Photography is one of the seductive means of making memories. So I wonder why many aren’t aware that they are making memories. [..]
What’s really going on is that you are making memories and maybe just maybe those photos will have importance to someone. [..]
[during the Vietnam War] I became acutely aware that photography is about memories. It’s about other shit too, but memories are the main source of image information transference.[..]
See, they are not just my memories. [..] All will be forgotten of the pain that still hurts 45 years later.
The very reason I bought a small digital camera in Dec 2000. And just as important as recording memories, you need to make the memories happen. You have to live while you can. And we did just that. Thanks Jenny and Jo.
Memories of Jenny - The Time of Your Life (youtube)
As many of you will know, I have another obsession in my life beyond paddling - Photography.
I started out buying a small digital camera for our Dec 2000 trip to the Cook Islands to visit Jenny and Jo's Meditation teacher, Barbara, who had moved there to help setup a refuge for women . We didn’t know a thing about paddling back then.
I had bought the camera hoping I would be able to capture our memories. It was a tiny digital camera by today’s standards, 1 Mega Pixel and it cost $1600 duty free and a 64 MB compact flash memory cost more than $300.
I did not flinch and I thought it was all worth it, as my credit card was swiped at Ted’s Pitt Street Camera Store the day before we flew out. 15 years later I can tell you here that it was one of the best things I ever did.
My motivation for the camera came from that fact that Jenny had 11 tumours in her lungs and I did not really know how long we would have together. In the end we had just over 9 years of married life. Given Jenny’s condition, a miracle really ..
We were married on 30th April of that Sydney Olympic year and we honeymooned on Lord Howe Island for 10 glorious days in May 2000. Jenny had a film camera and she took many photos.
On our return flight to Sydney, I remember a conversation we had at the Departure Terminal with an older couple from Whyalla who congratulated us on our marriage. We had briefly met them at dinner at one of the small restaurants on the Island.
They told us they had been married for many years and the trip to Lord Howe Island was a way of creating another experience in life and expanding their memories. Better than [running a busy business or] sitting at home and watching the Telly, they said.
This conversation and piece of simple worldly wisdom has stuck with me and I remind myself of it constantly. It was my main motivation to buy that small expensive digital camera for our December 2000 trip to the Cook Islands.
I took many photos that trip to Cook Islands, even of the Outrigger Canoes on the shore of Muri Lagoon - we had no idea what they were – who would guess our future.
Shortly after our return, Jenny and Jo found Dragon Boating. And over the ensuing years many experiences and memories were created, dutifully captured by our cameras.
I documented the many dragon boat campaigns here and abroad, and ensuing holidays that followed each event.
In the process of this documenting I came to realise the power of photography, not only its visual power, but its ability to record our experiences and remind us of things we have done and who we were. We were doing selfies before the term was even invented. We called them “Holdouts” and I think this might be the main cause of Jo’s shoulder injury.
In those last few weeks at St George Hospital in Jun 2009, I captured the last moments of our lives together. They are the best I ever made.
After Jenny’s passing, It took me a while to pick up a camera again. I had lost my purpose and will. I was hurting and numb all at once but paddled through for a year or two – it helped a lot to be busy and in the company of friends. New experiences were created and I even smiled [for] a little [while].
Lost in the enormity of what had happened so quickly, though it was not a surprise, I found my first moments of comfort and hope, when I decided to start looking at some of the photos from our lives together. It made me cry, but it also made me smile. I was so happy that I had this archive of bits and bytes to remind me of Jenny, Joanne, myself and who we were.
It was only after Jo told me to organise my photos and my Mum said I should start making photos again, that I started to move forward. I was completely broken but I took up their advice and kept myself busy again, organising and photographing again. I am still broken but I live with it better now, it is part of me and who I will always be, but I am happy, optimistic, naïve and creating more experiences.
So I guess what I am trying to say is that we have to go out there and make our memories through the experiences we create for ourselves.
In our lives we have loss, grief and bereavement. It is a part of living. You make a choice when it knocks on your door. And we have chosen to live in the Afterglow of our loss of Jenny – to remember and honour and be guided and inspired. Accept it and live with it and make the most of it, even let it inspire and motivate you. And that is what Jo and I have done, I would like to think.
“Believe in Hope” as the graffiti’ed wall in Cleveland Street said for a few weeks in July 2015.
Believe in Hope - Cleveland Street / Chippendale (Wed 29 Jul 2015)
Seven year ago today.
We remember Jenny. She (as they all do) lives on through our memories.
Memories of Jenny - The Time of Your Life (youtube)
This is my 2000th post here at eljeiffel.
I always try to write something for the Annual Presentation of the Inspire Award. Most times it is just for me, but sometimes I share it with a few people.
So here it is, unedited from the time it was written on the evening of Fri 27 Aug 2015. I think it is a pretty good way to mark the milestone.
As many will know, I have another obsession in my life - Photography.
