Revelations from a Praying Mantis

There were few opportunities to get outdoors and enjoy photography this week due to the weather.  Being that it is mid to late September, one would expect pumpkin spice, sweatshirt type of weather.  Not so, we got our first rain since August on September 22nd and the temperatures have sat at the lower 90s.  Given these circumstances, I chose to remain at home enjoying the air conditioning.

When I did go out to gather the mail,  I was suprised by a four to five inch long praying mantis scaling the wall of my home.  While I enjoy photographing all kinds of wildlife, I have taken very few photos of insects, and to have such an unusual visitor come to me was quite an honor.   Since I don't see a praying mantis often I was curious to learn more about them.  Immediately, I discovered that I have been misspelling their name which is "praying" and not "preying".  While preying is what they really do as one of the world's most prolific insect killers,  I doubt whether they have any ethical feelings about their behavior that would cause them to pray.  In fact, their method of disposing of their prey is to bite their heads and suck out their brains.  ( I can recall sitting through long meetings where the speaker, a decendant of the mantid genus, sucked out the brains of the participants as they were held captive.)  

They hold their front legs in a folded position which makes them appear to be praying.  Those front legs are armed with spines that are used to grasp their prey securely while they use their camouflage and slow movements to spring suddenly upon their prey.  Of the 1500 mantids worldwide, only 20 are found in the US and of those 20, only three are found here in the upper midwest.  This guy is a Chinese Mantis which was likely introduced to the US in the late 1800s to help control garden insects.

It's nice to know that I could gain such revelations from a prehistoric, religious looking creature scaling the walls of my home on a sorching fall day.

 Fade Away Fast, Please!

Nature Reclaiming the Garden Hotel

First of all, please pardon my whining this week. I chose a photo of the deteriorating Garden Hotel this week because it seemed to communicate with my underlying feelings. This photo is not even one of my favorite photos taken this week.  I pass by this place frequently and each time I do it taunts me by saying "You're tired of seeing me aren't you?"  

Right know I am experiencing an undercurrent of that message with my photography.  I am tired of seeing the images that I am creating.  I haven't lost my interest in photography, but I seem to be at that train depot waiting for new inspiration to arrive.  I am carrying my baggage with me in the form of  projects I still want to complete but haven't due to a number of excuses --  not reasons.  In the meanwhile, I am making myself busy with what I think are semi engaging images that keep me practicing my photography in order to be ready when the grand, inspiring idea comes along.  A published writer of novels tells me that she writes every day for one hour even through those uninspired periods.  Dieters, athletes, students, musicians, and photographers go through these plateau periods perhaps to gain footing for the next stage while holding on to hope the next stage will appear at just the right time.  Even the act of writing that last sentence felt a bit therapeutic.

The Garden Hotel which itself  has become an overgrown garden of mold, weeds and rubble like my image filing system.  Demolition of the building is scheduled to begin this month and is to be completed by December this year.  My eyes will be glad to see it gone and just empty space remaining.  I will enjoy seeing snow rest on the ground where it sat all these years  For me, the vacant land will present itself as a fresh canvas inviting new ideas.  

 Riding on the Edge of a Moment

On  Sunday afternoon, I was on my way to Nygren Wetlands to see what birds may have dropped by for a visit.  Before I could make it there I heard the whine of engines being pushed to the max.  That is when I made a detour to nearby Blackhawk Raceway where the track was hosting sportbike track time.  Watching them blur by seemed like watching a medieval battle with the knights racing to seize the victory while displaying the flowing colors identifying their own unique coat of arms.

During my short time there I came away with several photos that capture the color, speed and intensity of the event.  If you ever wondered what it is like to cling to a rocket made of carbon fiber and aluminum riding on the edges of physics,  just look at the intensity in the eyes of riders.  I had a great time that day proving that it is wonderful to be an opportunistic photographer.  Who could have more fun in just under an hour's time?  Sometimes it is what we do in those stolen minutes that injects energy into life for the week. 

 Fair Time Again

Here in rural Illinois, August is Fair time.  The start of school is just a weekend away and this time of month signals the end of summer although the humid, sunny, days give no clue that fall is coming.  Growing up in the midwest, the county fair is a local celebration for those who live in the rural areas and nearby towns alike.  Fair time brings together the the urbans and rurals and the young and the old alike in a ritual that's been passed down through the generations.

My photos this week were taken at our county fair which I had the priviledge to attend with two of my younger grandkids, who are definitely city kids.  We walked through the cattle barns trying to identify those special cows that provided the chocolate milk.  The kids enjoyed the excitement of being around the farm animals, touching them and feeding some of them.  They talked how fun it would be to own a calf, lamb or rabbit instead of their boring cat while not realizing the daily tasks that come with caring for livestock.  

