What is it about the growing of a life that brings so much joy to those confronted with it? You see it in all places where life blooms. I have even seen fear and dread turned to joy on the faces of those who have born their children not under the best of circumstances. What is it that compels a smile to form upon a stranger’s face and causes them to shyly peak a glance when a parent and child are strolling by? What is this strange power that morphs intellectual people into deranged monkeys who blabber in high pitched tones and coos to incite a smile or a laugh from the smallest of us? I think it’s because they are the embodiment of hope. They are a confirmation that against all fears and cynicism we hold for our dangerous and often disappointing world, we still affirm our confidence in love to mend all things broken. Their faces remind us that we maintain hope that we can provide for them a better future than our own. We reach out to touch the expanding womb because in part we know that our best selves of love, innocence and hope grows there.
7 comments in “Life Growing”
September 17th, 2007 at 11:02
Andrew, I love the grain in the top photo. Looks so much like film. Whenever I get grain on my pictures it’s like Ewwwww, but your’s looks like it’s supposed to be there. Fess up! How’d you do that? LOL.
PS – your words are great here also.
September 17th, 2007 at 11:09
Hey Bobbie. Thanks for your nice words. Yeah no real secret to reveal about the grain on this one. I shot this image at high ISO (I think either 1600 or 3200 ISO) and doing that produces lots of grain. It was a straight b/w conversion. I don’t even use photoshop anymore to work on my photos except layout. I just de-saturate the colors in Lightroom and use curves mainly to control tone in the conversion. I have noticed that some image gain looks more pleasing than other ones. Good exposure is really key to getting grain that is manageable and pleasing rather than overwhelming. I certainly have had my share of the “Ewwww” moments when looking at my pictures. LOL.
September 17th, 2007 at 12:47
Yo, son!
Uh … morphs intellectual people? … blabbering deranged monkeys? Whoa! I’ll wager that gets a couple of BELLY LAUGHS! (..get it? Belly Laughs?)
Keep up the good work, son.
September 18th, 2007 at 0:19
I’ll have to try the really high ISO sometime when I get the chance to. Hey, you should post some of your “Ewwwww” shots so I can see. Ha, ha. Just kidding. We are always too hard on ourselves. There is always someone out there who would think one of your bad ones is pretty good. That’s art, I guess.
September 21st, 2007 at 0:45
It’s Sept. 20…. Where’s baby H??? Can’t wait to meet her =)
September 21st, 2007 at 0:50
Yeah I know. We are excited to hear of the good news as well. We just talked with A and D tonight and they said the baby seems to be very comfortable hanging out in her cave. D on the other hand is pretty much ready for baby H to get the party started.
September 22nd, 2007 at 15:49
In response to your comments, Andrew, I thought you might like this quote. I love the photos, by the way. All of them. Such fun and special memories of this time!
“A baby is God’s opinion that life should go on.” – Carl Sandburg
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