I started out buying a small digital camera for our Dec 2000 trip to the Cook Islands to visit Jenny and Jo's Meditation teacher, Barbara, who had moved there to help setup a refuge for women . We didn’t know a thing about paddling back then.
I had bought the camera hoping I would be able to capture our memories. It was a tiny digital camera by today’s standards, 1 Mega Pixel and it cost $1600 duty free and a 64 MB compact flash memory cost more than $300.
I did not flinch and I thought it was all worth it, as my credit card was swiped at Ted’s Camera Store the day before we flew out. 15 years later I can tell you here that it was one of the best things I ever did.
My motivation for the camera came from that fact that Jenny had 11 tumours in her lungs and I did not really know how long we would have together. In the end we had just over 9 years of married life. Given Jenny’s condition, a miracle really ..
We were married on 30th April of that Sydney Olympic year and we honeymooned on Lord Howe Island for 10 glorious days in May 2000. Jenny had a film camera and she took many photos.
On our return flight to Sydney, I remember a conversation we had at the Departure Terminal with an older couple from Whyalla who congratulated us on our marriage. We had briefly met them at dinner at one of the small restaurants on the Island.
They told us they had been married for many years and the trip to Lord Howe Island was a way of creating another experience in life and expanding their memories. Better than [running a busy business or] sitting at home and watching the Telly, they said.
This conversation and piece of simple worldly wisdom has stuck with me and I remind myself of it constantly. It was my main motivation to buy that small expensive digital camera for our December 2000 trip to the Cook Islands.
I took many photos that trip to Cook Islands, even of the Outrigger Canoes in the lagoon at Aitutaka, we had no idea what they were – who would guess our future.
Shortly after our return, Jenny and Jo found Dragon Boating. And over the ensuing years many experiences and memories were created, dutifully captured by our cameras.
I documented the many dragon boat campaigns here and abroad, and ensuing holidays that followed each event.
In the process of this documenting I came to realise the power of photography, not only its visual power, but its ability to record our experiences and remind us of things we have done and who we were. We were doing selfies before the term was even invented. We called them “Holdouts” and I think this might be the main cause of Jo’s shoulder injury.
In those last few weeks at St George Hospital in Jun 2009, I captured the last moments of our lives together. They are the best I ever made.
After Jenny’s passing, It took me a while to pick up a camera again. I had lost my purpose and will. I was hurting and numb all at once but paddled through for a year or two – it helped a lot to be busy and in the company of friends. New experiences were created and I even smiled [for] a little [while].
Lost in the enormity of what had happened so quickly, though it was not a surprise, I found my first moments of comfort and hope, when I decided to start looking at some of the photos from our lives together. It made me cry, but it also made me smile. I was so happy that I had this archive of bits and bytes to remind me of Jenny, Joanne, myself and who we were.
It was only after Jo told me to organise my photos and my Mum said I should start making photos again, that I started to move forward. I was completely broken but I took up their advice and kept myself busy again, organising and photographing again. I am still broken but I live with it better now, it is part of me and who I will always be, but I am happy, optimistic, naïve and creating more experiences.
So I guess what I am trying to say is that we have to go out there and make our memories through the experiences we create for ourselves. And this is what I love about PD’s, we are always out there doing something. This time last year we were in Bologna on our way to Ravena, this year we are heading to Hawaii in the next week and month, next year Adelaide and who knows where after that.
Finally, in our lives we have loss, grief and bereavement. It is a part of living. You make a choice when it knocks on your door. And we have chosen to live in the Afterglow of our loss of Jenny – to remember and honour and be guided and inspired. Accept it and live with it and make the most of it, even let it inspire and motivate you. And that is what Jo and I have done, I would like to think.
“Believe in Hope” as the graffiti’ed wall in Cleveland Street said for a few weeks in July 2015.
Believe in Hope - Cleveland Street / Chippendale (Wed 29 Jul 2015)
With this post it is time to let go of a lot things, including the photos of another time and life. I have shed my life here (and Facebook more recently) like a snake sheds it skin and there is nothing left but to start over again. Time to move on, but it is hard to let go .. but I will.
Trying to make a new start here (arotlt.com) with photos from this point onwards. There will be the occasional post at eljeiffel to mark the odd moment in our lives that are relevant, but for now thanks for coming along for the ride these last, almost, 7 years.
Sometimes photography seems abstract, but then something happens that makes it concrete.
Colin Pantall (Tue 06 Nov 2012)
Sometimes you read an almost random post by someone you don't even know - you it find so pertinent and you are deeply touched and you learn something about life and yourself. Today is one such day ..
Colin Pantall (*) writes (*) on the passing of his Mother-in-Law, Elizabeth, last weekend:
I think it was a relief in some ways that she died, because she wasn't independent and it wasn't the way she wanted to live, but at the same time it was a massive shock. Not because of the death, but because of the passing of an era, the end of a living history. You can keep history alive in various ways, but when the person who witnessed it goes, it does spell the end of a chapter. It doesn't mean we should forget it, but there is still some part of a time that has gone. Things have moved on.
