer romantic or snuggly.  The dark mornings and brisk, windy runs have gone from refreshing to annoying.  I'm sure all of these feelings will return next fall but for now, enough is enough.  

I am whining.  But as someone who rarely complains and who tries in earnest to keep her needs at a minimum,  I am cashing in on all of my pent up resistance to self-entitled jerks and using it here.  Bring me the sun.

These faces would sure appreciate it.  As would my appallingly pasty legs.

Thanks.

I might be biased.

Last post:  Sept. 8, 2010.  And that one was done by Dave.  I'm pretty sure I haven't written anything here since May.  ish.

I of course had big things in mind for this blog.  Every holiday season, I'd get the year printed in one of those cute little photo blog book things and save it for us to reminisce back on whenever we wanted a stroll down memory lane.  But, turns out, there isn't much time for blogging when you're leaving jobs, traveling the country, enjoying the holidays, becoming a famous magazine photographer :), and, well... living.  And, the way I see it, if there isn't much time for blogging, there sure as hell won't be much time for reminiscing anytime in the near future so I'm giving myself a break.  Which is hard for someone (a perfectionist) like me to do.

So, as Les and I decided last night (I'll call you back tomorrow, by the way), sometimes there are just too many details to catch up on and the best thing to do is talk about what's going on now and let the rest be.

Done.

One of the reasons I love taking pictures is that it forces you see the world more specifically.  You're constantly looking for an alternate way to capture the world around you.  Different angles.  Varying light.  It makes you see details that I think would otherwise become part of the overall scene and go unnoticed.  Or, at times, you make a deal with yourself to leave that particular moment alone and record it only to memory.

Blogs strike me as the same sort of temporarily captured moments, like the verbal version of photos.  A lot of the time they seem like thoughts the authors had processed or explored that day or week.  If you know them well enough, sometimes you can even hear that person saying the words and using the phrases.  Dave is an incredible writer.  Funny, candid, honest, conversational, and relatable.

You can check out his blog here.  He's also recently gotten a piece published in the latest edition of XXC magazine.  Page 24.  And, yes, that's me riding his literary coattails and stealing the photo credits.

I think one of the reasons he's so good is that he writes mainly about riding, something we all know he loves more than most things.  Granted, he studied writing in school and that certainly has a presence in the structure and layout of his work, but mostly, he just loves his topic.  When you adore something like that, you want to research it, need to spend time thinking about it, can't wait to look at it from another angle.  He's a perfect example of loving something so much that being good at it is just a natural progression.  A lot like the way he rides actually.

There's a lesson in that.  Loving something, or maybe someone, to the point where you just can't help but do it well.

So on this Valentine's Day eve, what or who do you love that much?