shoe store inspirations ... revisted

You may remember this post ... this is where I got the line from.
Isn't it great?!

NYC - Kenneth Cole - Fifth Avenue - March 2006

I Heart Harry Reid

Senator Harry Reid spoke at BYU's Barlow Center last night. It was pretty good. I like that he is no non-sense and says what he means. You'll remember how excited I was the first time to meet him, so you can only imagine how ecstatic I was to get a picture with him!


In the question and answer portion of the night, someone asked Senator Reid why he was a Democrat ... he responded with the following reasons:

• Upbringing - his father was affiliated with unionized labor
  
• He wants to help people from the bottom up because he does not believe in the "trickle down" theory. Society must be improved and helped from the bottom up.
• The rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer in America - "its not right"
• He believes in government and that it needs to be improved and not denigrated
  

I thought it was interesting too that he made some very strong statements against Republicans and in favor of the Democratic Party:

"The economy is always better under Democrats"

"Republicans are more concerned about the rich than they are about the poor"

It was good for me to hear his convictions behind the democratic party. The issues that he mentioned are things that I often find myself turning to when people in the Church make me second guess my political feelings and their alignment with the principles of the gospel (not necessarily on purpose, but just by being themselves). I really liked how he said that there are issues more important that gun control and abortion ... that is definitely how I feel.


The saddest statement he made of the night had to do with how members of the church often treated himself and his family. He said in response to a question on how his religious convictions were received by other politicians or dignitaries, "the most un-Christian and hurtful comments are made by members of the church". Sigh. Very sad. When relaying the details of the night to my father (who is extremely jealous of my interaction with the Honorable Harry Reid) we had to remind each other that the knife cuts both ways ... when we say negative things about Orrin Hatch's politics its just as bad as when conservatives say negative things about Harry Reid's ... its important to not become the very things you are fighting against.

Reflections and Transparency

Tourist Silhouette

I feel like the photo above needs to stand alone, but I wanted add some words of explanation and some additional photos as well ... so I will try to separate the Tourist photo from the others with words. These were taken on July 2nd when my mother and I visited the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. The structure itself is very dynamic and provocative. I particularly enjoy the combination of brick, steel, and glass. Very industrial, yet warm and solid. I really like the way this photo came out. I knew it would be good when I was quickly snapping this fellow tourist/photographer before he moved or noticed. Its like self-documentation. I like how the man is a shadowy figure and the glass is simultaneously reflective and translucent. I also like all the different lines, angles and layers that are going on. The photo below also captures those same elements but adds perspective and dimension.

Ladder

The time of day lent for some interesting lighting on the top floors of the steel and glass walkways. I took the opportunity to take a self-portrait because I was wearing such a brightly colored shirt and the whole window/mirror/reflection-thing in pictures is so trippy. Photographing yourself and you watch yourself doing it. Funny. I wish it wasn't so light and washed out and that some of the shadows were in better places but that's the way it is.

See-through Reflection

The exhibit was also very moving and though provoking, however the summer crowds make the emotionally charged exhibitions difficult. I was much more affected by the exhibition on the bottom floor (the one you didn't have to wait with a ticket for) titled - "Give Me Your Children: Voices from the Lodz Ghetto" which documented the German's invasion of Poland and the life of children in the subsequently created ghettos. This exhibition presents their voices—preserved in letters, diaries, memoirs, and oral histories—as well as historic photographs and original documents. I had to choke back the tears more than once. It is shocking and extremely saddening to see what people can do to each other.

Coming to America

In case you can't tell in the terrible picture above - that is Tony Danza. Yes, the Boss from Who's the Boss ... he was the master of ceremonies at the concert on the capitol. This pictures was taken at the run-through given the night before - Tony was charming as ever.


The fourth of July is one of the best holidays for reasons so very accurately pointed out to me by a friend of mine - its a holiday that is celebrated by gathering with friends and loved ones eating BBQ, playing outdoors, talking/laughing ... and it does not require decorating or gift giving. And there are FIREWORKS. I love fireworks. They are soo fun.

Having lived in Utah and now DC/Virginia and away from California for some six years now, its interesting to see just how Country music is so integral to the 4th celebrations. I never knew this growing up in the OC. Ever concert given in UT/DC is heavy on the country music and this year was no different. People I have never heard of were playing twanging music and everyone was just bouncing around lovin it. They did however play a cover to a song I am familiar with - Neil Diamond's America.

Everywhere around the world
They're coming to America
Every time that flag's unfurled
They're coming to America

Got a dream to take them there
They're coming to America
Got a dream they've come to share
They're coming to America
America - Neil Diamond

Me and a few thousand of my closest friends

celebrating the birth of America on the National Mall

HAPPY 4th of JULY

Sunset Boat, 2006

This was the surprise of the day when I went walking through the National Botanical Garden's public garden.
Who knew there was an original Dale Chihuly there???
Its amazingly beautiful.

woman math

As I had forewarned, I would be blogging about the latest book on my reading list, Generation Me. This book fully describes my generation (or anyone under 35). Its extremely accurate and that is down right frightening sometimes. Of course, the author Jean Twenge says it best when disputing the Boomer's claim to the title the "Me Generation". While they may have forged the path to making "the self" trendy in the 1970s, "Today's under-35 young people are the real Me Generation, or, as I call them, Generation Me. Born after self-focus entered the cultural mainstream, this generation has never known a world that put duty before self. This book presents, for the first time, the results of twelve studies on generational differences, based on data from 1.3 million young Americans - focusing on the current generation of young people born in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s.

One of my favorite quotes from the chapter on "The Age of Anxiety (and Depression , and Loneliness)" is in reference to the phenomenon that GenMe marries later than any other previous generations. This is all, of course, depicted in prime time TV. "Many people think of a single women when they imagine lonely young people ... the enormous wave of anxiety will practically knock you out of your chair. ... Yet there is a grain of truth in the media hype. The deadline for having children - somewhere between 35 and 40 - makes life extremely anxious for many single women. They constantly perform the calculation I call "woman math": "If we get married next year, I'll be 32; we'll want a year or two to be married without kids and it might take a year to get pregnant, so I'll be 34 and 35 before I'm pregnanta nd probably 36 when the child is born. Then if we wait until the first kid is two years old before we try for another one, I'll be trying to get pregnant at 38. Crap."

Ahhh ... I laughed forever when I read this! To see it all out there in black and white and realize ... yup - woman math ... I do that. You know, sometimes I hate how predictable I can be as a woman.

writing on the wall

Parisian Graffiti

Monmarte District in Paris, France