He also talks about how someone is remembered through photographs and our memories.
On Photography, he writes:
things are also preserved and the family album does this admirably. It's a shorthand of memory, of history, of an edited and at times idealised past, where certain things are hidden and certain things taken away - sometimes in retrospect. Even so, we still look at it quite objectively as something quite factual.
However, complementing the photos (if they were made and are available), there are the memories to draw upon and the cues (*) that inspire them:
But Elizabeth didn't have those old photos, so I wonder how she will be remembered. Just as words are sometimes better than photographs, so is food. I remember her Slovenian cooking, her gingerbread, her puddings, her cakes and so does my wife.
I have learnt that it is important to remember and in some ways this has become my life purpose (*). As Colin reminds us, there are photos as well as our memories - what we remember.
eljeiffel (*) for me is all these elements of remembering, remembering not only Jenny (*) and those that have gone before us, but my own legacy (*) - the scratches and fractures (even if it is just a couple of photographs of the colours orange and blue, and the hidden memories they evoked in me) I will leave on this world when I am gone.
Blue - Asakusa Kannon Temple / Tokyo (Fri 21 Sep 2012)
A Couple of Random Memories: The original Boston version of the song was released in 1976, the year my family moved from Tamworth to Wagga Wagga. Would have been in 4th Form (or Year 10 as it is called now). Just a kid. Remember being very sad to leave Tamworth (we had moved to Tamworth from Goulburn when I was a few weeks short of the age of 2) as it was all I knew (have very few childhood memories before starting school).
Geoff and Lynn - maybe 1963 ? - "Lynn has this photo: one of my earliest memories - sitting on top the lounge having our photo taken." - Tamworth (picasa)
I have always said that while the move was difficult in the initial stages, it was one of best things to happen to me in many ways. It was a quite a formative experience to be separated from everything you had ever known and to have to start all over again. I think it helped me to accept change (particularly when you have no choice - you just have to accept it and make the most of it) and made me more resilent to the impact change can have on you, particular in the early stages of the change (hope that makes sense).
Have been to Boston quite a few times - 1988, 1990, 1991 and 1994. Planning to spend a few days there following Tampa 2011 in August 2011. Been a while, so looking forward to seeing it with another 17 years of life experiences behind me. Had always hoped to run the Boston Marathon which is held on Patriot's Day (3rd Monday of April). I tried to qualify by running the Melbourne Marathon in 1993, but was about 8 mins short of the pre-qualifying time of 3hr 15min (it was a bit easier in those days). Was lucky enough to be in Boston to watch the 1994 Boston Marathon.
Joanne, Jenny and Geoff - Hawkesbury Canoe Classic 2006 - Windsor - Sat 28 Oct 2006 (picasa)
In 2006, Jenny, Joanne (Jenny's younger identical twin) and myself (Jenny's husband) decided to do the Hawkesbury Canoe Classic (HCC) with our paddling club, Pacific Dragons. By mid June 2006, there was enough interest to enter three mixed OC6's crews.
At the time we, along with a number of other PD's paddlers (see picasa), some who were also paddling the HCC, had also been selected to represent Australia at the 2006 Asian Dragon Boat Championships in Macau in late Sep 2006 (see picasa). It was great campaign and we even learnt how to paddle and race standing up.
On our return, via Singapore for a Breast Cancer Survivor Dragon Boat Regatta for Jenny, we had about four weeks to prepare for the HCC. Our team comprised of 5 paddlers from the Macau Campaign (Mandy, Nicci, Jenny, Joanne and Geoff) and Paul who would do the majority of our steering. We were commonly referred to as the Macau Crew, but we decided to call ourselves Team Happy for our team entry application, as we were a happy bunch of paddlers. We were in it for fun and we did have a whole 13 hours of fun and finished strongly standing up.
A year later, I was asked 3 days before the 2007 HCC to fill a seat, in a Mixed OC6, that had become vacant due to a paddler injury. They were called the Red Devil's and had been training seriously for months. They wanted to have fun, but they also wanted to break the Mixed OC6 record, which they did. I was pleased to help out at such short notice and have fond memories of the crew and night (see picasa). Jenny and Joanne even came to the start line to wave us off (picasa). It was a nice surprise as I was not expecting them to come out because of a Breast Cancer Seminar they attended that day in the City.
Sadly, we lost Jenny on Tue 30 Jun 2009. Joanne and I have tried to live fulfilling lives, something that Jenny wanted for us. We have paddled in her memory and honour. She inspires and guides us from above. It is barely 12 months, and we already have some great memories.
In 2009, Joanne and I did not paddle the HCC. We had only just returned from Europe after the 2009 World Dragon Boat Championships. I was able help out at quite few training sessions towards the end, and Joanne and I went to the start line to wave the PD's Mixed OC12 crew off (picasa). Lisa has some great recollections of her experience (see Part: 1, 2 and 3).
