all that glitters is gold

when i was like five, maybe six, or possibly even seven, i used to be a photographer. my specialty was portraits...group portraits to be exact. i would round up either my favorite, most photogenic, or prettiest colored stuffed animals and then hunt around my apartment for the ideal shooting location. it usually fell under a house plant of some sort; or, near our third story window that overlooked a sea of potholed black top...the scenery, to a child, is always beautiful in the imagination. i would take my time lining everyone up either from tallest to shortest, shortest to tallest, based on color or, as superficial as this may be, based on favoritism and then i would snap away. the result was always perfection in my eyes...the same eyes that viewed that bumpy black gravel as an ocean of diamonds and glitter in the hot july sun mind you. sometimes, i would cut the head off of someone, or shoot things way too low but, in the end, i was always satisfied. i still have those pictures. they live at my dad's house now. all of my childhood models lived there as well until the great lighting bolt and consequent fire of '02. it destroyed them all, except for maybe three. the little guy pictured above is one of the survivors. he's always been a favorite. purchased from a garage sale back in the mid-eighties, he's been with me for twenty or so years now--and he still smells of the same strange funk he's always smelled of. garage sale stuffed animals just scream germs...so one day, my mom threw him in the laundry. when he came out, the smell emanating from him was indescribable. he's filled with beans so it was a damp, soaked bean smell that haunted my entire room for months, but i never minded it. in fact, being that he was such a favorite, for so many years, i actually grew to somewhat enjoy the stench. still, to this day, i catch myself taking a big whiff of that little guy just to again see that glitter in the rocky asphalt of life.

love, thank you for looking at me as i looked at those stuffed animals...and thank you for believing in who i am instead of focusing on what i'm not. thank you for fueling me to go further than anyone else ever has and thank you for investing in me...