In my view you cannot claim to have seen something until you have photographed it. – Emile Zola

*****

I’ve always loved the idea of photography; to take on simple picture and have it display a powerful emotion. When I was little, I would always steal my parents’ camera while we were driving somewhere (as my ability to go places on my own was limited at best) and snap pictures of the world traveling by. Of course, they weren’t exactly quality photos, seeing as we were moving, but every once in a while passable one would come up and we could keep it.

There is a certain power that comes from holding a camera in your hands; it’s a portal through which you may show others how you see the world. I recall the excitement I felt the first time my parents bought me a disposable camera, and I went around taking pictures of all my dolls and favorite places. Click, Click, Click. They weren’t perfect, not by a long shot, but I still have each of them saved in a little photo album of mine. Oh, how proud I was of them.

Then, on Christmas when I was ten years old, I received my first digital camera. Admittedly, it was a piece of crap, but oh, to me, it was the most precious of items. I would carry it around, capturing my pets and friends, rooms of my house, and vacations galore; it became a new ritual for me to tote it to school on the last day, forever embalming their faces, frozen in time. By now, I’ve advanced to a much higher quality camera, but I still have that old clunker, for memory’s sake.

Christmas this year, I was gifted a tiny wooden drawing mannequin keychain, from my sister. It was sort of an inside joke; our town’s Jr. High art teacher was this wacky, eccentric old man who had this old drawing mannequin (much larger than my keychain) that he kept in the back, only to wheal out at the beginning of each semester, pose him in wacky ways, and tell us to sketch out what we see, from where we were sitting.  He always introduced the mannequin as Fred, and explained that the piece of duck tape covering his mouth for the sake of his own sanity, because Fred would never shut up when he was packed away in storage. I’ve taken a lot of art classes throughout the years, but by far, this one was the most memorable; he changed the way I looked at the world. So in honor of him, I have this key chain, appropriately named, Fred Jr.

I couldn’t stand to just shove Fred Jr. onto some key ring, and forget about him; he had such character, such personality, and I wanted to document this in some way. So I turned back to my old friend, the camera.  I’ve taken dozens of photos of him posed around my house and neighbor hood, and every chance I get, I add to this collection. So I have decided to start something to add to the end of my blog posts. This little segment called Through My Eyes featuring none other than Fred Jr. Tell me what you think of my little friend. Don’t be shy, he doesn’t bite.

Well that’s all for now, so until next time, Keep on Dreaming &*)