Finding My Focus

My new super Macro lens takes great close up pictures that have a shallow "depth of field" (ie, the part of the picture that's in focus). That can be good for isolating the subject but you do have to decide what you want to focus on.

Do you focus on the details that are closest to you while making the "big picture" slightly out of focus? Or do you focus on the petals and leave the stuff closest to you blurry?

I was musing on this as it relates to photography while weeding the garden this week. Weeding is a great time for contemplating my navel thinking about my philosophy of life. The garden was very weedy so this topic expanded into finding the focus in my life.

When I was younger I always had plans for the future. After graduating high school I'll go to THIS college because I want to go to vet school. OK. maybe not vet school. Next I'll go to graduate school. OK. I need to take a few years between undergrad and graduate school. No problem. 

Toward the end of graduate school I quit making much in the way of future plans. Graduate school didn't quite work out as I had planned and while I did eventually plan my next career move it kind of stalled after that.

So lately I've been plan-less. 

And I feel "scattered." I  have a good job that I mostly enjoy. I don't have any major career plans because once I reach full professor (tenured) I don't intend to move into administration. We aren't moving any time soon (a first for me in a LONG time - this house is the second longest I've ever lived in one place in my whole life). No major life changes coming up that require plans. No major changes coming up (that I can predict).

So that leave my "personal" life. I've taken an art class, I've enrolled in a Spanish class, I've dabbled in this and that but not really found a focus (except gardening). This leaves me feeling like I'm not accomplishing anything.

It's not an accurate perception but it's there.

So I decided to sit down and list all of the categories of stuff I'm interested in and have claimed to be working on and make plans. One year, two year, five year and ten year goals.

Do I want to become proficient in Spanish or just learn enough to help while traveling (the latter, definitely)?

Do I want to spend more time and energy improving my photography? My writing skills? My drawing/art?

Do I want to work on finally refinishing inherited furniture that needs work? Will I ever replace the no longer functioning innards of the 1950s era radio with a modern system (an iPod doc, anyone?) or is it fine as an aesthetic piece?

It's time to find a focus. What will I do in "this" lifetime?

Thanks to Zack Weiner of Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal and BAHfest for this GREAT concept!

I love technology

I love modern technology.  When it works it can make things so much easier!  You can now carry a smart phone to the garden center so that you can go on-line and check out the plant before you buy it.  You can blog about your garden and share pictures.  You can read other peoples' blogs to find out what works for them.  It's easy to check multiple sources for information.  No more needing a shelf full of book.  No more depending on a relative or neighbor for advice that may or may not be any good.

Lately I've started using technology to document the progression in my garden.  During the winter when it was time to order plants I was trying to go back and remember what the garden looked like, where there were empty spots, what blooms together.  Of course I've never made a map.  That would be too useful.  

I'm going out every two week to a month and photographing every inch of my garden.  I start at my driveway and take a photo of that end of the garden.  Then I take a big step to the left and repeat.  And repeat.  It takes about 100 photos.  Way too cost prohibitive in the old days of developing film.  Now?  Cheap and easy.  And I can find what I'm looking for if I organize it well on the hard drive.  Next winter I'll have a better guide to where I might be able to squeeze in just one more....

I love technology.

PS.  The end of the semester is in sight!  In about two weeks I'll have more free time and will try to get back to blogging regularly, I promise!