It is photography's shortcoming that I couldn't capture the smell of frying funnel cakes and the aroma of sizzling sausages and onions on the grill. That would be a feature that would skyrocket sales of any new camera. My photos mostly sample the county fair experience and the excitement found in the livestock and project judging and the blur of neon and motion found in the midway rides. County fair time is special because it unites us by exposing the common roots we all share through agriculture and our yearning for a sense of community and simpler times.

 Looking at My Options

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The two photos this week hold significance to me not because they are great quality or have a special meaning to something in my life other than my participation in an online discussion about whether opportunities make life easier or harder today.  I have always been in favor of having many options because more options tends to relieve stress whereas, not seeing or having too few options  increases stress and makes life harder.   While I am  suppporting the "more oppportunities" viewpoint in the discussion,  I am struggling with "too many opportunities" in the task of setting up a new  camera.  Both photos for this week are similar to many I have taken previously.  What makes them special for me is that they are the first wildlife photos that I have taken with my new z8. 

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I have spent more time lately trying to figure out setup menus for the shooting banks and studying about the camera focus options than I'd like to say.  I enjoy shooting;  not setting up the camera menus.  The fact that I was able to set the camera to get the photos I wanted ended my week on a high note.  Even as I was taking the photo of the blue heron in flight, I was rehearsing an alternate focus tracking option that would have been better for this shot.  To me, that means that I am now at the place where I can see my opportunities (options) for using the camera less as a source of bewilderment and more as a source of motivation to keep learning and experimenting.

 Imagine

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This week I stumbled on this old Ford truck while deep in farm country searching for freshly picked sweet corn.  I always carry my old d5100 with me for such occasions as I find it less awkward than using the Subaru's built in back up camera.  This old Ford had character, and I am not speaking of the kind of character who was photo bombing me in the original photo.  What I saw in that old truck was decades of honest hard work during steamy July days and a trustworthy winter ride across unplowed country roads during the cold, dark days of December.

Photographs are taken with the camera but they are born in the mind of the photographer.  In 1968,  Bobby Kennedy became best known for a social comment that I think reflects my feeling as I took this photo and others like it. "Some men see things as the are and ask why?  I dream things that never were and say why not!" The original photo above is the view most people see as they drive by that old Ford -- just another junker within a retirement home for rusting clunkers that no longer have utility.  It's unworthy of a second look.

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The photo that I saw in my mind that day is the one on the left side of the page.  It shows an everyday blue collar worker still wearing those faded denims and sporting blotches of tanned (rust) wrinkled skin inflicted by storms and long dusty days. If this was a portrait of the farmer who drove this truck I would want to show the blemishes and calluses from an unwavering commitment to daily chores. I added a vintage film look to the photo as a nod to the period when this truck was a working vehicle.  The sky was blurred to emphasize the passage of time and the slow changing pace of life in farming communities where work, heritage and personal identity are wound tightly together.  For me, this image strengthens my belief that where a photo takes you is much more important than where you took the photo.  Which photo takes you to that welcoming place you long to be?  

A man's castle is..., well, his vacation home!

  

Three Inch Thick Doors

This weekend was my wife's 55th class reunion, and I attended as her other. and I enjoyed it greatly.  She graduated from a very small midwestern farm community where everyone knew one another.  I recall overhearing her classmate tell of getting a speeding ticket in high school only to discover his mom and pop found out about it before he ever got home.  (Remember, no cell phones or messaging)  Kids in this community had grown up going to grade school together so the ties among them are strong,  For me, it was an excellent experience since I didn't have to wear a name badge with my senior photo on it.  In fact, I was under no pressure to remember any of them as I am not a part of that segment of their lives.  To see them enjoy sharing their present and reliving their past was great and all I had to do was not get their way.  I didn't take any serious photos of any of them other than the one they requested.  Sometimes you need to put the camera away and just be part of the total experience. 

Handpainted Ceiling Panels

The reunion was held at a castle built in 1927 by the publisher of the Chicago Daily News as a vacation home for his family.  Its original owner, Walter Strong, lived an interesting life during the Al Capone and Prohibition era in Chicago. He was a truly an amazing man who developed a circle of influence well beyond Illinois. A dinner and a tour of the castle was part of the day's activity and the photos displayed this week are among the few that I took.  My only lense available this day was chosen for a group shot and not my wide angle that would have been outrageously fun at this place. (secret passages and hidden panels etc.) None the less, the architectual details from the painted ceiling panels in the rotundra to the rusted, aged armored doors were eyecatching.  While I couldn't get the interior photos I wanted, my curiousity and interest was stimulated enough for a return visit.