Out of the mouths of kids...

So I was driving my kids somewhere yesterday, and the radio person was talking about Barack Obama. Upon hearing Obama's name, Delaney immediately said "Daddy! They said 'Rock Obama!' 'Rock' Obama, daddy!" (Yes, she calls him "Rock" Obama). Whereupon the following exchange ensued:

Troy: They must be trying to get votes, because they are talking about Barack Obama.

Me: What's that, buddy?

Troy: I said someone must be trying to get votes, because they said Barack Obama.

Delaney: I voted for Strawberry Shortcake!

Me: Really, Baby Girl? You voted for Strawberry Shortcake?

Delaney: Yeah, I did!

Troy: Oh Sis, you can't vote for Strawberry Shortcake, because she's not running for mayor! Silly girl!

I love those kids.

A Year Later

I haven't written anything here in nearly 4 months. There have been times when I've had things to write, but just haven't done so, for a variety of reasons, I suppose. But today I want to note the first anniversary of the day I received word that my kids would not be allowed to have me taken out of their lives. It was one year ago this morning that I was on my way to a construction site, cruising down I-5, when I received word from my attorney that the custody evaluator saw the value of the relationships I have with my kids, and recognized that relocating them to Los Angeles would do them no good.

In the past year, my relationships with them have only grown stronger, I feel that I've become an even better father than what the evaluator saw, and I've really done everything I can to raise them in the best ways I know how. I feel that the three of us are extremely close to one another.

Last weekend we had some pictures taken. These were mostly done as an 80th birthday present for my grandma, but I couldn't help but buy a whole bunch more. Here are a few of my favorites:

Viva Friedlander

So the trip to New Mexico went very well. I met Lee and Maria Friedlander Friday night, and they are both very friendly, cordial people. I didn’t get to take the picture of Lee that I had hoped for, but I did manage to grab a digital snap as he was signing books.

Lee and Maria Friedlander

Saturday and Sunday (up until my flight) were spent wandering the streets of Santa Fe and Albuquerque with my camera. The weather and the light were perfect. Sunny, clear skies, and about 75 degrees. I photographed my shadow all over those towns.

Above I mentioned carrying a digital camera to take a picture at the book signing. The digital camera came out again briefly Sunday, in downtown Albuquerque, and produced the picture below. I’ll leave it to your imagination to determine which of the four prohibited activities this guy is participating in.

Oh, It's On Now

I have become a huge fan of Lee Friedlander in the past two years. The body of work he has produced over the past 50 years is most impressive, and he continues to be very productive today, even at 74 years of age. When I saw his shows in San Francisco in April, one curator told me that Friedlander was in Japan photographing at that time, and that he would have two books published this year. A well-known photographer told me last year that, in his opinion, “nobody is more consistently inventive than Lee Friedlander.”

I think that my new interest in Friedlander’s work was at least partially precipitated by the recent changes in my life. I turned to 35mm photography last year as a result of new demands on my time. As I was trying to save my marriage and my kids from divorce, I completely shelved my large format equipment. Weekend outings with my camera came to an end, and all of my waking hours not spent working were devoted to my family. My kids’ mother decided that wasn’t good enough and the divorce eventually happened, but the effect on my photography has lasted. I have not made a large format photograph in over a year and a half now. I have sold two of my lenses, which I never imagined I would do.

But I continue to photograph, and fairly often. It’s easy to grab pictures with a 35mm camera on a lunch break. Or during a trip to the park with the kids. Or while waiting in a drive-thru at a coffee shop. In the introduction to his book of Frederick Law Olmsted landscapes, Friedlander writes “We photographers don’t really make anything: we peck at the world and try to find something curious or wild or beautiful that might fit into what the medium of photography can hold.” What a wonderful quote from someone who has used handheld cameras his entire career. We peck at the world.

Friedlander will be opening a show and signing his latest book, New Mexico, at a gallery in Santa Fe on October 31st. And I’ll be there. I may never have the opportunity to meet him again, so I’m seizing this one. And I already have a photograph in mind for when I meet him…

I can hardly wait.

A Rally Cry

I’ve always been one to remember dates and (mostly useless) trivia. I can often tell you where I was and what I was doing years ago on a particular date, and I can often make odd connections between things that occur on the same date, but years apart. For example, I can tell you that the cocker spaniel my sister and I had for a pet died on the 100th anniversary of Ansel Adams’ birth—February 20th, 2002. I recently won a bet with a friend who claimed Oregon State had never played a football game on a Thursday night before they played USC two weeks ago. I knew this because I remembered them playing a Thursday night game on August 31, 2006, which was the 25th anniversary of the day I started first grade.

