My soul-mate and partner in life (Evelia) is a 1st generation U.S. Citizen . Her parents were immigrants from Mexico City, and after getting their bearings here in the U.S. settled down in East Chicago, where her Dad owned a barber shop, while her Mom ran a baby clothing store above him on West Chicago Avenue.

Her and her brothers were born in 'Da Region...

But a lot of her extended family lived (and still live) in and around Mexico City, so visits back there while Evelia was growing up was thing. This image of Her, Her Brother, and Her Uncle was taken atop the Torre Latinoamericana building in the historic district:

I ran across this black and white print while going through some of Evelia’s Mom’s photos some time back. The print was understandably faded and at the time I didn’t have a lot of hope that it could be cleaned up. But the current state of creative content software has advanced to a sometimes shocking state over the last few years and, after scanning into a digital format with an Epson V600, followed by some manual tweaking in Topaz Photo AI, the results were impressive.

#Photography #Images #BlackAndWhite #Portraits #People

Living here in Monterey Bay (and the adjacent Big Sur) means that there is an unbelievable abundance of beautiful spots to hang. Even seemingly unassuming little stretches of beach can carry with them a charm that makes you want to return again and again.

Asilomar Beach on the southern side of Pacific Grove is one such location. When I took on my current CIO role in Monterey, I initially rented a small studio nearby and would bike along the stretch of Ocean View Boulevard and Sunset Drive, often ending up at Asilomar. I was so taken with what was to become Evelia and my new home, that I kept messaging her images of the surf, the tidal pools, the people, and the sunsets. So much so that, as she was wrapping things up in the Midwest ahead of our “move”, it kind of pissed her off (for anyone who is concerned, I have long since been forgiven for that).

Its charm in many ways is that it is just a simple, classic community beach. No stunning cliffs, no dramatic flora or fauna. But… there’s not a day where you won’t find someone walking along the surf’s edge, or see a dog chasing a ball, or a small group sitting on some beach towels being chill.

Today’s Moment of Zen is a terrific small-moment example of that. Taken during the Golden Hour, it was simply a quick snapshot of a mother and her child walking along the water’s edge when something caught the child’s attention and he began digging his toes into the sand:

Nothing Special. Just a Perfect Moment.

October 28th, 2023

#Photography #Images #People #Beach #Sunset #MomentOfZen

"No union is more profound than marriage, for it embodies the highest ideals of love, fidelity, devotion, sacrifice, and family. In forming a marital union, two people become something greater than once they were. As some of the petitioners in these cases demonstrate, marriage embodies a love that may endure even past death. It would misunderstand these men and women to say they disrespect the idea of marriage. Their plea is that they do respect it, respect it so deeply that they seek to find its fulfillment for themselves. Their hope is not to be condemned to live in loneliness, excluded from one of civilization's oldest institutions. They ask for equal dignity in the eyes of the law. The Constitution grants them that right."

-- Justice Anthony Kennedy, June 26th 2015

Periodically I share this image as it remains one of my favorites. Evelia and I were living in Minneapolis when this profound statement was made by Justice Kennedy and the U.S. took another step forward in embodying the true meaning of “Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness”. It was also coincidentally the same weekend that the Twin Cities were having their Pride celebration. It was a wonderful, exhilarating moment in time, filled with joy and excitement for the future; and in the middle of it all in Loring Park, stood this representation of one of our strongest symbols of equality and compassion, with one flag on the right fallen on the ground, almost as a unintentional symbol of the fact that all struggles for freedom have a cost and not all live to see it happen.

Later, as I was working the image in post, I was struggling a bit with a way to amplify the feelings of this day amidst all the color and the happy crowds and it hit me that for this scene, while the joyousness of the occasion was the inspiration for the photo, the strength of the rainbow symbol was the key. After that it made perfect sense to focus on that.

Forward progress is rarely a smooth path and stumbles backward often precede great leaps forward. Given the recent events that we have seen, hopefully we can take solace in the fact that setbacks are not forever.

#people #love #future #respect #progress #obergefell #resist #photography #images