Finding the courage to create sometimes seems like a struggle. It seems easier the older I get because I have become more focused and now have my own unique vision of what I want to accomplish. When I was younger, I had no sense of place or individual style. There were many other artists that I greatly admired and I would explore their various styles. The more I would explore them the more I would recognize how they related to me. I fell in love with the imagery of a photographer named Fred Holland Day, who was probably one of my greatest influences. He was a photographer and philanthropist reaching the peak of his career at the end of 1800’s. He seemed to dabble in a lot of different interests, history, nature, and art. He was greatly inspired to create extraordinary images of the male nudes. He never married but it was never confirmed if he was a homosexual because his life was kept private. He was a contemporary of Alfred Stieglitz and a part of the Photo-Secessionist movement. He is rarely known and many of his images were quite controversial at the time and not always socially acceptable and so were less popular. His images are filled with beauty and a wondrous grace. His attention to light was extraordinary. His influence felt by other photographers since. He was a visionary who could see beyond himself and approached each image with such artistic integrity that their brilliance still radiates though them to even a modern viewer. Unfortunately there was fire in his studio that destroyed most of his work. Mostly what survives was out on loan or in private collections. After the fire, he gave up photography and moved on to another venture. Of course the process of creating images was completely different during his day and gave his images their unique impression. And his images were more about the expressionism of his subject’s subconscious mind. The light, softness of focus, and texture of grain was always remarkable. I become obsessed with the quality of his images and spent many years doing portraits in this style, trying to get to the very core of his mood and tone. Of course, with the modern processes that quality is just not quite obtainable, not even digitally, but the presence of his format lingers in my imagination.

For me it took years for my own unique style to emerge, the taking of lots of bad photos, of experimentation and exploration…”to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous misfortune” so to speak. But if you keep at it and search for the truth in yourself that uniqueness of style will become apparent. I see so many people become defeated too early thinking they are not good enough and give up. I think the real courage to create comes from giving yourself the latitude to fail and recognize sometimes we create very bad images.

In light of recent events I see how fragile our lives can become. I have always known how important it is to fill every living moment of my existence with something meaningful. One of the goals I learned to set a long time ago is to find something remarkable within each day. It doesn’t have to be a big something, it just needs to be something that you can take a moment and just recognize. For my self and others it begins with the aroma, taste, and pleasure of that first cup of coffee in the morning. It’s the relationship and love for those around us. It’s beginning to recognize these moments we may take for granted the begins the process of awaking our sense to the life that surrounds us and make us aware of how precious that life becomes. Sometimes we don’t recognize that remarkable beauty until it is gone.

It began early for me, when I first took up photography. I would spend hours photographing the same subject; different angles, different perspectives, constantly exploring my relationship to the subject. Sometimes I would be drawn to something and not ever know why; perhaps a texture, a tone, a feeling, or an emotion. I always respond to my gut impulse. When I am walking down the street and I suddenly connect to something, it becomes the hook. The creative process begins with curiosity and wonder. I begin to probe what is the root of this impulse. What within me triggers my attraction? A life of working in the theater, gardening, and studying classical art brings me to a greater geometric understand of balance, form, and structure.

I am drawn, like a painter, to that underlying geometric structure which creates shape and movement. The points of a triangle fascinate me. The movement of my eyes following the out line of the shape defining the contents of what the shape contains. I am also drawn to “S” shapes inverted or natural. To me there is a comfort in this subtle flow of movement and as it welcomes, draws me in, and excites me. Now that I have probably lost most of you, you may be asking how does this awareness of the substructure relate to reality? It’s everywhere; it becomes the foundation for everyday existence. The meandering of a stream, the structure of a building, the trees in a garden, the lines of a fence, the relationship between children playing in a park, the movement of an athlete. When you become aware of it these shapes begin to emerge everywhere and in everything. Suddenly you begin to pay a closer attention to the relationship between things in your ordinary environment. I am particularly drawn to it in the structure of the human form. Because it is the rawest, most basic, every changing form that surrounds me. Add light, emotional context, mood, tone, and the remarkable natural beauty begins to emerge. All of us are exceptional in some way. Many of us just cannot see what those remarkable qualities are. We are too afraid sometimes to look deep into the mirror of ourselves and allow others to become those mirrors for us. I am fearful when television becomes our only mirror and tells us how we should live our lives. We have to find trust within our selves in order to learn to adore that existence. I am far from perfect from doing this myself, and yes lead a life full of my own distractions. But if I can recognize a few extraordinary moments in each day, I am generally fairly content.