I’m crazy.

Today is the second anniversary of the day I went to Hawaii for the first (and only) time. I flew there on October 6, 2006, for a friend’s wedding. The wedding was in Honolulu on the 7th, and I stayed there and on the Big Island for 6 more days afterward. I had worked my ass off during all of 2006, and that was to be a week of relaxation and photography of an exotic landscape I had never seen before.

But I was unable to really relax at all. My work back home just dominated my thoughts, and I was fighting back as hard as I could against another onset of depression. I also missed my son and baby daughter tremendously. I clearly remember my son (2 years old at the time) telling me that “next time I want to go on ‘bacation’ with you, Daddy.” That made it very hard to leave.

While I was in Hawaii, I heard a country song that was getting a lot of play at the time. It was by Rodney Atkins, and the chorus went:

“If you're going through hell
Keep on going, don't slow down
If you're scared, don't show it
You might get out
Before the devil even knows you're there.

If you're going through hell
Keep on moving, face that fire
Walk right through it
You might get out
Before the devil even knows you're there.”

It was a catchy tune that found its way to my ears at a very appropriate time.

And now it seems I need to live by that song’s rally cry more than ever. The pressures are almost as high as they’ve ever been in my life, but now other problems have piled on. I don’t know what I’d do if I didn’t have those kids there to greet me at the end of all these shitty days. But I’ll always be thankful that I still have that.

Heartache

I finally told Troy last night about the changes that are coming. He had been led to believe that our family would be putting the house up for sale so that we could move closer to my job. As a family. I guess I shouldn't be surprised by anything any more, but that one was shocking nonetheless. He looked at me with bright, cheery eyes and told me that we would be listing our house for sale and then moving to be closer to my work. I got a lump in my throat and told him the truth.

He seemed to grasp the reality of the situation immediately. His face started to sag, and he said "I want to stay together as a family and not get a divorce. I want to stay married. I'm trying to hold back the tears, but they are coming to my eyes and it's hard to stop them."

I was heartbroken. I told him that it's okay to cry. I told him that I had done everything I could to prevent a divorce, and that the decision wasn't mine to make. He told me he needed to go find his mother to tell her that this is a bad idea. He went off to find her, and I helped him. As soon as he told her what he thought, she tried to skirt the issue as best she could, but was unsuccessful. Yes, Troy, you get to go pick raspberries today. And yes, the neighbor boy invited you over to watch a TV show. And no, Daddy won't be living with you any more. That's just the way it is going to be, no matter how much better you and your sister deserve.

I did tell him that I will always be here for him and his sister, and that he can always come to talk to me about this. I told him that he can ask me whatever questions he has, he can express any fears or hurt feelings he has, and that I will always tell him the truth. He deserves to be told the truth, not to go on in a candy-coated, la-la land world of fiction and fabrications.

Recent happier times

Fathers and Sons, III

My dad, my son, and me (and my sister's dog)

---

And I said "Daddy, I'm so afraid

how will I go on with you gone that way?"

...And he said "That's my job; that's what I do.

Everything I do is because of you,

To keep you safe with me.

That's my job, you see."

-From another country song

Needless to say, this will be a much happier Father's Day than last year's was. It should be a great weekend, relatively speaking.

Delaney turns 2

Well I know one day I'll give you away,

And I'm gonna stand there and smile.

But when I get back home and I'm all alone,

Well I'll sit in your room for awhile.

...When tough little boys grow up to be dads,

They turn into BIG babies again.

-From a country song playing in my head right now

Finally!

Lee Friedlander, from Self-Portrait

I finally got to view a large number of Friedlander prints in person last weekend during a quick stop in San Francisco…and what a treat. My first stop was at the Fraenkel Gallery, on Geary Street. This gallery has published a good number of Friedlander’s most recent books, and is the home of “America By Car,” a series of photographs Friedlander has made with his Hasselblad Superwide from the insides of rented cars throughout the country. Friedlander continues to be as inventive and creative as ever, and there are a number of treats in this exhibit. One particular photograph that surprised me shows a view out of the passenger’s side door. It’s very bright outside relative to the inside of the car. But also visible in the picture is Friedlander’s face looking back at you in the side view mirror. And to make his face visible, he had mounted a flash to his camera and rotated it 180 degrees, so that it was pointing back inside the car, to illuminate himself. It was a very innovative picture. I was told by gallery staff that a book of this work would be available in about a year, and that Friedlander is still producing photographs for this series. I eagerly await its publication.

