Photos

     Lately I have been organizing my photo albums. It has been a journey. The fun part is getting rid of photos I no longer want. I never thought I would say that  I no longer want some of my photos. Some of the people in my photos I no longer want to remember. This is  a tough one. Sometimes the photos they are in are too artistic to dispose of . Often they are jumbled in photos with those I am still in touch with so I opt to keep those photos anyway.
    Through photos one sees the passage of time. Some people have not aged as well as others. Some people have passed away.
      It takes a long time to sort through photos. It took the passage of much time to have taken all my photos. 

Its all About the Pictures

      When I go on vacation I am always snapping photos. It is part of what makes vacation fun. Some think that photo taking prevents people from enjoying the moment. I strongly disagree. Taking photos is part of what makes the moment fun. I like seeing how great a photo I can create. It preserves the moments that will never return. When I am have forgotten my phone or camera I always regret the photos I was unable to take.

  I can't imagine not having these photos . I loved being where they were taken and I loved taking them. Its best to get LOTS of photos because you never know which ones will really come out well. 

Picture This

      I love photos. Often when you look at them you find things you didn't even know were there. It was even more mysterious with film cameras. When you would look in the viewfinder it was hard to  envision that space as its own entity. Digital cameras make it a little easier. But not completely.
      I always learn a lot about my friends from  photos . Sometimes I see facets of their personality reflected in their faces that I overlook in real life. Sometimes I notice more vulnerability in a photo that I don't focus on when I see them in person. A photograph is the most in the moment a person can be. Photos remind me to try to be more in the moment.
     

a captured moment

   

Selfie Mania

     Since the advent of digital cameras and the popularity of cell phones with cameras, the selfie has been on the rise. I hate the word "SELFIE". Its not like people did not take a lot of pictures of themselves before the digital age, its just easier now. I am a fan of the selfie because I take better pictures than my friends do and I am able to take better photos of myself than anyone. Most people I know specialize in full length photo taking. They also don't realize that a photo taken from above looks better than a picture taken from below. If I don't take the picture there is a 90% chance I will look awful. If I take the picture there is a 95% chance it will be an amazing photo. Those are just the facts. So I will not refrain from taking selfies any time soon.

Citizens of the Subway

yuppie child and frum child

 I love watching people on the trains. It is always fun to guess the relationships of those sitting in such close proximity to one another .
  The two little girls in yuppie child and frum child are just so cute.  I purposely cut out the parents from the photo. The kids were just so cute and just acting like kids   proving that people are people no matter where they hail from.
   The second photo was more confusing. At first glance it seemed as though this was a couple wearing blue on the train together on a random Sunday. After a closer look I am not sure that they even know each other's names.
   

are they together or just sitting beside each other?

As we approach the last photo I posted called together , we see that though there are so many disconnected people on the train  there still are some who 

ride with their friends  and it is apparent that they indeed are friends. It is so refreshing.

 When I first moved to New York I used to people watch
constantly. After awhile I got caught in my own
bubble and started looking inward instead of outward on the trains. Sometimes that
has been to my advantage. Sometimes there is
just too much weirdness on the trains that it is better to
be engrossed in a novel or a song on my ipod.
     Lately I have been paying more attention
to my surroundings and noticing the photo opportunities on
the subways. Now that I have an iPhone it is a lot easier
to secretly snap a photo. I feel like there really is a softer
side to New York City that I had not noticed until I
began photographing random individuals. It has been a
nice surprise.

together 

Facebook Dislike

          One of the most enjoyable parts of Facebook is catching up with old friends. One of the most disturbing parts of Facebook is seeing how badly some of my friends have aged. I recently looked up my best friend from nursery school on Facebook. Bad move. She looks really old. Mind you I haven't seen her that much since I was about six, but still. There are no two ways about it . She has aged. Granted so have I , but I don't look as old as she does. Maybe its best to have my Peter Pan syndrome shaken but its  still. downright depressing. Sometimes its best to leave well enough alone. I'd rather remember some people as they were and not as they are now. Granted , one has no control over who one might run into in person or who one will see a picture of in the  newspaper, but Facebook and the internet in general make it more previlent. Sometimes technology isn't better.

The Wanderer

In front of  FAO Schwartz on fifth avenue 

One of my most favorite things is walking around Manhattan by myself. Its not that I dislike walking with others, its just that I  really enjoy walking by myself. I like noticing the details along the way and snapping photos. Perhaps I would notice the details with another person by my side. Perhaps not. It does depend on who I walk with and if they are willing to stop along the way and take in the sights or if the destination is more important than the journey.

Picture Perfect

     Some of my friends have posted frumster profile photos that are a much better version of what they really look like. I always wonder if this is fair to them and whomever they meet on the site. The picture really is  them but it really doesn't look authentic. The picture looks so good that I almost don't recognize them. Sometimes even when someone actually resembles their profile photo when I meet them in person they don't always seem as I've imagined them. But when they have an enhanced profile photo, well... I am less forgiving.
      One guy had such an old profile photo that I walked right past him at our assigned meeting place. When I finally met up with him I was taken aback. He looked little like his photo and quite a bit older. Had I known what he really looked like I would never have met up with him. I suppose he thought it would not make a difference to me how different he looked from his photo. It may not have made a difference had I liked him,  I did not like him or how he really looked.
       It is important to have a flattering dating profile photo, but it should still look like you. 

photo please...

     I never learn my lesson. My usual policy is that I don't contact men on dating websites that don't post their pictures . A guy without a profile picture contacted me today. Against my better judgement I replied. Instead of immediately requesting a photo I chatted with him online. When I finally saw his photo I was in quite a dilemma. Not only did he look a decade older than his listed age, he did not look appealing to me either. I  was in quite a pickle. Why hadn't I upheld my rule?
Then again , it was not entirely my fault. This is the chance people take when they don't post their picture on dating websites. They think that if I really like them then it won't matter what they look like . So silly.
      Anyway, back to Romeo. Well as soon as I saw old Romeo's photo I knew he was not for me, only confirming all doubts I had about him without the photo. He had a lot of flaws before I saw his photo, but I guess I thought if he was cute it might not be so bad.... Well the photo brought me to reality and no Romeo was not for me photo or not!
     Well , I have learned my lesson. Next time I am immediately asking for a photo when mr no photo contacts me.

spring in the city

   there is nothing like window shopping in new york city in the spring.  in honor of spring i have included some fun photos i have taken. 

 some of these photos were taken on sixth avenue , some on fifth avenue and some in union square.
enjoy!

picture this

my parents never hung pictures  on the walls  of their house when i was growing up. a few years ago they hung a few pictures in the dining room and maybe ten years ago they hung some up in the hallway upstairs near the bedrooms. until then the only pictures that were on the walls were in my bedroom or in my siblings bedrooms. when i was a kid my family moved into the house my mom still lives in . i remember asking my mom why we hadn't hung any pictures on the walls. i don't remember what her answer was.
every apartment  i have lived in i have adorned with pictures. to me it makes me feel more at home. this is odd  since my parents' home never had pictures hung on the walls . but it does.

i have always admired the family photos that lined the walls of other families homes. since ive lived on my own ive always had family photos on my apartment walls.
though my parents liked the house that we lived in they always wanted to move to another area of the city. though they were always looking to move they never did. perhaps this is why they never put up pictures until more recently.  maybe they never felt like it was really home so they never wanted to put up pictures. maybe i always want  a place to call home so i always hang pictures  on the walls of my dwelling.