In 2010, Jo and I will paddle the HCC.
Shortly after Jenny's passing, the 2009, Prague bound, Australian Dragon Boat Squad presented Jo and I with a gift in Jenny's memory. It was a Star, located in the southern sky, named In the Memory of Jenny Petterson in the Constellation of Vela. Vela is latin for Sail and the star was picked because of the Constellation's water themed name.
Jenny, believed the 2006 HCC was an experience that created life time memories, which it surly does, as anyone who has paddled the HCC will tell you. She fondly recalled (see more further below):
It was such a great experience under a sky filled with thousands of stars.
It is something that we will be able to look back on for the rest of our lives.
So when it came time to name our 2010 Mixed OC6 (Charlotte, Rachel, Jo, Alasdair, Graeme and Geoff) Team, I tried to think of a name that allowed us to remember Jenny and to inspire us. It had to be Team ?? following our 2006 tradition. It did not take long to come up with Team Vela which I think allows us recognise the past, present and future.
I hope this goes some way to explaining the name - Team Vela.
This post includes some photos and recollections from the 2006 HCC, as well as a couple of inspirational quotes.
We will remember Jenny as we paddle under a thousand stars. In particular, we will remember Jenny and the star named in Jenny's Memory in the Constellation of Vela as it shines down brightly upon us from the southern sky.
Go Team Vela! - the most fantastic team on the Hawkesbury!!!!
Regards .. Geoff
Joanne, Jenny and Geoff - Hawkesbury Canoe Classic 2006 - Windsor - Sat 28 Oct 2006 (picasa)
On our return from Macau a routine CT scan showed that I had an accumulation of fluid around my lung. I had it drained so I was able to take part in the Hawkesbury Canoe Classic. This is an 111 kilometre race from Windsor to Brooklyn along the Hawkesbury River. All types of craft including kayaks, canoes, outrigger canoes and surf skis take part in the race. It was a fantastic experience. I was a member of a six person team who paddled an outrigger canoe. Geoff and Jo were also in the team. We set off at 6pm and paddled through the night arriving 13 hours later. It was such a great experience under a sky filled with thousands of stars.
Pacific Dragons Crews and Supporters - Hawkesbury Canoe Classic 2006 - Windsor - Sat 28 Oct 2006 (picasa)
Jenny and Joanne - Hawkesbury Canoe Classic 2006 - Windsor - Sat 28 Oct 2006 (picasa)
"A single step repeated hundreds and thousands of times would see us eventually arrive at the end. It did not take superhuman strength or a talent that most do not have. It took a steadfast commitment. Step by step, the miles added up and the challenges slipped by. Today just like those days on the trail, is another step. Tomorrow is yet another. I walk this journey in anticipation of the end, but I also know that there is much to learn in the process. It is the process, no matter what the hardship where great beauty and adventure can be found."
Sunrise - Hawkesbury Canoe Classic 2006 - Hawkesbury River - Sun 29 Oct 2006 (picasa)
Sunrise - Hawkesbury Canoe Classic 2006 - Hawkesbury River - Sun 29 Oct 2006 (picasa)
Respect your soul: don’t keep repeating "I’m going to make it". Your soul already knows that, what it needs is to use the long journey to be able to grow, stretch along the horizon, touch the sky. An obsession does not help you at all to reach your objective, and even ends up taking the pleasure out of the climb. But pay attention: also, don’t keep saying "it’s harder than I thought", because that will make you lose your inner strength.
Team Happy - Geoff, Jenny, Mandy, Jo, Nicci and Paul - Hawkesbury Canoe Classic 2006 - Brooklyn - Sun 29 Oct 2006 (picasa)
Sarah and Gav - Hawkesbury Canoe Classic 2006 - Brooklyn - Sun 29 Oct 2006 (picasa)
Gav wrote on Mon 30 Oct 2006 ..
PDs, There are some very inspirational people in this club. They won't jump out at you, and they won't tell you about it - but if you stop, look and listen you will see immense courage, inner strength, and team work mixed in with a joke and a smile.
3 PD OC6s + Claire on her ski, showed some true grit on the weekend by finishing the Hawkesbury, and in good time. Each paddler taking 40,000 strokes through the night (give or take a couple).
For a race so long, you can't start the race with the mind set and strength you need to finish it. It's impossible. You have to find it along the way. Brutal mind games that get played out as the kms tick over.
The paddlers have to dig deeper and deeper in themselves in order to keep going and enduring the pain and extreme fatigue.
In the darkness, they imagine the sweet sweet moment at the finish line where they realise their goal of conquering the distance, and finally allowing their bodies to stop.
Sometimes it feels like it is getting further away. But when it finally, actually, really happens - PADDLES OUT- the sense of achievement mixed with relief is overwhelming and pure ecstasy.