My next stop was right down the hall, at the Scott Nichols Gallery, to see some Brett Weston prints. I saw several of his signature works, including two from Oregon that I’ve long wished to see in person. They were nothing less than stunning. The blackest blacks, the creamy whites, and all tones in between were a real gift to see. I’m very thankful that these two shows were hanging simultaneously.

My final stop for print viewing was at the huge Friedlander retrospective at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. There are purported to be a few hundred prints on display, and I believe it. This show had prints from nearly every phase of Friedlander’s career on exhibit, including some very recent fashion photographs from 2006. I was somewhat taken aback by seeing Friedlander’s prints large. I had never seen them outside of his books, and his big Hasselblad pictures were surprising, but in a good way. My only regret after viewing this show was that there weren’t any photographs on display from his Apples and Olives book from 2005. That book seems to exhaust me every time I look at it. The pictures are just so complex, so enthralling, that I get tired when looking at it.

The man is a creative genius.

Inspired and motivated, I made a significant number of negatives of my own after seeing these shows. I made it from Embarcadero to Golden Gate Park, and most points in between, including Haight and Ashbury. It wasn't until after I was there that I realized I was in the Haight district on 4/20. Nice.

Cherry Blossom Time

Loveliest of trees, the cherry now

Is hung with bloom along the bough.

-A.E. Housman

The picture above is from Lee Friedlander’s wonderful book Cherry Blossom Time in Japan.

The cherry blossoms on the capitol mall in Salem are in full bloom right now, and the weather these past couple of days has been beautiful, so I’ve been out photographing them. In keeping with my recent self-portraiture theme, of course I’m careful to insert myself into these photographs, typically with my shadow falling somewhere in the frame. The whole mall was pink just a couple days ago, and now the trees have all gone white. The petals are continuously getting blown off the trees, so I think the explosion has peaked. But it has felt great to take just a couple of hours for myself to head out to photograph them while they last.

Eventually I’ll post some pictures here. I have no idea when I’ll do any printing again, as everything else in my life continues to be in a huge state of flux. Thankfully I’ve sought experiences like these with the cherry trees to keep me thinking clearly.

Fight For What's Right

Please note that the issue of my client moving to California with the children is non-negotiable. We are certain that given the circumstances of this case, that Judge [withheld] will have no problem allowing my client to move to California with the children.

-Excerpt from the letter notifying me that Anne intended to take a default judgment against me allowing the kids to be alone with me for no more than two weeks out of the year.

It didn't quite work out that way. As soon as I received this proposed judgment, it became abundantly clear to me that it was time for someone to start looking out for our children's interests. This was the mother of all wake-up calls. As Michael Jackson sang, "No message could have been any clearer." Troy loves that song.

The settlement terms are set now. The custody evaluator's recommended parenting plan will be put into place, and our kids will continue to benefit from their relationships with me and with my side of the family. And I will be in their lives to help them heal appropriately from the upcoming changes and subsequent pain. They deserve that. Actually they deserve better, but that's all I can do. But at least I'm doing all that I can and will continue to do so.

Because bluster and bullshit are no way to determine a child's future.

And besides, doesn't the picture above indicate that the kids are somewhat attached to their father? Maybe just a little?

Thinking of her

literature and opera are full of

characters who die for love:

i stay alive for her.

-From "No Longer a Teenager," by Gerald Locklin

The Kids Score A Win

Self-portrait, 2007 (click for larger version)

"You have suffered enough,

And warred with yourself,

It's time that you won."

-From "Falling Slowly," by The Frames

I've been thinking about the picture above for a long time. I took it last spring. While the date 1.20.09 has been something to look forward to for about, oh, seven years, I was drawn to the framed statement in the window: "Damn, you're a good father." The reflection of my shaved head is visible above that.

I heard from my attorney today. The custody evaluator for my case is recommending against Troy and Delaney being uprooted to L.A. While Anne is recommended for custody because of her "primary caregiver" status, at least common sense appears to be finally gaining some merit in this case. While I'll never sway from my opinion that kids deserve equal access to both parents (except where one parent is unfit), and while I find it more than a little unfortunate that my reward for working so hard so Anne can stay home is to lose custody, it's comforting to know that somewhere in this screwed-up system is a voice of reason. I would not be intimidated, I would not be cowed, and I would not be marginalized. I've held up in this situation for over 13 months now, and I've done it for the right reason.

