Photographs captured with a DJI Spark and NikonD3400. August 2018. Charles River. Boston, MA.
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Charles River Landscapes
New England Air
Low Light
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The Edge of 16
A poem from the book “Portrait of a Stained Glass Life”.
Jamaca Ryder – Field Ethnographer
Soma, Somatic. Population: ?
Flat Face Kids
Featured
The Devilish + Demure TJ Hicks
Part 1. In Memory of Strange Fruit
For a Spark – 7/4/2018
All images captured 7/4/2018 with a NikonD, iPhone, and DJI Spark in the Blue Hills Reservation in Eastern Massachusetts.
Lake Ponkapoag – Blue Hills. Captured with a DJI Spark. 7/18
Collage
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Macro-Photography
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Black and White Photography
Lake Ponkapoag – Blue Hills. Captured with a DJI Spark. 7/18
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Landscape Photography
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Lake Ponkapoag – Blue Hills. Captured with a DJI Spark. 7/18
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Robbins Pond – Halifax, MA. Captured with a DJI Spark. 5/18
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Blue Hills. Captured with a DJI Spark. 7/18
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Hingham Harbor – Captured with a DJI Spark. 7/18
Charles River. Boston, MA. Captured with a DJI Spark. 6/18
Lake Ponkapoag – Blue Hills. Captured with a DJI Spark. 7/18
Blue Hills. Captured with a DJI Spark. 7/18
Blue Hills. Captured with a DJI Spark. 7/18
Lake Ponkapoag – Blue Hills. Captured with a DJI Spark. 7/18
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Lake Ponkapoag – Blue Hills. Captured with a DJI Spark. 7/18
The Great Blue Hill. Captured with a DJI Spark. 6/2018
Blue Hills. Captured with a DJI Spark. 7/18
Lake Ponkapoag – Blue Hills. Captured with a DJI Spark. 7/18
Hingham Harbor – Captured with a DJI Spark. 4/18
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Lake Ponkapoag – Blue Hills. Captured with a NikonD. 7/18
Cordage Parrk – Plymouth, MA. Captured with a DJI Spark. 4/18
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Hingham Harbor – Captured with a DJI Spark. 4/18
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Lake Ponkapoag – Blue Hills. Captured with a DJI Spark. 7/18
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Plymouth, MA – Captured with a DJI Spark. 4/18
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Robbins Pond – Halifax, MA. Captured with a DJI Spark. 5/18
Robbins Pond – Halifax, MA. Captured with a DJI Spark. 5/18
Robbins Pond – Halifax, MA. Captured with a DJI Spark. 5/18
Hingham Harbor – Captured with a DJI Spark. 4/18
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M-A-R-L-E-N-A
Neighbor Jim
Stories
The Sunflower
Captured with a Nikon D3400 and an iPhone during the month of July in eastern Massachusetts.
Photography
Invitation
Invitation. Deconstructed photo collage. Limited print run (please contact me if interested). The photo was taken 5/2018 in the Blue Hills Reservation of Massachusetts with a Nikon.
Strange Fruit
Featured
Expert Expression
Blue Hills Summertime
All captures taken with a DJI Spark and NikonD3400 during the months of June and July 2018 in the Blue Hills Reservation of Massachusetts.
Featured
Montreal Light – A Short Story
Artifacts of a Product Manager
Artifacts of a Product Manager
Photography Was a Passion of Mine Long Before I Became a Product Manager
After just a single elective photography course in college, I became hooked. The class format was simple enough — first, we received our assignment with some basic instruction from the professor, next we took to the streets with our overpriced film to capture our shots, and we then selected our top 3 to 5 film negatives (remember those?) that we wanted to develop onto photo paper.
That magic occurred in the darkroom — a barely lit cave directly adjacent to our more formal classroom. It was filled with dangerous chemicals, *early 2000’s emo rock, and intensely frustrating iteration — all to create something a little more tangible. My head was spinning. I loved it.
Once we completed the development process, it was time for our instructor to kindly deconstruct exactly how and why our photos sucked, but “don’t worry” she explained — if we enjoyed photography and kept working at it, we were almost guaranteed to get better.
She was an expert photographer, and I proved her correct
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My footing was sure before the ground shook.
