It Is What It Is

I have lived in Rolfe Iowa for 30 years now. Over the course of those years I have tolerated, sometimes hated, and finally have learned to appreciate life in a small rural town in Iowa. I have experienced implications from extended family members that I have a pathetic life in a god forsaken location, but as I said to my niece once, don't feel sorry for me. I have chosen to live here. Travelling abroad and reading broadly I have come to realize that people who live in small rural areas are the curiosity of the world. We have our iconic characters that are the stuff of books and we live so remotely that most of the world wants a glimpse of what its like. When travellers visit a foreign country they want most of all to go to a place where real people live away from the touristy spots. I like to think I live in one of those places. I like to think I live about as real a life as it gets.

I have travelled abroad to Italy and Chile and travelled in this counrty from Boston to San Francisco. I have eaten benets in New Orleans, shopped Michigan Avenue in Chicago and ridden the metropolitan bike  trails in Minneapolis.  I have loved it all and want to do more of it.I have loved the food choices and the coffee shops, the parks, the architecture, the lights, and the excitement. But when my travels end I am always ready to return to the small community I live in.

I know most everyone I see in my small town. I love it that when I walk down the street someone a block away might yell out my name in greeting. Or when I call the wrong number, I love it that I recognize the voice on the other end of the line and after apologizing for the error am told the number of the person I meant to call. I love it that I can ride for 40 miles on the rails to trails, that I can access from my town, and some days not meet another single solitary soul. I think its cool that I can leave my car unlocked and charge my groceries. Once when my brother arrived for a visit ahead of my arrival from being away, he went to the local grocery store and was recognized as not one of our own. The clerk asked him if he was Carmella's brother and then told him to tell me happy birthday. They knew he was coming. They knew it was my birthday.


                                  


Rolfe Fire Trucks in the Rolfe Greater Days Parade July 2012

When I want to taste the city all I have to do is make a reservation and a road trip. I can go to Des Moines and visit the museum, botanical center, walk the trail, eat at the Latin King, and shop East Village. I can experience the city. If someone from Des Moins wants to experience my small community, they better know someone to visit. There is no hotel. You can't visit it by paying admission. You can't experience it by driving through it. You have to have a guide.

I used to tell my daughters to make sure they live somewhere where they can buy nylons and green onions on Sunday. They have all taken my advice. I don't believe any of them would return to life in the community they grew up in. They have found a sense of community where ever they have landed, or they have been willing to forego it for the amenities of the city. But they have it nice. They can come home anytime they need a fix and languish in the solitude of the small town. They are lucky. So am I.

Becoming a Professional Photographer

There’s a new photographer in Pocahontas. Whitney Photography by Nikki Whitney has set up down the hall from me and we hope to eventually have a door between her office and Studio C where she can access my indoor portraiture set up.

Interestingly, I am thrilled to have another photographer in Pocahontas even though I am still trying to grow my own business. It may be because of who it is.I met Nikki late last winter. She came for tea and to talk about both of us being photographers in such a small town and how to make that work. She is not native her Pocahontas, though her spouse is and in fact was a classmate of one of my daughters. We hit it off right out of the gate and before she left we had already begun discussion of how to best collaborate and what to make our relationship "look" like. A few weeks ago, during Heritage Days, she had her grand opening and in a show of solidarity and collaboration I supported her launch with an ad and open house on the same day.

I have been surprised by people who have said that I’m a "good sport" or questioned me about why I haven’t perceived Whitney Photography as competition. Surprised, in fact, to the point that I have questioned my outreach to her and wondered if I am a good business woman. As he usually does, my husband Ken explained something to me. He said that in the old days when you attended a professional school the message from your professors was that you are entering your profession to serve the public in contrast to serving yourself. He said that it was stressed that it was about the community and serving them and that in my inclusiveness of Nikki in the photographer’s community of Pocahontas I had served the public and in doing so showed that Nikki and I are professionals. And he said that losing that had been to the detriment of his profession and many others and that embracing it was taking the higher ground. I liked that.

So how are we collaborating and what are we making it look like? For starters Nikki does weddings, I don’t. So she will get all my wedding referrals. I have seen her work. She is good. I can recommend her with no reservations. Further I have worked with her already. I hurt my back doing a photo job in May and when, soon after that, I needed to go to the school to shoot cap and gown pictures I needed help with equipment hauling and set-up. Nikki was free and came along on the job and we split the profits from it. I have been shooting all the high school sports and groups along with prom for a few years and I hope to keep that. But I am helping Nikki break into the middle school sports and groups which there just happens to be a window to jump through right now. I also will not try to get the soccer sports and groups job anymore and will pass along the Santa pictures job to her which is a great place to meet parents of small children. This summer I got the Poky Rec sports and groups job which I hope to keep. Nikki is already exploring securing the school picture contract and is interested in my helping with that if she gets it. I expect Nikki will be professionally respectful of my accounts as I will be of hers and we will share like professionals.