There is hope. And I've got a lot more left in the tank.

Blessed is the man who finds wisdom,

the man who gains understanding,

for she is more profitable than silver

and yields better returns than gold.

-Proverbs 3:13-14

More Friedlander

There will be an exhibition of Lee Friedlander’s interpretations of the landscape designs of Frederick Law Olmsted at the Met in New York for the next few months. I’ve known about this for several weeks, and would love to make it over there to see some of his prints in person for the first time.

Then yesterday I learned that his huge retrospective show, Friedlander, will be opening soon at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. I have had the accompanying book since it was published in 2005, and I have got to see this show. It has been in Europe for a couple of years now, and I understand that there are over 400 prints to be displayed at the San Francisco installation.

And if this all weren’t enough, the Fraenkel gallery, located a mere quarter-mile from SFMoMA, will have a show of Friedlander pictures taken from the insides of cars throughout America hanging through April.

Hmm. I checked briefly, and it looks like I could fly to Oakland for under $100. I could rent a car and go to the two shows in San Francisco. Then I could fly to Long Island for less than $200, rent a car and go the Met’s show. Then I could fly home from there.

It is so tempting. If only the rest of my life weren’t so whacked right now, I could easily see myself doing this and it would be so educational and fun. Damn.

On New Beginnings

I've been thinking quite a bit about new directions my life will be taking as the result of the break-up of my family. Lately I've given lots of thought to my photography post-divorce.

Prior to being sued for divorce, I had defined for myself a long-term (life-long, perhaps) project of portraying nearly every aspect of my hometown through my 4x5 camera. I had listed approximately 40 portfolios that I wanted to put together over time that would illustrate certain aspects of Portland, and taken together, these individual bodies of work would coalesce to emerge as the most comprehensive view of a city ever put together by an individual photographer. Think Atget on caffeine with film instead of glass plates and a longer time frame in which to work. The hundreds, maybe thousands, of resulting 4"x5" and 4"x10" contact prints would eventually find their place in a historical museum of some sort.

But that all seems to have changed now. I used my 4x5 exactly two times in 2007. Once was for approximately 20 minutes while my wife waited in the car. The other time was for a brief afternoon outing to two locations. That was all I did with that camera last year. Nearly every free moment was spent with my children, or on trying to save my marriage. I certainly do not regret any time ever spent with my kids, but it was very clear that things would never be the same again. My photographic life's work became a mere afterthought, and a very trivial one in comparison to trying to protect my children from having their father removed from their lives.

Now I don't know if I'll ever take up that work again, nor whether I will even print the negatives I've already produced. I feel an odd sort of estrangement from that project, and from the pictures I've already captured. I am very much into the new work I've undertaken since accepting the failure of my marriage: self-portraits with 35mm cameras, pictures of my own shadow, and pictures of my kids with my shadow cast into the frame. This last motif lends itself well to the family picture aesthetic I've written about here before. I'm energized and enthusiastic when I am photographing my children; perhaps even more so when I'm including myself via my shadow.

But the feeling of abandoning my previous project is sad, at least somewhat. Things may change in the future. I certainly won't be allowed to spend time with my children every single weekend, as much as I'd love to. And maybe on the weekends when I am not with them I might hear my 4x5 calling again. But for now, I feel like I must put that phase of my creative life behind me. I won't destroy my existing negatives, as some might. But I don't even feel like looking at them right now. Fortunately I feel confident that my new work direction will provide sustenance for years to come.

Onward.

On Fathers and Senators

"In the end I suppose that's what all the stories of my father were really about. They said less about the man himself than about the changes that had taken place in the people around him, the halting process by which my grandparents' attitudes had changed. The stories gave voice to a spirit that would grip the nation for that fleeting period between Kennedy's election and the passage of the Voting Rights Act: the seeming triumph of universalism over parochialism and narrowmindedness, a bright new world where differences of race or culture would instruct and amuse and perhaps even ennoble. A useful fiction, one that haunts me no less than it haunts my family, evoking as it does some lost Eden that extends beyond mere childhood.

There was only one problem: my father was missing. He had left paradise, and nothing that my mother or grandparents told me could obviate that single, unassailable fact. Their stories didn't tell me why he had left. They couldn't describe what it might have been like had he stayed. Like the janitor, Mr. Reed, or the black girl who churned up dust as she raced down a Texas road, my father became a prop in someone else's narrative. An attractive prop-the alien figure with the heart of gold, the mysterious stranger who saves the town and wins the girl-but a prop nonetheless."