I have so much in my head from the past weeks range of emotions, beginning last week with utter jubilation for my 50th Birthday Party, to facing on internalized terror by sky diving to the depth of despair from the loss of an old friend. Today I have a strong desire to go home and see my father and spend the day with him. My strength in family has been fortified this past week to become stronger than ever. I feel like I am looking into the face of my own mortality and see the areas where I need to rebuild those bonds. It feels like to older we get the further we get from things that are truly important to us. I know I am a terrible workaholic and last year took only one weekend off the entire year to get out of Missoula, and that we to help with my father’s wedding in last August. This is Memorial Day and the day we remember and pay respect to our fallen military members that have given their lives to secure the precious sanctity of us as a free nation. To give us a way of life and to enjoy the riches of simple pleasure. When I have traveled outside of the US I saw our country through the eyes of other cultures. We were looked upon with adoring admiration. As the center of freedom in speech and idealism and especially as a leader in the expression of pop culture, from music, to movies to innovation. The simple things most of us take for granted. I know I do. Today is a day of reflection, to rejoice, and of celebration. It is to honor those that have protected our way of life. Though I have not personally known anyone who has served and been lost to war. I have always been a person to not put much value in war, it seems the casualties for life is far too extreme. Yes I am aware of evil in the world, which has ever been so dominate in my head this week, with the loss of Kelly Jo, and that is must somehow be brought to control. Many years ago I visited the Martin Luther King Memorial Center in Atlanta and become awestruck by how issues of fear, hate, and racism have been quenched by a belief in a peaceful means. Gandhi was an inspiration for the world on the enlightenment of a peaceful order. But then facing my own fears on that fateful morning of 9/11, to witness those towers fall, our own security, held so sacred, suddenly terrorized. I don’t see any such way to deal with hate other then by force. Sorry my heart is still a bit raw from yesterday.

Today is a day for me to reconnect to my heritage, and reflect on all those that have gone before me. Those that have paved a remarkable road I have been able to travel. First to my mother, who passed away this week five years ago. I am thankful to the precious life you have given me. To my dear friend Gilbert, who have given me the passions to lead a creative life. To my grandmother Elsie Cyr, who gave me courage to face and accept my unique difference. In musical theater there are brilliant moments at the end of the play when the dead all come back to surround the living to sing of a triumphant life, though it is a corny idea, it is a brilliant concept. Today I feel the strength of those ghosts surrounding me in a harmonic chorus the celebration of what I have become and all the wondrous things I have. I am thankful and will reach out to those that are dear to me.

“Now they’ll walk on my arm through the distant night
And I won’t let them stray from my heart
Through the wind, through the dark, through the winter light
I will read all their dreams to the stars
I’ll walk now with them
I’ll call on their names
I’ll see their thoughts are known
Not gone –“
From the musical “Spring Awakening” lyrics by Steven Sater, music by Duncan Sheik

My heart sunk last night as I learned the fate of Kelly Jo Merseal Dube-Woodard. Her body was discovered in the woods out in Mineral County. I wrestled with a sleepless demon though out the night, awakening to cry out and at one point got up so sick to my stomach just thinking about what’s become of you. The officials and family have not released any detail as to what has happened, but I feel a part of me is missing this morning. Kelly has been a follower of this project from the beginning and a supporter of my work for some time. I feel like I have few connections to my old world of growing up in such a small town and not all of them as positive. Sometimes it feels like there is so much anger and hate in the world that it becomes unbearable. A lot of this negative energy is targeted at people that are different then the norm. I have spent a great deal of my life avoiding confrontation with such harmful influences. Kelly was a person who embraced everyone and could see the remarkable qualities in others. When I worked with Kelly’s daughter Jesica, I could see much of her mother’s influences and teaching within her. Jesica my heart goes out to you this morning as I cannot possibly imagine the turmoil you must be feeling right now. Your mother was so utterly proud of you she was bursting with excitement, every time I talked to her over your accomplishments.

