Fifth Anniversary

Those of you who currently read this blog, and I’m familiar with one lovely lady out there, will know I just celebrated my fifth anniversary of my stroke. This year I won’t be writing as much about that choosing to concentrate on my art, and my writing. Like many of you last year was the worst I’ve experienced in my life-time. I don’t think I opened my camera bag once last year, sure I took some cell phone photo’s, but nothing to really satisfy my soul. In addition I closed down what business was left and for the first time in many years I filed a normal tax return. At the time it was a most painful step, logical to say the least but still....

I started working with a friend I’ve had for a long time, first started work with him in New York many years ago. We developed quite the friendship, I was invited to his house, met his wife and children, and came for all the holidays plus backyard barbeques. Long story short, he and his wife have divorced and he moved back to the Northeast. A lot of my planning involved my computer work, learning new things and just playing with the latest innovations. Another part of the equations was to find a friend who had moved on to a new business and needed a hand. Although divorce wasn’t a part of my master plan, it sure played an important part of this plan.

After he was moved out of the house he found himself broke, but with an advertising idea that looked like it could work. He had a number of high profile contacts so all that was needed was some legwork, research, and someone he could trust to share in the business. Someone who had the time to invest, had the desire to make a go of it, and who didn’t really care about the money at first. We started with one client, I took the editorial we had and made some small adjustments to it, I’d find the talent’s website’s and would make their bio information fit our needs. I proofed read everything, and I even had a hand in keeping the people who were working on the project with us stay focused.

We picked up our second account and then our third; tiny steps to be sure, but all the while we could see the economy slowly improving. So my financial health is improving, I’m making almost enough money that soon I’ll be able to shoot again. In the meantime I’m working on prints of my work. I’ve started refining a new book that features only the work I’m interested in, the kind of images I want to shoot so I can show models which direction I’m headed in and if they would like to invest their time and talent perfect. Don’t know how far I’ll get this year, baby- steps on the road to a full recovery. Along the way I’ve picked up several friend who believe as I do, who are interested in sharing the passage with me, who help fire my ideas and beliefs. Some young people who have such a zest for their art that it’s contagious. Maybe that’s all we need in life, to make it more fulfilling, sharing the spice that makes life worth living, that brings out our passions, so that we remember what it was once like to be young. This year I plan on writing about that transition, getting fire up again, and getting my butt in gear. I want to wish all you readers a wonderful new year full of the spice for life.