This photo blog just turned sixteen seventeen years old. It’s hard to believe, but here we are! In keeping with tradition, I figured I had better head out to the capitol for a photo of the year’s digits in the windows.
I’m always trying new angles of the capitol building on holidays like this one, and there are always new ones to discover. This is especially true when they make changes to the capitol grounds; the northwest parking lot, the new front and rear entrances, and that kind of thing. Some of those changes required removing trees which had obscured the view from certain angles, so new possibilities have opened along with the additional parking or walking space.
Of course, there’s always the tried and true angles. Even the same old framing can have new life when there’s fresh frost on the trees or an interesting sky, or when a guy shows up at 6 am instead of midnight like I did this year. I didn’t have to worry about a never ending stream of randos photobombing my shots, and there are fewer drunks on the road at 6 am on New Year’s Day than there are after midnight on New Year’s Eve.
If I wanted to sponsor a piece of legislation this year, it would be to fund some lighting for the State Seal on this new what-have-you on the capitol mall. The text is lit up so nicely, but the seal itself is dark. It doesn’t look right.
In years past I’ve lit the seal myself, most often using a tactical flashlight jammed into the snowbank. I did that this year, but the lithium batteries were run down and didn’t like the cold very much. So it didn’t really do the trick as well as it’s done in the past. So instead I’ll just grip about the fact that I have to light it myself in the first place!
About that Sweet Sixteen thing: when I first started, I blogged a lot. These days, not so much. Maybe some day life will slow down and I’ll post more. For now, I post what I can. The other day I thought about how this site is really more of a journal than something I expect to have an audience. I can put my photos here, blurt out my thoughts (for better or for worse), and there they are. I can even go back and review them from time to time. But if nobody ever read this site besides me (and frankly, I haven’t checked my analytics in a long time) it would still give me the same enjoyment and creative outlet it always has. What started out as a labor of love is now more love than labor. I enjoy posting stuff when I can, and I’ll always have it here to look back upon when I want or need to do so. If someone else enjoys it along the way, all the better.
Here’s to at least another sixteen years.