In Photography It's All About the Relationships

There are some people in life that make you laugh a little louder,
smile a little bigger and live just a little better.
Anonymous

It's a typical Sunday morning - I'm up early, Sheila's still asleep and Molly the Wonder Dog is curled up at my feet. My home office is quiet, although I can't help but smile over how noisy the Hasselblad clock, after twenty years is still so loud. This is just a sidebar - it's the one complaint we always heard, and I don't understand why the Swedes never came up with a quieter mechanism.
 
As I looked around my office this morning and then into some of the most fun posts I've ever shared this past week, it occurred to me that EVERYTHING in my office, my career and for that matter, my life is all about relationships. I pulled three images from posts this week - each one is connected to the topic.

• Melissa Albert's portrait is about the relationship with her subject, gear, and creativity. I shared it in a blog post because I loved the photography, but I got to see the image, first in an IM, because Melissa's become a wonderful friend over the years.
  
• Kristofer Rowe in his "Why?" podcast talks about the relationship he builds with his birds, especially his love for Ospreys. But there's another aspect to the relationship to SCU - I wasn't aware of Kris's work until "meeting" him through Tamron USA. Now, a few phone calls and one podcast later, there's a great friendship starting.
  
• My three weeks in a row of chasing industry leaders for their head shots for Throwback Thursday brings the relationship topic into full swing as thirty-eight photographers went digging for their senior portrait, having no other purpose than to have a little fun!  Note: click on any one of the three images above if you missed the posts from earlier in the week.
  

Even the noise of the Hasselblad clock brings us back to a relationship with a company and people I admired for so many years. And the image I grabbed just to have some fun and include it here was captured with a LUMIX FZ300 and brings me full circle to all my Luminary friends and the team at Panasonic.

So here's my point this morning. Take a few minutes and think about everything in your life. Think about your career to date. Think about the gear you use, the pictures on the wall in your home, office or just sitting on your desk. Look at those messages/reminders on post-it notes and your calendar. Think about family or friends you're likely to talk to or spend part of the day with today.

Everything comes down to relationships. Whether they're big friendships or just small acquaintances just getting started, our world survives on those people, and sometimes critters, who have come into our life. It's not an earth-shaking epiphany this morning, but the exercise of just looking around my office did set the stage.

When Sheila and I moved last December we set out to make the new address more than just a house - we wanted to make it a home. We laugh because everything in the house has a story behind it, a memory and a relationship to another chapter in our lives, either individually or as a couple. And, with each story is another relationship.

Wishing all of you a beautiful Sunday and a day filled with time to enjoy and appreciate the relationships in your life that keep you smiling, laughing and living life just a little better! Go for those long hugs and appreciate their therapeutic value. Find the time to just feel the "wow" in the reflection of the choices you've made and the people who have come into your life who actually matter.

Happy Sunday!

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