--Quoted from Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance, by Barack Obama

I just started reading Senator Obama's first biographical book last night, stirred by his speech in New Hampshire Tuesday night. While I am only a few dozen pages into the book, I gather from its title, and from passages such as those above, that Obama longed to know his absent father as a young child. Perhaps his father's absence carries through this entire book; I have not read enough to know yet.

But it would appear that even our nation's leaders, even our most inspiring and motivating citizens, have or had the same basic need for a close father as the most humble and anonymous among us. The title alone was enough to get me to start with this book when I sought more information on Senator Obama, but passages like this have made me jump into the text with both feet.

And I'll be damned if I'm going to allow myself to become nothing more than a prop in stories told to my children.

A Worthy Cause...And A Nice Gift

Today I've turned 33. By far, this has been the roughest, worst year of my life, and I met the day with no sort of excitement at all. Perhaps I approached it with a little bit of anticipation, confident that the upcoming year cannot possibly be as bad as the year just finished. Final tally: 3 deaths in the family, a pending divorce, and the battle of my life to preserve my relationships with my kids and to remain an important part of their upbringing, while trying to keep them from being uprooted to a suburb of Los Angeles.

But I received a very nice birthday gift of sorts today. My office is rather generous with its employees at this time of year. This year we were given an option of Christmas gifts to choose from: a $100 credit card, an iPod Shuffle, or a jacket with our company logo on it. It took me almost no time at all to decide what I wanted: I asked for the $100, with the condition that it be donated to Kids Need Both Parents. You may have seen their bumper sticker on cars in the Portland area (perhaps you've seen my car!) or beyond. This is a very worthy cause that promotes children's needs for two active, involved, and equal parents wherever possible. I encourage you to click on the link to learn more about what they are all about.

As our gifts were distributed throughout the office today, my boss approached me with a handshake and commented on my generosity with my gift this year. It gave me a bit of a chill when I realized that the company had honored my request and donated to this cause. I never imagined I would be reaching out to resources such as this, but I'm glad I have. And it feels wonderful to be able to help support these people doing their best work for our children.

We Like Hikes

Awhile back, I wrote about the self-portraiture work I've undertaken recently with a 35mm camera. In addition to pointing the camera at myself, I've also included my shadow in certain pictures, where I think it makes a composition stronger. In this spirit, I've taken many pictures lately of my kids, with my shadow cast somewhere into the frame to indicate my presence. And my children are such an integral part of my life that I feel that when one sees them, one also sees me, to some extent. Several times when we've been out hiking, I've made duplicates of my 35mm pictures with our digital camera for quicker results. Here's one example of using my shadow to indicate my presence when photographing my son:

Troy, quick study that he is, has noticed me turning the camera on myself from time to time. He loves to mimic my actions, and he wanted to use the digital camera himself during this same hike. Here is one resulting picture. I love it.

Fathers and Daughters

Delaney and me on the carousel at Jantzen Beach



Volumes of research on daughters and sons consistently reveal that divorce hurts kids. That’s just the way it is. Daughters often feel abandoned, guilty, sad, and angry. They often become depressed. No matter how much a father tries to convince a daughter that it wasn’t her fault, it doesn’t matter. Up through adolescence, young people usually see themselves at the center of their family and friends, and they feel, whatever happens, happens in large part because of them…

But your daughter will also feel abandoned. She’ll ask “What was wrong with me? Wasn’t I worth sticking around for?” This is where you must begin to help her.

Your daughter expects parents to stay married. If she sees you or her mother renege on that commitment, she becomes confused. Heroes, in her mind, keep fighting. In reality, though, sometimes you can’t. If Mom leaves…your fight is limited.

But whenever, for your daughter’s sake, you can fight, you must. How you fight, how you persevere, how you manifest your courage will always influence your daughter…This is what heroes do. It is what your daughter expects. Making the heroic choice at work, in marriage, and throughout your life will shape your daughter, who she is and what she becomes. You need to lead her wisely, consistently, and heroically.


--From Strong Fathers, Strong Daughters: 10 Secrets Every Father Should Know, by Meg Meeker, M.D.

I was already aware of the importance of a father in a young girl's life, but I was particularly impressed by the strength of the argument above. I will always advocate for Delaney.