Run like the Ancients

When we were home in Christiansburg for Labor Day weekend and my grandma's 90th birthday, my dad passed on to me Christopher McDougall's book Born to Run. Inspired by the great distance runners, the Tarahumara Indians of Copper Canyon, Mexico, McDougall explores the ancient art of running, trying to discover out how the Tarahumara manage to run up to 60 miles a day, often several days a week, for 60-70 years of their life, and rarely, if ever, end up hurt. In comparison, 80% of all modern runners is hurt every year.

What he finds is a culture of people who enjoy running and who trust their body (their legs, their feet, their ankles) to carry them wherever they need to go without the need for fancy footwear and expensive orthotics. When he discovers that no medical study has ever proven that the newest and 'best' running foorwear prevents injuries, and in fact they typically cause running injuries, he dives into a training plan that stresses natural stride, minimal support, and a quick footed lightness that protects the body from injury.

The book profiles interesting characters, all runners who come to their passion from different avenues, and culminates in a 50 mile run through the Copper Canyons of Mexico, pitting some of the best ultra runners in the US against the legendary Mexican runners.

I walked away from this book inspired to change my running style.

There are many reasons that people decide to make the change, many of them prompted by nagging, permanent, running injuries. I have been fortunate never to have had any major issues--no plantar fasciitis, no stress fractures, no Achilles injuries--just a few minor muscle tweaks, and currently a nagging hamstring that I just can't seem to heal and that seems to re-injure without warning in a variety of exercises.

My hope in making a change is that this nagging injury goes away as the rest of my legs get stronger. Also, I am searching to embrace the spirit of the Tarahumara and really focus on enjoying my running. In the runs that I have done since finishing the book (including one 5 miles race), I have really tried to zero in on letting my body run and enjoying how it feels. I tried to erase thoughts of distance left and time, and to trust that I do know how to run (even if using my current running style). At the end of each run I felt good--tired in a great way--and I managed a decent, consistent pace throughout the whole run.

The next steps are to change my footwear, forcing me to alter my stride, and then to start training slowing, letting my body adjust to the changes and letting my feet and ankles strengthen over time.

My dad is at least 4 months into his transition and he says he is a completely changed runner. I hope to follow in his footsteps.

Hopefully Heather and I can both embrace our inner runner.

And if you haven't read the book Born to Run yet, I highly, highly recommend it.

Jess and Matt Married!

Heather and I attended the wedding of a childhood friend this past weekend. Even though Jess moved away from Christiansburg in middle school, we've managed to keep in touch through the years. And when Heather and I first met Matt two years ago we knew they had something special.

The wedding was held in the beautifully renovated Chamberlin Hotel in Hampton, VA and even though I wasn't the official wedding photographer, I tried to get as many beautiful shots as possible. Here is a sampling of some of my favorite.

We both wish Jess and Matt years of happiness and love!

Time to Pack

Things have been hectic around our house for the past few weeks. We're in the process of moving to a new apartment in Syracuse and we've been trying to pack in bits and pieces so as not to overwhelm ourselves at the last minute.

But the time to move has crept up on us and we are now T-minus 3 days (!!!) to the move. I ran out of paper for the kitchen dishes tonight and it still seems like we have so much to do.

The cats do seem to be enjoying the mess and chaos and the piles of boxes that they can climb on, but I so wish it wasn't so much work to move!

Fortunately our new apartment only costs half of what we're paying for rent right now so we plan to double our payments to our debts.

Hopefully we survive the weekend move!

Photo project

A week or so ago I started a 365 day photo project in an effort to push me to think creatively, work on my photography techniques, and look for picture opportunities everywhere I go.

I think it must be working somewhat because Heather says I'm commenting on everything in terms of what might make a good photograph nowadays.

The downside is that the camera and case is rather bulky and I haven't been carrying it around with me all the time, so I've definitely missed some opportunities for what might have been a good picture. This also means that I have sometimes had to take pictures inside, which severely limits my subject matter, and often forces me to use my flash.

I've been reading some books on wedding photography and photography in general and I realize that using flash still confuses me. Not necessarily knowing when to use flash, because I think that's fairly easy, but knowing how much flash when you're at certain exposure settings or distances in order to get a pleasantly exposed picture that doesn't turn the background black or completely overexpose and flatten the image. I think in the future I'm going to need to take some sort of course or workshop on it because I think understanding flash better and not relying on 'auto' will make me a better photographer.

