Apologies For a Year of Absence
Let me start out by saying I've been horribly neglectful of my blog. Almost an entire year has passed since I've entered my very first post!
Writing blogs reminds me of my time on the radio. Sitting behind the microphone, airshifters like myself pleaded for callers so I would know I wasn't broadcasting into empty space with no one on the other end.
Now, I'm returning to my individual creative business—including my blog—with renewed life and vigor. Instead of doing it just because I'm supposed to (and yes, unfortunately, I'm sure I'm not the only one who's felt this pressure), after the challenges, trials, and rewards of 2011, I'm now ready to do this for myself because I want to and it feels right. Since I did graduate from University with a fiction writing degree, so you'd think writing a blog should come naturally to me. Now that I've freed myself from perfection paradigm (perfection paralysis), I've turned the channel and now the thoughts are running freely. In the pure sense, this is what the blog is supposed to be, right? Unfortunately I was thinking of it as a permutated marketing tool, and it really paralyzed me from just being myself. So, no more. I'm reclaiming my blog for myself so I can be truly insightful and honest about myself and my work.
2011 was an extremely eventful and challenging year. Looking back, it was a year of foundations. Our daughter Savannah was just born, and me and one of my best friend's "gave birth" to our now successful and growing event photography business FAB PHOTO. I spent almost all of my time adjusting to family life and immediately increasing my earning potential.
Now Savi's in daycare, and FAB is on its feet with over 30 jobs under its belt. I feel like it's time I can jump back into my own individual business with renewed maturity, vision, energy, and creativity.
I did beat myself up for not moving forward enough with my own individual business, thus the apology. Looking back, I had no idea how much energy my family demanded nor the changes I needed to make myself. 2011 will live in bittersweet memory. It's like Kurt Vonnegut said in Slaughterhouse Five, from the perspective of Billy Pilgrim who got unstuck in time: "Remember the good times, and forget the bad." Good times are for enjoying, the challenges for learning.
So now, with both of my 2011 babies on their feet and waking on their own now, I'm excited to spread my personal creative wings and fly into 2012.
Speaking of my "chidren", I can close this blog and seemlessly segway into my next entry by disclosing that 2011 did, in fact, witness the birth of another very important personal creative project: the beginning steps in the creation of my very own Tarot Deck.
Although most of my energy went towards my family and FAB, I did manage to lay the foundational work of this purely personal project I've wanted to do for many years. So for that I am thankful, and instead of continuing to beat myself up, I've processed and accepted 2011 as a year of completion and foundations. Now I'm feeling the very real fruit of my labors, and look forward to what 2012 will reveal.
Bow to the Little Kahuna: our daughter Savannah in Rincon, Puerto Rico, during my wife Tara's last month of maturnity leave January 2011.
One Year Later: Our "Happy New Year" card, January 2012
The "Other Baby" in my life: FAB PHOTO (www.fabphotochicago.com), our event photography company that specializes in photography as entertainment (featuring Mr. Fabulous)
Some FAB PHOTO highlights from 2011, including Burton Snowboard's Sean White and the Bank of America Chicago Marathon for VW
My very first official Tarot Card, still in the raw with no retouching or illustration added: The Eight of Pentacles