After graduation, I worked at 2 technology startups that could not have been more different from one another. The first spun off from an established R&D firm and made it easier to search for audio online (speech to text). The second was an online personals website that made it easier to hook up. Although both were very different (with equally quirky cultures that I enjoyed) both provided a great primer on the day to day hands on work required to market and sell products and services to a group of people who can benefit from its use.
After 5 years; I built up enough experience and knowledge to become semi-dangerous. My footing was on solid ground — and my future path was becoming a little clearer as I understood more clearly what I wanted to do, and what I didn’t want to do. I was in full stride and gainfully employed. I wore a Halloween costume to work for the first time ever. I was going on international business trips (yes, international)
And then the economic crisis of 2008 occurred and people were frightened. The people who ran companies were also frightened — and many (including my own) responded the best way they knew how. Layoffs.
I created digital shipping tools after I was an office boy.
A few years later, I graduated from a corporate-sponsored MBA program and dove head first into my first official role as a Product Manager with FedEx. My excitement and curiosity were matched with challenge and ambiguity — but more importantly, with the praise and kudos from my team and management on the victories and progress made along the way.
After a few years I came up for air to reflect — experts were asking me for my opinion, no two days were the same, and I was helping people in my own humble way — making online shipping easier and more efficient, in particular — for those silently head down in the largest and ugliest cube around — getting all the most essential and despised tasks/chores of the day — like preparing labels for shipments. You may have heard of them as they have many different titles:
- administrative assistant
- secretary
- temp
- regular assistant
- personal assistant
- executive assistance
- <insert your own> assistant
- person sitting next to the person in charge
- office boy
- me
And trust me, after providing that service (even for a single year at one of those startups) my appreciation for these task managers grew. All from our shared experience, holding down the cube.
To be continued…
Opposite Poles
Night Moves – On Connections
A Collection Inspired by “Night Moves” – A song written and performed by Bob Seger. One of my absolute favorite songs ever.
I was a little too tall
Could’ve used a few pounds
Tight pants points hardly renown
She was a black haired beauty with big dark eyes
And points all her own sitting way up highWay up firm and high
Out past the cornfields where the woods got heavy
Out in the back seat of my ’60 Chevy
Workin’ on mysteries without any clues
Workin’ on our night moves
Trying’ to make some front page drive-in news
Workin’ on our night moves in the summertime
In the sweet summertimeWe weren’t in love oh no far from it
We weren’t searching for some pie in the sky summit
We were just young and restless and bored
Living by the sword
And we’d steal away every chance we could
To the backroom, the alley, the trusty woods
I used her she used me
But neither one cared
We were getting our shareWorkin’ on our night moves
Trying to lose the awkward teenage blues
Workin’ on out night moves
In the summertime
In the sweet summer time, summer timeAnd oh the wonder
Felt the lightning
And we waited on the thunder
Waited on the thunderI woke last night to the sound of thunder
How far off I sat and wondered
Started humming a song from 1962
Ain’t it funny how the night moves
When you just don’t seem to have as much to lose
Strange how the night moves
With autumn closing inNight Moves
Night moves (night moves)
Night moves (night moves)
Yeah, Remember, night moves
Sure do remember those night moves (night moves)
Ain’t it funny how you remember (night moves)
Funny how you remember the night moves
I remember, I remember, I remember, I remember night whoa, whoa
It’s works, Working and practicing
Oh, on the night moves
Working and practicing….
Because if you don’t read it – there is no telling how long I may deny your entire existence…
Dumpster Diving
The dumpster arrived recently
just in time for some overdue spring cleaning
And I could not help but imagine
how lovely
all of this stuff and extra things
would appear inside Continue reading →
Nobody Likes Poetry. A Poem.
Featured
New England Air
Featured
Grand Canyon Skywalk. Arizona, USA
Featured
A Missed Opportunity
New England Air
New England Air – A Story Book
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Featured
Suspicious @ 15
What am I, really?
The sun does not make me happy,
nor the rain get me sad
yet I stand on their edge like a border
Perhaps happy and sad
are another language
for a body built to understand such things.
I am full of
stuff and things.
Dream Files from Old New England
An excerpt from “Final Resting Place”.
My body violently jerks out of sleep. Like in the movies when you see someone wake up in a dream. It’s never happened to me before.
It’s happening right now and I feel it — perhaps the strangest sensation I have ever experienced. My body rises out of bed and makes its way to the downstairs back door as if being controlled remotely.
My body senses the disconnect and tries to kick into gear — catching up to current movement — but it can’t. It feels like I’m tripping and I hate that sensation. I don’t let it take over this time. This is meant to happen — don’t fight it.
