Someday

My recent discovery of National Geographic's Photography Website - Your Shot - has been incredibly inspirational. The site provides a community of like-minded photographers from around the world, who vary in skill and experience. You are allowed to upload only 15 photographs per week, which forces reflection as to which photos to share. Through the Daily Dozen feature, there is the possibility of having your photo published in National Geographic.  After Ballerina, National Geographic photographer was my top childhood dream. This then is a huge incentive driving me to take better and more interesting photos.

The editors of the magazine and website also give out assignments, the best photos from which will be published as a story on the web-site, all with an eye of helping people become better photographers. 

All right - enough of my gushing about their web-site, but really, you should check it out if you are interested in photography. It is full of inspiration. Back to the main point of this post

Currently, there is an assignment posted called Someday. The goal of which is to take and post photos representing your daydreams and goals for the future. This assignment really struck me. In the past 18 months, many of my life-long dreams have been shattered. The loss of what I thought was my dream job due to not getting tenure has me really re-thinking my future goals. The loss of two pregnancies in the past year and being 42 years old, diminishes likelihood of fulfilling the dream of having children. Right now, despite these dreams being. possibly, washed away by circumstances in life, I am in a good place. I have new dreams and new hopes that are populating my Someday daydreams. This is the place I am coming from when I chose these photos (you are limited to three) to submit to the assignment.

(1)

Someday - Someday I will travel to places where nature is grand and majestic, but for now, I will explore nature in the green spaces and natural areas of my hometown. 

When I look at other people's nature photos, I often see a grandness and a sense of the pristine in the photos. Part of that sense comes from the setting itself. Part of it comes from the photographers skill in creating it. Since my funds for international travel are non-existent right now, I am focusing on nature in my back yard. In this endeavor, however, I am driven by more than just lack of funds. I am driven by the desire to educate people that nature doesn't just exist in National Parks, exotic jungles, and the Arctic Circle. The populations, communities, and ecosystems in our own back yards are just as much a part of nature and ecological processes. I am not 100% sure where I am going to go with this idea - of celebrating the nature in our "backyards", but I see it as driving force for my future - be it photography, teaching, or volunteer work. 

Shawnee Mission "Lake" at Shawnee Mission Park

(2)

Not all Somedays come to be. Someday I had always hoped to have children to play with at the park. While I haven't completely given up that Someday - it may be that it never comes to be. 

There are times when the tendrils of sadness unexpectedly reach out and grab my heart, dragging my spirit down to a dark, sad place. Sometimes, there is a obvious trigger - a pregnant woman in the parking lot, a happy family on a TV commercial. Other times, the trigger is uncertain, unclear, and the tears just come, streaming down my face. This happened yesterday morning. Then in the afternoon, I was looking through photos I had taken last year, and this one struck me as really reflecting that sense of loss. So I included it in the Someday assignment. 

Nall Park

(3)

Someday it will be Spring again, and the buds on this branch will leaf out.

When so many of your hopes and dreams have been shattered. When you have been on the rollercoaster ride of a job hunt - maybe this will be the job for me, maybe this time I will here a yes instead of a no. When so much about your future is uncertain,...then you look for short-term Somedays. Somedays that are certain to come to be. The promise of Spring is just that. A Someday that, no matter what else happens, what other uncertainties there may be in my life, will come to pass. And as someone who suffers in winter - SADS from the dark and the cold - Spring is a Someday that I long for each year.