Growing up in small towns, especially in Montana, we always seemed so far removed from violence. We feel safe and somehow secure by the comfort of the community that surrounds us. Superior is a very remote place, a little town wedged in the bottom of a canyon in the mountains of the most western part of the state. It is on I-90 before you cross over the mountains into Idaho. It’s actually a remarkable little community where everyone knows everyone else and very little changes with time. Kelly’s sister Paula, was one of my best friends and the Merseal’s lived across the street from us on the east end of town, near the high school. Their mother JoAnne, is also a remarkable woman filled with love, compassion, kindness, caring and consideration, which was infectious to her children. I always felt it brimming from her soul whenever I was around. They were a family of all girls and we were a family of all boys. We all seem to be poor people then, Superior was a town of very little means, mostly supported by a sawmill, southeast of the town. I didn’t really know much of their father, he seemed to work a lot, but their family was always so happy. There was so much contentment in our neighborhood. Mischievous behavior was going up some creek, building a bon fire and drinking some beer. Alone, insolated from the rest of the world. It was a community about the people. Livelihood in our small town seem to center around high school athletics and a old family operated theater call The Strand that only had showing 4 nights a week. It was a great place to grow up. I had not quite discovered my sexual orientation yet, but was somewhat isolated from the others because of my creative differences. Kelly, and her family somehow always embraced this and somehow supported me, even when my own family didn’t. I felt nurtured by the Merseal’s especially JoAnne their mother. I remember she was always curious about what I was up to and at times was envious they had such a remarkable mother. This is such a loss to such an extraordinary family. Today I am so deeply moved by the depth of your sorrow. Tears fill my eyes to think of the joys and love you have all shared. I know you are a close family and have always been there for each other. What the heart has once known it shall never forget.

“HAPPY 50TH MY DEAR FRIEND…SO HARD TO BELIEVE WE’VE KNOWN EACH OTHER MORE THAN 30 OF THOSE AWESOME YEARS!! YOU ARE AMAZING AND YOUR WORK NEVER CEASES TO AMAZE ME TER. I REMEMBER YOUR 1ST MOVIE YOU MADE AND SHOWED ON THE BED SHEET HANGING ON THE WALL!! :-)”
Kelly Jo Merseal Dube-Woodard – posted to my facebook wall the night before she disappeared.

Kelly you are and inspiration to us all and will be dearly missed. Thanks for becoming a part of my journey! My heart aches with sadness to know harm has come to your precious world. And “Yes those where the days, when it all seemed so simple then.”

A week later and I finally got the video and still pictures from my sky dive last week. Watching it again still took me to that point of nervous anxiety. It was weird to experience something and recount what was going through your head as it unfolds, and then to see if from on outside perspective as if I were a spectator. It’s like two different experiences of the same event. You cannot see the real anxiety one feels. Photos have an interesting property in that they can either enhance and create a forced perspective of who you are and how you experience events, or they can become a substitute for the experience. As a photographer I tend to never shoot personal experiences, family events, things I am involved in. Some how in my head I want to remember my emotional connection to the events. Perhaps when I am old and my mind begins to go I will end up regretting that I did make a greater effort to preserve some sort of historic record. This was an event that I did want recorded that I can look back and relive within the moment. Gary Sanders, who I jumped with, had both a video camera and a still camera that shot the entire event as it unfolded. I believe the still camera captured an exposure every 5 to 10 seconds