I arrive at the back door as it swings open — the backyard is visible through tunnel vision and everything outside the radius is blurred. Tunnel vision — like the depression sometimes.
Refocus. This is beyond me and my thoughts. However, this dream is more informative than the others.
Even now, my thinking takes over. I stop and just wait, the expanse of the green before me. The backyard trees form a dark canopy gently lit by the dim moon. Just enough to see directly in front of me. Then something from the far right corner comes into view.
My hesitation almost tears me away, but I stay. Accept it.
And who approaches — none other than Buddy, the neighbor’s dog. He is not floating though, his pace is quicker and purposeful. He comes and sits about ten feet before me. His eyes are wide open and his mouth appears to be smiling — almost. He sits there for me simply to enjoy his presence. A joyous feeling takes over.
And almost as quickly as he appears — it’s over.
Stuck in Time: The Abandoned Westborough State Mental Hospital
Original Hospital Plan
Campus Pencil Drawing
The East wing of Building #23. The windows are covered with plyboard and a security fence outlines its perimeter.
Building #23 – Another section of the massive main hospital – which house approximately 200 in-patients at any given time.
Building #23. The front “visitors entrance” into the lobby of the main patient ward.
A peak inside building #23
Building #10. This structure predates the main patient ward and was the site of the original boy’s home on the campus grounds.
The quiet and bare grounds of the abandoned hospital campus.
Small trash door and show. A look inside the courtyard of building #23.
Building #7 – Administration
This structure sits on the south side of the now abandoned Westborough State Mental Hospital campus – just a 3-minute stroll from the main patient ward at building #23.
Here, staff would perform various administrative duties and rest during breaks from caring for the approximately 200 in-patients residing at the hospital at any given time.
Building #7
Storm Clouds
Over the abandoned Quincy Quarry. Quincy, MA. April 2018.
Unsolved Mysteries
They had pictures on TV again, from up there in space. What are they looking for up there - that isn't already down here?
Teacher Told Me (work in progress)
Black + White
These are some recent black and white photographs of some furry friends. Taken at Burrage Pond Wildlife Mgmt. area in Halifax, MA. (April 2018)
Two Mares
Brooklyn
The Bough Breaks
A Question
The Pine Forest in Matte
This photograph was taken in the Blue Hills Reservation – Dedham, MA. March 2018.
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Euro Mutt
“The world’s trash and mutts – the whole lot of them, in ships every day by the dozen.” – Matilde H. Journal Entry (est. 1880) recording of an overheard comment during passage to an American port (NYC). German Immigrant – 16 at the time of passage. Traveled alone.
Or, personal labels I am comfortable with – by Matilde H. (1883)
My sense of beauty is Italia,
simple yet bold.
pragmatism of Deutschland
thoughtful and structured
attitude towards others of France
laissez-faire but curious
passion of Scotland
misunderstood yet strong
presence of England
conservative and reserved
pace of España
relaxed with meaning
purpose of Ireland
complicated and symbolic
surroundings are Kongeriket Norge
filled with peaceful tranquility
I do not love them,
Nor hate them.
I am with them.
Always.
My X-MAS Time Gift Wrap
All of these precious gifts from you
they consume me
and often at times like these
oh how they can confuse me
“why am I acting my way
through Christmas again”?
I know we do not have much
in the way of material things
which sort of makes
- it sting a little more.
Did these gifts
ever hold a real sparkle in your eye?
You heaped them on me
and I always knew
this was your display to me
of love –
everybody could see.
I never learned to wrap a gift
decorative bags became an indispensable friend.
Perhaps I am lazy,
or have never found the perfect packaging
for my one and only true gift
to you.
Please Come Home
A 20-pound ball of empathy –
he is one of our marvelous creatures.
Has anything ever held a mirror up to your humanity
like an animal that loves or
an animal that fears?
Throughout history,
we have served each other’s purpose.
They are bred in our reflection
mutts at the core, wanting to be truly known,
begging for nourishment –
constantly.
*Chase — otherwise known as booter, booter-butt, chicken butt, or boo boo
Iteration
A Restless Lullaby
Only the Hits – A Series of Cover Art
The Anhedonia’s – “Who has their finger all over my excited switch”
The retired cranberry bog next to Burrage Pond (aerial photo + video)
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Nature Reimagined 