Tears, smiles and hugs all round.
After the Hawkesbury, your concept of distance and yourself changes forever. From then on, you are never again afraid of 'not being able to finish' a race. It is now just a question of how hard you can go.
Well done to the 'Amazing 18' !!! May we all be made of the same stuff.
There is only one way to find out.
Joanne and Jenny - Hawkesbury Canoe Classic 2006 - Brooklyn - Oct 2006 (picasa)
On Wed 1 Nov 2006, Jenny wrote ..
Thank you all so much for the wonderful experience. It was unbelievable and seems like a bit of a dream now. It was truly an honour to be a part of Team Happy. It is something that we will be able to look back on for the rest of our lives.
We cannot thank you Gav, Sarah, Tamara and Luke (and for that matter, all of the other land crews) enough for all the support you gave us. You all made things so easy for us and looked after us soooo well. We could never have done it without you. From helping us on and off the boat, keeping us warm, feeding us, helping us change and massaging our weary bodies. You are the best!
Go Team Happy! - the most fantastic team on the Hawkesbury!!!!
In putting together yesterday's post, I drew on a photo that has Lynn and I sitting together on top of the Lounge in Tamworth. It was taken just before our brother Tim arrived into our lives - he was born in Tamworth in Dec 1963.
In putting together an earlier post about Tim I came across this photo of Lynn and I, at his house in Canberra, on the day after we said goodbye.
Only really made the connection that the two photos put Lynn and I together in a way that I guess Bookend's Tim's Life and our life with him in between.
Nice to have the photos and the memories ..
Lynn and Geoff at Tim's Place - "the day after we said goodbye to Tim" - Griffith / Canberra (Sat 12 Mar 2005)
A Life in between.
Lynn and Geoff - maybe 1963? (but definitely before Tim arrived in Dec 1963) - "Lynn has this photo: one of my earliest memories - sitting on top of the lounge having our photo taken." - Tamworth (picasa)
I think that the most important thing that photography can do is to relate both the photographer and the viewer’s memories (*). At first sight a photograph looks straightforward as it slices off a scene or a moment in time. But the images that photography captures are actually ambiguous (*). And it’s because of this ambiguity (*) that I like photography..
via Sampling in street photography (photographing other images like signs, posters and billboards) - in 35mm (*) by Alex Coghe (*) and Michael Ernest Sweet (*).
Martin Luther King Jr (*) Mural (2 of 2) - Chicago (Tue 06 Sep 2011)
Detail - Loch Ness Locks / Fort Augustus / Scotland (Sat 04 Sep 2005) I did not find the Loch Ness Monster, but I did find this amazing piece of rusted iron.
I have a been a little stuck on this post. Whenever this happens I look to the Manual of the Warrior of Light (*) by Paulo Coelho (*) and found this ..
A warrior knows that the ends do not justify the means.
Because there are no ends, there are only means. Life carries him from unknown to unknown. Each moment is filled with this thrilling mystery: the warrior does not know where he came from or where is going.
But he is not here by chance. And he is overjoyed by surprises and excited by landscapes that he has never seen before. He often feels afraid, but that is normal in a warrior.
If he thinks only of the goal, he will not be able to pay attention to the signs along the way. If he concentrates only on one question, he will miss various answers that are there beside him. That is why the warrior submits.
This is my 1000th post. A milestone of sorts and something I would not have thought possible when I made my first post (*) here on Thu 26 Feb 2009.
I think the above passage from the Manual of the Warrior of Light (*) provides a useful metaphor for this blog and the 1000 posts that it now comprises.
It is a reflection of my life and who I am. I am never quite sure where it is going - I just try to make connections between what I read, what I see, what I photograph and what I feel.
A lot has happened and changed in the last three and half years since that first post. I have learnt a lot about myself and others. I have made plenty of mistakes, yet I think I have done a few things right. I have been defeated, yet I have have had a few wins, for which I am grateful. I have been sad and I have been happy. I have felt lost and without purpose yet in some ways I have found myself. I have looked to the past, present and future. I have had regrets [and learnt how to let them go]. I have given up and I have battled on. I have lost belief in myself, yet I have found ways to restore that belief. I have been hurt, upset and I have forgiven. I have cried and I have laughed. I have been directionless and without purpose, yet I have had goals. I have been inspired. I have tried hard, too hard sometimes. I tried to be something I am not, and I have learnt my limits and what I can be. I have watched and followed, and at times I have lead, mostly unknowingly I should think.
Somehow I am happy when some say I should be angry. I have suffered and have empathised with the suffering of others. I have been drawn into other people's battles and have known how to respond. I believe in luck (and fate) and know that it comes from being prepared and the willingness to take a risk.
I have changed but remained the same. I am older though I feel younger. I am experienced but still feel like a beginner. I am wiser but more naive. I found a voice (an awkward one at that) I did not know I had. You don't know how far you have been until you get back. I've been all over and it's been all over me . Therefore I am thankful for this blog and what I have learnt about myself and others.