It is great to have a colleague to discuss settings and composition with and we have already done that. Her business has already made mine better prompting me to go back and and complete my brand. I have finally defined my logo, a tag line, and my style. After I launched Studio C in 2009, I got to a stopping place and I stopped. I never went back and finished those sorts of details. If you haven’t already, visit Meet Carmella on my website to learn a little more about my philosophy and style. Which reminds me … I need to set up reciprocal website linkage with Whitney Photography by Nikki Whitney, my friend and professional colleague.

Travel by Rail

There is something of the nomadic in me that my husband does not understand. He jokes that if the car is leaving our driveway I want to be in it and I don’t even need to know where it is going. He is pretty close to the truth. I love to travel. I love a road trip. And right now, as I write this, I am loving a train trip.

I have only flown for 12 years. I missed my brothers wedding when I was in my 30’s because I was afraid to fly and had never flown. (I am ashamed to say it, but it’s true). I took a job in 2000 that I had no idea involved any kind of travel outside the state and as it turned out after I accepted the job I was told I needed to go to D.C . on my first day. With 3 kids still at home and a need to get out there and get back in as short a time as possible, I booked a flight. I was terrified and the tale of that trip is a story all its own. Had I know there was air travel involved when I applied for the job, I probably would not have applied but as it has turned out, I have travelled by air a couple of times a year over the last 12 years to fulfill my job responsibilities. I have also travelled to Italy and Chile to see 2 daughters whose choices have stretched mine. And so I have proven that I can fly but though I have flown when necessary, I have never really come to like it.

That is why this morning at 7:30 a.m. when the snow began to fall in Minneapolis, I was watching the beauty of it from my coach seat aboard the Empire Builder. That is why today I have crossed and followed the Mississippi River for miles looking out the window of the lounge car at small towns like Columbus MN and Red Wing WI. And large cities like Milwaukee WI and Chicago IL. And all this while knitting on a wool vest for my husband and talking to dining car seat mates about the eagles we have been seeing. And comparing our train travel stories. That is why this trip to DC finds me on the Capitol Limited in my sleeper car gazing out my private window into a dark sky with a huge orange moon waiting for my dinner reservation at 8:00 after which I will return to my room where my bed has been made ready for my sleep. And where I will either knit, or read a book or watch a movie on my laptop until I am sleepy.

So far my travel by train has been alone. Do I like travelling alone? Yes, I do. Would I prefer travelling with my husband? Yes, I would and I await the time when it is his choice to travel by train with me. I would love to be sitting opposite him in the lounge car sipping wine and playing cribbage. I would love to nap with my head on his shoulder when I get drowsy after my bowl of corn/shrimp chowder for lunch. I would love watching him read a book or listening to him chat with a stranger. He probably expected that I would confirm train travel as my preferred mode of travel. But he may not have expected that I would be passionately in love with it.  He knows now. And he has been finding out all day as I text him exclaiming over everything from the falling snow to all the cute little features in my private room. And he will see this picture of my first class lounge in DC while I waited at my gate on my return trip with free coffee, baggage storage, and internet access.

Someday I am certain he will take a train trip with me. But meantime, I will continue my journey through the night and into mid-day tomorrow and then next week I will board the train again for my return home, happy to be there and happy to plan my next trip by train!

Inspired?

I guess I don't get inspired very often to blog and I'm not sure I am now but I have either had too much coffee or too much work and I feel wound tighter than a drum. I will try to channel that energy.

As I write this entry in my on/off blog (I guess you would call it that when I go 7 months ignoring it) it is snowing beautifully outside. Let it be said that we have had an awesome winter so this snow can count as beautiful. Not an awesome winter if you sell snow mobiles or if you ice skate but if you are a mover of snow and you like to take walks in decent weather, it has been awesome. Anyway, whenever it snows and I'm home and I have a fire I get to thinking ... about lots of things but mostly about food, and coffee, and reading, and knitting, and good movies, and good friends. I need more of all 6 but I am pretty blessed over-all.

This week is my Mardis Gras week of cooking. I have made chicken gumbo, beignets, and am set up to make Louisana Red Beans and Rice this weekend. Why Mardi Gras inspired me I have no idea. I have never been to Mardi Gras but it sounds pretty fun. Anyway it just takes one little idea to launch me on some tangent and I am entertained for a whole week. Never let it me said that I am high maintenance!

The one time I was in New Orleans with a few hours to sneak out of meetings I went with acquaintenances to Cafe Du Monde and we had beignets. You cannot eat these without being covered in powdered sugar. Try it. Pictured are the ones I made this week. They are heavy on the powdered sugar. So just to be safe, I eat them with lots of coffee.