Girl at dusk, Berkeley, CA.
“A” could be for a hundred and one things, A hundred and one things, but we have to start somewhere. Apolplectic. Amblin’. Anti-social. Agita. Anima animus. But one has to start somewhere, and so thus with About time do I start a month o’ photos, a semi-annual (by which I mean, somewhat annual and not every half-year) tradition here at Casa LD. Casa El Dee, as a reader long ago suggested.
About time I return to this very helpful place. One of my biggest challenges is about time, generally speaking and particularly in an era governed (perhaps ruled? not always benevolently?) by Moore’s Law.
I usually resort to this month o’ photos thing when I’ve fallen to a very low output, which I have as of late. This time around, it is attributable to some of the usual reasons, and other less than usual. The usual: the press of the actual of life against the virtual, and the increasing challenge of representing the lives of increasingly subjective subjects. The less than usual: some good – such as a big redirect of my online writerly (mostly editorly) att’n to VillageQ, née Lesbian Family; some less than good – such as renewed/ intensified internal familial stressors, stemming from the gentle, insistent decline of an aging father, the difficult-to-process (and -manage) estrangement from sibling, and protracted employment instability. By which we really mean, insufficiency. The stuff of early 21st century midlife living.
All of the above is coupling with the perpetual challenges of balancing the private with the public, amidst the larger mission to Be of Service.
But! November is traditionally NaBloPoMo (emcee’ed now by Mel Ford at BlogHer), and so I’m playing along. I’m using the letters of the alphabet because, why not. Also, what with there being 26 letters of the alphabet and 30 days this month, I can take a pass for four various days and go alphabet letterless. I know Thanksgiving is this month. And my dad is in gentle but persistent decline (c.f. paragraph 3 above). One never knows.