Anyway, here is one of my 365 day photos, which I will be keeping an album of on facebook. I'll post my favorite here when they come up.

Enjoy!

You gotta start somewhere

As the end of summer draws near, I would have to say that out gardening experiment wasn't a huge success. Honestly, I think our biggest problem was that we just had a planter, and not a garden on the ground. The only soil we could find at Home Depot was technically top soil and was meant to be used with regular soil, but we didn't have that option so we hoped for the best.

It seems that everything we planted took a long time to grow and was a little stunted. Our herbs, our parsley and basil, is miniature and is just now big enough to pick and use. The peas we had were producing, but there weren't many of them, and then they got super scourched during the heat spell we had in July. After our week away out west they were pretty much goners. Our squash sprouted leaves and some flowers, but then they scourched away as well. Our cucumbers also had some leaves and flowers, but didn't seem to do much but turn yellow in the sun.

Amazingly, just when we had given up on the garden for the season and said we would just let it die off, we had a couple of days of rain and voila!, we had some miniature cucumbers! So now we're nurturing a few cucumbers and some herbs. We picked our first cucumbers yesterday and made a cucumber and tomato salad with some tomatoes with my parent's garden and some fresh basil and it was soooo good.







We can't wait until we have a real backyard to call our own and some real dedicated gardening space.

But I suppose we had to start somewhere.

Ashley and David--Married!

Here are a few of my favorite shots from Ashley and David's wedding last month. They were married in Federal Way, Washington, between Seattle and Tacoma. I wish them, and their adorable son Nathan, years of happiness and love!

Meet Green Blossom Photography!

Crazy as it may sound, I have decided to enter the wedding photography business.

I have been interested in it for awhile now, and in the back of my mind I always said that being a wedding photographer would be a dream job. I just didn't think I would be talented enough to do it.

But then along came opportunity.

A few months ago, Heather's brother and his fiance asked me if I would do their photography as a wedding gift. I had been dubbed the 'unofficial' photographer for Heather's step-brother's wedding last summer, though at the last minute, a long lost uncle who happened to be a professional photographer showed up and I was relegated to backseat photography. I think I came out with some good shots, but I wasn't the front and center photographer and I was using borrowed, slightly older, equipment.

Nevertheless, I guess it put me on the radar for Heather's brother, and I was only too happy (though extremely nervous!) to accept the challenge.

I wanted to do a really good job for them so I did my research--I read blogs on wedding photography, browsed galleries of professionals, checked out books from the library, even invested in a Digital SLR of my own (which we were going to get at some point anyway), and practiced, practiced, practiced.

The day of the wedding I was nervous, but once I jumped in and started shooting the time just went so fast. I had so much fun! Composing shots, suggesting poses, snapping moments from the middle of the action, and looking for photo opportunities around every bend. I know I still have a lot to learn and I know I made a few mistakes because I'm not not on auto pilot yet when it comes to exposure techniques, but I was pleased (and maybe a little bit surprised) with the results of my photos.

Since the wedding I have been editing in my spare time and I am really happy with the final results. I hope the happy couple will be too!

Which leads me to the business aspect of the venture. Because I had so much fun during every step of the process (planning, shooting, editing), I really started to think that maybe I could do this as a profession. It will have to start as a part time side job for awhile and I know it will be awhile before I make much income from it, but I could see myself being happy shooting weddings for years to come.

I finished the editing process on the pictures yesterday and since I wanted to post some on this blog, I figured I better come up with a name and a logo that I could put on the photos before posting. Heather and I spent the last weekend brainstorming names, and then I spent a couple of days googling our ideas to see if they were already taken in the photography business. Crazily almost every single idea we had was already in use, so it either means I'm not very creative or I'm on the same wavelength as a lot of artists out there. Which might be a good sign :)

In the end, I chose Green Blossom Photography, which I designed a logo for today. I also purchased the domain name so no one else can use it in the future. Since I don't have a website yet, the name is just living in cyberland, but I wanted to jump in before someone else snatched it up. The website, blog, facebook page, etc. will all come in time.

I'm just staring out and have a long way to go but I am so looking forward to this new adventure.

So welcome Green Blossom Photography!