Many times I have asked myself why? post what I have posted here and other times I have said to myself, well why not? (this post being an example). I am starting to forget things, so it is nice to make the effort to write what is important, so it can be recalled. I have memories and I am making memories.
Most importantly, I have Remembered Jenny (*) - how she lived and how she died. Jo and I are the bearers of her memory and she lives on in our hearts and in our minds until we lay to rest beside her.
I could go on, but I won't ().
It's all here in these 1000 posts which are just like snapshots of my life.
Like Paulo Coelho's good warrior, I am not really sure where I am going and what might be ahead. I have come to learn that this is what life is all about. Ultimately I think I have learnt to become a bit more certain of the uncertain. I have accepted this - well at least I think I have.
Hopefully, i will have the opportunity to post another 1000 posts. Let's see what happens.
[the warrior] is overjoyed by surprises and excited by landscapes that he has never seen before - Loch Ness / Scotland (Sat 03 Sep 2005)
Wilson Street Lock - Newtown - Sun 14 Apr 2002 (photo.net)
The above photo was taken at the entrance door of an Anitque Factory called Original Finish (thanks Charlotte) on Wilson Street in Newtown.
I drive past here on days I do outrigger training. Often walk past here on weekends, as the area has unlimited parking and is convenient to the Cafes and Shops of King Street Newtown.
I had seen quite a few photos of this type on photo.net, and for some reason I noticed the lock and decided to photograph it up close using macro mode. It seemed to be more interesting cropped to a square format.
Surprisingly, a few days after uploading it to photo.net, I noticed that it seemed to be getting more views than my typical photo uploads. Normally, I would get the occasional viewer and would be lucky to get 20 to 30 views in the first week and hopefully a couple of comments. Somehow this photo found itself rotating on and off photo.net's home page and this explained the surge in views.
When I looked at this photo tonight after many years [1], I was surprised to see that it had reached almost 63,000 views. This has to be my most viewed photo on photo.net. Not a lot by popular photo.net photographers standards, but good for some one like me.
Some memories follow. I bought a small digital camera in Decmeber 2000 just before we went to the Cook Islands for a Holiday (see picasa). It was an original Canon IXUS. It cost $1,600 duty free and was all of 2 Mega Pixels (1,600 by 1,200 pixels). A small, cheap and out of date mobile phone camera would easily surpase this IXUS's pixel capabilities.
It was a great little camera and I used it to capture our memories.
I did not know anything about photography. When I overheard someone at Lunch talking about a web site called photo.net, I quickly found it and after I had figured out how the site worked, I joined up as member on Fri 16 Mar 2001. The site was a community that allowed the uploading of photos for comments, rating, and written critiques. There were also forums to discuss all things about photography, cameras, accessories and technique. It was the original photo sharing community. I can recall even the founders of flickr being ordinary members of photo.net just like me. They created flickr to develop a community that photo.net struggled to move to.
I met some great people. Also learnt a lot there and had just as much fun.
[1] I have not been really active on photo.net since late 2004 - ran out of quota to upload photos, but still lurk there.
[..] a photograph that reveals itself - that is to say, reveals ourselves - only once we slow down long enough to allow the flood of memories (*) to ease back into consciousness. [..]
The payoff comes not when we recognize the structure of its photographic composition or the delicacy of its photographic exposure, but rather when we allow it to bring forth what we can best experience (*) by closing our eyes and remembering (*).
via Transitions by Frances Billes - LensWork Daily (*) by Brooks Jensen (*).
Introducing Joanne Petterson: Your 2013 Auroras Flag Bearer A Tribute to Joanne and all those who have supported her in paddling and life - Love Geoff (*) Gyor / Hungary (Sun 21 Jul 2013)
I would just like to say how honoured and proud I am to be representing you as the Australian Flag Bearer.
I love this sport and am very passionate about it and have been fortunate to witness many opening ceremonies and I still can't believe I have been given this honour to carry the flag.
I have been involved in the Australian squads since 2003 and have been fortunate enough to have been included in many great teams and squads, and have met many wonderful people over the years.
Each Aus Sqaud experience has been memorable for all different reasons and we are now making more memories together which we will reminisce over for years to come.
I have loved this time in Gyor and it was so nice to see how good all the divisions looked on the water and how each of the divisions supported each other.
We have all trained hard and put in a lot of work and we are now ready to face the rest of the world, so what is important now is what goes on in your head.
Some things I have learnt over the years are:
1. Trust and believe in yourself, your team mates, coaches and managers knowing we have done everything required.
2. Work together as a team and a squad on and off the water and support each other.
3. Go hard and don't hold back.
4. Focus on doing your best possible race rather than focusing on the result.
5. Be positive and be brave - you can go harder than you thought was possible and your body will be able to do it.
From my experience, I have seen it time and time again, not just in paddling but in life, keep a positive attitude even when things become tougher than you could possibly imagine, as anything is possible.
