Summer of Yes

The beginning of summer always brings excited anticipation. Hopes of beach days, plans for road trips, dreams of outdoor BBQ's...but for some reason, this year I'm more excited than I usually am when looking down the barrel of a season full of smelly subway trains and un-airconditioned evenings. Maybe it's because I and most of my friends are staying in the city this summer (it's usually a headache-inducing battle of the schedules just to find a day when half of us are not out performing in some summer stock or another), maybe it's because I've actually taken the time to read the last few issues of Time Out and put some of the more awesome events into my calendar, or maybe it's just because I'm 29 and I'm determined to hold on to every last shred of my wild youth.

My friends and I have declared this the Summer of Yes. It's a a loose derivative of another friend's Week of Yes, in which she did not allow herself to turn down any social request for seven days (in hopes she'd land the man of her dreams, or something to that effect). Our Summer of Yes is much less restrictive. In fact, we haven't ventured too far beyond screaming it's name and raising our arms à la Steve Holt! every time we do something delightfully fun - but just putting a name to our experiences leaves us feeling hopeful, connected, and excited for the months to come.

This sumer, I eagerly await the chance to...

*Finally visit the Botanical Gardens
*See some friends shake their thang at Broadway Bares
*Don a swanky hat for the Jazz Age Lawn Party
*Barter for indie goods at the Brooklyn Flea
*Embrace the challenge of combining two apartments into (a) one (bedroom) with John
*Get back to baking
*And make some delicious summer pasta salads
*Watch this blog continue to grown and change into what I need it to be
*Relax at a lake house below the Mason-Dixon line
*Dip my feet into the ocean (and stimulate that economy!) at the Jersey Shore
*Save my pennies
*But window shop with complete abandon both on Amazon and on 5th Ave.
*Maybe actually buy something fun
*Or maybe not
*Work my way through my summer reading list (new Dan Brown, anyone??)
*Eat bagels. And more bagels.
*Sleep in when I can
*And embrace the quiet time I get when I wake up early
*Put on lipstick, in the middle of the day, for no good reason at all, just because I can.

                  #summerofyes

365/photo-a-day - May Wrap-Up

mmm coffee - signs of spring - citi field - memorial day love - the highline - sunny day popsicle

mad.sq.pk. public art - 59th street - green market veggies- urban shadows - omelet - flatiron building 

memorial day street fair - green market flowers - citi field - derby juleps - central park (x2)

soho graffiti - mckittrick hotel - levain bakery - fresh chamomile - go mets - so many flowers

dinnertime - rainy day - rainy night - more graffiti - monday yoga - delicious bagel 

Well. This month.

Yeesh.

You probably thought I'd hung up my apron and given up blogging for good. Hell, even I thought for a minute there that work had completely taken over my life and I'd never get another post written. This site would lie there in the Internet graveyard, next to Friendster, Prodigy, and the You've Got Mail voiceover, never to be seen or read again.

In the past 30 days, I logged more hours at work than I have in a very. long. time. Day after day spent in a cold and dark theater, working the same transition over and over agin until every perfectionist in the house was satisfied, fixing a musical number until I heard it in my sleep, opening and closing curtains until I could do it blindfold. I grew very, very tired.

However, it wasn't all bad (and I'm not really complaining, gainful employment is never a bad thing!). In the precious moments I was able escape the theater and acknowledge the outside world, I had some pretty great times. Walking the High Line with an old friend. A Mets-Reds game. Spending time in a huge art installation in a public park. A most wonderful Memorial Day that started with yoga in the park and ended with backyard beers with friends as the sun went down. Remembering to literally stop and smell the flowers in the green market I get to pass on my way to work.

I strayed a bit from my photo-a-day rule during this time. Some days, there was just no opportunity to take a photo that I would be proud to show. I even tried once to take a picture of an interesting-looking doorknob that adorns one of the set pieces, but theater lighting is just not conducive to Instagram. So I instead used the times I made it out of doors to take multiple photos and then spread those out over the month. It doesn't quite hold up to my rules, but as I've been learning over this past half a year, it's ok to break your own rules.

May by the numbers:
Photos of the sky: 6
Photos of flowers: 6
Food photos: 6
Photos of my feet: only 1! (it was a light yoga month)
Photos with people: 3 (I'm getting better. It's not great, but better!)

365/Photo-a-day is a personal undertaking to capture one photograph per day in 2013. All photos were taken by me and processed with Instagram, Snapseed, and/or PhotoToaster. The images were compiled using Picture Collage Maker Lite. What to see my pics as they happen? Follow me - @maspad on Instagram!

365/photo-a-day - April wrap-up

sunset - cooking with tea - more sunset - N-train tracks - lunch break

empty rehearsal hall - drinks with TP - spring shoes - fresh spinach - mmm bagels

31st ave. - fancy dinner - homemade broccoli soup - girls' night - q'boro plaza

I ran somewhat into the proverbial wall this month - I struggled creatively, and finding the inspiration to take even remotely interesting photos was difficult for me. Maybe it was the weather - I kept expecting to walk out the door and be greeted with the summer wind, but I was still rocking the pea coat until just a few days ago. Maybe it was my fairly monotonous schedule - I started a lengthy rehearsal process and was gifted a free month at New York Sports Club, so I spent the majority of my time in colorless studios and gyms instead of outside or doing yoga. Or maybe it was just a quarter-year slump - for the first time in a while, I didn't have a trip, holiday, or fun excursion to look forward to and photograph.

That's not to say I had a bad month. I really don't mean to be such a downer! Walks into Manhattan, dinners with friends, and attempts to figure out just what is going on in poor Don Draper's mind made for an easy and relaxing month - just nothing exciting enough to photograph with much enthusiasm.

But maybe that's the point of this project (and I'm kind of sussing this out as I write). It's easy to take the photo when it's all bright and shiny and pretty and there are babies or puppies or cupcakes, but it's much harder when you get up/go to work/come home/eat a defrosted veggie burger/go to bed/lather/rinse/repeat. So that's when and where the latent creativity needs to surface - the search to find the interesting in the mundane, the beauty in the everyday.

I'm beginning to think I come to this conclusion at the end of every month. But it's only Month #4, and these realizations just make me love this project even more.

April by the numbers

Photos looking down (feet or hands): 3
Photos looking up at sky and/or buildings: 15
Photos of food and.or drink: 7
Photos of people: 1 - sadly, my newest low - next month I WILL be better about this!

365/Photo-a-day is a personal undertaking to capture one photograph per day in 2013. All photos were taken by me and processed with Instagram, Snapseed and/or PhotoToaster. The images were compiled using Picture Collage Maker Lite. Want to see my pics as they happen? Follow me - @maspad on Instagram!