So here is what I remember: The sky was filled with clouds that seem to hang low. There were only a few patches of blue and the air was filled with humidity. I remember my mind racing the hour it took to drive to the Ronan Airport. I kept scanning the horizon, watching the sky that seemed to be filled with a brooding intensity. I kept catching myself speeding as if I was racing through time to get to that destination, but once I began to get closer to the site, a jittery nervousness began to overwhelm me. As I turned onto the airport road, it felt as if my heart was about to stop. I was the first one in my family there. Gary Sanders, the man who was going to take me on the jump met me outside as I pulled in. It turns out he works for the US Postal Service, and I told him I worked for UPS we joked about the two working in tandem. First and foremost I had to sign and initial 6 pages of waivers. As I began to read through the details, the anxiety mounted. I guess the serious repercussions of what I was about to do didn’t really hit until I was signing away all liability in worst-case scenarios. He jokingly said this would be the worst part of the day. Next he began to take me through the process of the jump, what I had to do, positions I had to maintain, and how to secure a safe landing. An unrealness began to creep in my mind and I was having a difficult time concentrating on what he was actually saying and I kept asking him to repeat his instructions. I didn’t want to miss any of the details, but I could feel a part of me beginning to shut down in my head, trying to come to terms with what I was about to undertake. My need to disassociate from the experience began to scare me. I am generally very connected to most things I do, and this was completely out of my character. Next was the process of dressing for the job. Flight suit, harness, cap, goggles. This offered some security, just because it stirred so much of the childish fantasy side of my mind that I was about to live a very cool adventure. I emerged from the building all decked out for my family to see. Suddenly it all felt all right.

I met the pilot and Gary walked me thought what we would be doing on the plane and the prep process of the actual jump, I am actually going to call it fall, because no actual jumping was involved. It was a small plane, barely big enough to fit the three of us, with only one seat for the pilot. The process would be for us to shimmy out the open door, to a step ledge, with our hand supported forward by the airplane wing support bar. Now I really know I was in for trouble. I was actually going to have to get outside of the plane to fall. We did some pictures on the ground, me with the plane. Said our good-byes, my brother having the strangest look in his eyes. We crawled into the plane and suddenly we were taxiing to the runway. Once we hit the runway, they closed the door, the engine whirred and suddenly we were propelled into the sky. It seemed to take forever to get to 9,000 feet. We went through the clouds and climbed above them. I got up on my knees to look out, again beginning to feel myself retreat deeper within. Suddenly we had reached the altitude and began to get into position. As the door opened, my breath was sucked out with it. The wind began to whoosh around me. My heart was beating so fast, I thought I was going to pass out. We began to step out on to the ledge, my stomach began to churn because I thought I was going to miss it, we shimmied out, the wind blasting into my face and body. The pressure was immense. I was supporting myself by the brace on the wing, Gary kept trying to get me to release and pull my arms back as we had rehearsed on the ground, but it was like I was paralyzed and didn’t know what to do. He pulled my one arm right arm back, and I could feel him tugging on my left, finally I just took a deep breath, my heart now in my throat and fell back. I saw the plane rapidly disappearing above me. I put my arms out and we up righted our position, the pressure on my face like I have never felt before. We were suddenly passing though a cloud and could not see the ground and had no real sense of falling.

Suddenly there was a tremendous jerk as the parachute opened and we began to drift out of the clouds. The drifting was euphoric. Suspended, I was finally able to pull my goggles up and enjoy the suspended floating sensation. I felt like I was weightless but I became aware of the pressure of the harness in my groin area. We practiced as landing and it all seemed like it was over before it had really begun. I saw my family on the ground watching me. We landed exactly where he said we would, though he said we were way off because of my reluctance to let go. As soon as I stood up I remember an uncontrollable laughter broke out through out my body. I could not stop. The experience was over and I had survived. It’s a mind-boggling experience and to face things in ourselves is remarkable to see unfold. It was the perfect way to celebrate my birthday. Would I do it again? Probably not. It was something to experience and confront within myself and don’t need to relive. I guess this is where the pictures are worth to capture. That night I slept like I have not slept in a very long time. I don’t think I will be having any more dreams of falling.