I know this to be true and I have witnessed many great moments in this sport and through that have realised as the German crew said to us after a Final at the 2009 World Championships "you made the impossible, possible".
I often remember a comment one of my coaches said as we huddled together in a circle after our last race together at the 2009 World Championships. He said "look around at each of your team mates, this will be the last time this team will race together". So saviour the moment.
I'd like to wish everyone well in Szeged, go hard, be strong both physically and mentally, be brave, but most of all have fun, these are all memories we are making together which will last a lifetime.
A pretty random post, but it has put a smile on my face and was fun to put together.
Heard this song on the radio on the way to training yesterday evening. It's a song you will often hear on the radio on a stormy afternoon or evening.
The storm clouds were looming as we got closer to Bank Street and it had started to lightly rain. The wind came up and the air became colder, and in combination with the songs haunting lyrics, driving beat of the bass and drums, and the memories it evoked, it made me tingle and I was covered in goose bumps.
The music and lyrics seem to capture the feelings and mental images that I carry with me, to be and feel Australian.
I guess that's all reasonably vague, but feelings for me are difficult to describe - much in the same way Dennis Denuto demonstrates so passionately, yet unconvincingly, in the classic Australian Movie The Castle:
It's the vibe of the thing, your Honour.
The vibe or the gist are terms I use a lot to cover for my inability to express my feelings or what I am thinking :-) Dennis is my hero. Here he is at his definitive best:
The Castle - in the Federal and High Courts (youtube)
Some random memories. The song goes back to 1982, which would have been my last year of full-time uni. I did see The Flowers (Iva Davies predecessor to Icehouse) at the University Union in the 2nd Term of 1980 and then a few weeks later back in Wagga Wagga for the University Holidays. Was excited to have some friends, from my school days in Wagga Wagga, to be the local supporting act. For some reason I asked Jenny whether we could have the song played at our Wedding Reception. She liked it and it was played during the night and as a filler as we said our farewells at the end of the evening. It was put on repeat as I we took a lot longer than we had planned.
Great Southern Land Lyrics
Standing at the limit of an endless ocean Stranded like a runaway, lost at sea City on a rainy day, down in the harbor Watching as the gray clouds shadow the bay
Looking everywhere 'cause I had to find you This is not the way that I remember it here Anyone will tell you, it's a prisoner island Hidden in the summer for a million years
Great southern land Burned you black
So you look into the land and it will tell you a story Story 'bout a journey ended long ago If you listen to the motion of the wind in the mountains Maybe you can hear them talking like I do "They're gonna betray you, they're gonna forget you Are you gonna let them take you over that way"
Great southern land, great southern land You walk alone like a primitive man And they make it work with sticks and bones See their hungry eyes, it's a hungry home
I hear the sound of the stranger's voices I see their hungry eyes, their hungry eyes Great southern land, great southern land They burned you black, black against the ground
Standing at the limit of an endless ocean Stranded like a runaway, lost at sea City on a rainy day, down in the harbor Watching as the gray clouds shadow the bay
Looking everywhere 'cause I had to find you This is not the way that I remember it here Anyone will tell you, it's a prisoner island Hidden in the summer for a million years
Great southern land, in the sleeping sun You walk alone with the ghost of time They then burned you black, black against the ground And they make it work with rocks and sand
I hear the sound of the stranger's voices I see their hungry eyes, their hungry eyes Great southern land, great southern land You walk alone, like a primitive man
You walk alone with the ghost of time And they burned you black Yeah, they burned you black Great southern land Great southern land Great southern land Great southern land
You might be able to guess why I picked this particular youtube clip of Great Southern Land. Two weeks to Nationals. Canberra here we come .. really looking forward to the racing with my team mates and catching up with all our friends from right across Australia.
Lake Burley Griffin Sunset - Black - Canberra (02 Aug 2002 *)
I think that the most important thing that photography can do is to relate both the photographer and the viewer’s memories.
For me and my ever failing memory, this is exactly what is the beauty of photography. While I am failing to remember names and the little details that make life easier in the connected world I engage in, I can remember my feelings and memories. Photography helps but, oddly enough, I also have a photographic-like memory for my feelings and scenes that catch my eye.
I can look at any one of my 100,000 digital photos that I have taken over the last 12 years and tell you where it was taken, why I took it and what I was feeling at the time. Amazing really. Thank you photography, I am a better person because of you.
[..] memories don’t seem to live ‘in’ the photographs. Instead, each photo is like a key, which triggers or accesses a memory (*) that actually lives in your mind. But without the photo to act as a key, there may be no other way to access the memory (*). What then? If a memory (*) is rendered inaccessible, it’s lost. Sometimes you lose memories by synaptic degradation; other times, by misplacing a photo.
via Your Oddly-Shaped Mind (*) by Melting Asphalt (*).
Jenny always loved this photo which I took while Jenny and Joanne participated in the 2004 World Dragon Boat Championships at Qingpu, a lakeside race course, about 50 km to the west of Shanghai. I had it professionally printed in A4 and A3 sizes with a selection of my favourite photos. Jenny always wanted me to frame it and put it up somewhere in the living area so we could remember our trip to Qingpu and Shanghai as well as enjoy the intricate and subtle details of the sunset silhouetted wind blown willow.
Whenever Jenny went into Hospital we always put photos up around her room and it was always a great way to generate a bit of conversation with the many Hospital Satff that were in and out of her room.
When Jenny went into ICU for the final week of her life, I pulled the A4 print of this photo out of the pile of prints I had had made and placed it on a column in front of her bed in the vague hope that she might see and recognise it.
On the day before Jenny died Joanne picked up the photo and moved it across Jenny's face and we were excited to see her eyes follow it - the first sign to us of some improvement in her condition. I went off to an outrigging canoe training session that Monday night happier than I had been in a long time and I arranged to see her on the way home, well after the normal visiting hours.
When I arrived into the ICU about 9.30pm, it was a different place to the busy and noisy place it was during the day. It was very quiet and the lights were dimmed apart from a soft spot light above Jenny's bed. She was asleep and looked very relaxed, the most relaxed I had seen her in the two weeks she had been in hospital. I decided not to wake her and sat quietly at her bed side and watched her steady breathing. I spoke quietly and proudly to Jenny's dedicated nurse about Jenny's life. I left Jenny that night not knowing that it would be the last time I would see her alive.
At 9.16am on Tue 30 Jun 2009 (the next morning), Jenny left us without Joanne or I by her bedside. Yet I know, Jenny was not alone, as the above photo, the one she loved so much, looked over her as she broke free from this world.
Just as the above poem extracts indicates, it might be nice to think that Jenny transformed herself into our memories:
They have no death but only transformations
It is through our memories of Jenny that she lives on.
I will frame both A4 and A3 prints once I find a place for them and myself. For the moment I am happy to have written this post (which i had planned to do for a long time) which was inspired by the above poem extract. Thanks Charlotte.
Thanks to LottieP for allowing me to find the above extract from a poem by Tessa Ransford via her post of a beautiful poem titled The White Stone of Lewis.
(My first post from an iPad while on a weeks holiday at Coolangatta.)
[l-r] (front) Jo, Janet, Jenny, Don [back] Tony, Richard, Gerard, Geoff - Our Company's 1989 Inaugural Corporate Games Team (one sunny Sun day in Nov 1989)
I've written about the End, so here is the Beginning ..
The inaugural 1989 Fairfax Corporate Games was how I met Jenny. We both worked at the same company and responded to a call in the company's newsletter, to help organise a team.
I'm not sure I had seen Jenny prior to that, even though we had worked in the same building on and off over a number of years. I was just back from three years working out of Tamworth, my main childhood home town. It was a big company in those days and the Head Office filled a 40 storey building on the corner of Park and Elizabeth Streets.
I remember the first meeting to help organise the team on Level 23. We both got out of separate lifts at the same time and walked in opposite directions to find the meeting room. We couldn't find the meeting room during our opposite navigations of the inner core of the building. When we bumped into each other, I asked her if she was looking for the meeting room for the Corporate Games. She said yes. And, in those first moments I noticed her beautiful blue eyes and friendly manner.
I did not know she had a sister, Joanne, who also worked at the same company, and it was only on the day of the event, that I realised Jenny was an identical twin. We all had a great time and at the end of the day I had to rush off quickly to attend a 5 day residential work course at Dover Heights.
I thought of her often and did not see her again until a few months later, when Jenny rang me out of the blue to meet so she could give me the photo above. We met at my desk on Level 26 and at same time she gave me this photo, she had the courage to ask me to partner her to a friend's Wedding. I was in shock and did not know what to say. What was a beautiful women like Jenny asking someone like me to partner her to a Wedding. How brave was she, and how shy and uncertain was I.
So, I made her endure a night of uncertainty, telling her I had to check that the Wedding did not clash with a hockey game I was scheduled to play on the same day. What was I thinking? I was always going and said yes the next day. At the same time I asked her out to dinner and to see a movie on Fri 30 Mar 1990, so we could get to know each other a little better before the Wedding.
The Wedding was duly attended and I even managed to play my game of hockey before the wedding, scoring a rare winning goal. It was my day!!
A month later we were out in the city with a group of Jenny and Joanne's work friends (I was hanging out with them by then - they were all accountants and I was the engineer), and as we passed a rowdy group of men, I instinctively held Jenny's hand. Whoops - but she held my hand back and did not let go.
That was our beginning, our destiny for a life together, until the day she transformed herself into our memories.
And, it is through our memories of Jenny that she lives on, this photo and post being just one.
