Well.

It's been a weird couple of months. Not all good, not all bad. I think I drifted away from blipfoto in the beginning because of my central problem with being a member of the blipfoto community: being a member of a community. I'm not good at it. I'm uncomfortable getting comments on my images every day and really only wanting to comment on the images of others when they really kill me (which, for the best photographers on the site, is once or twice a month tops - I'd probably be leaving myself about 4 comments a year if I weren't me). I'm just not a talkative person, not an extrovert and never will be, and not even very good at being a cooperative introvert. But I'm trying.

But I stayed away for a few other reasons. One was the project I did in April, which I wanted to do very much alone, and did (not quite edited yet, but close). Another was work, which was eating me alive. I've been able to rein it in a little now, and I'm keeping my eye on this fall when I can move on to do something else.

Lately, though, I've felt the need to return - felt a little need for a nudge to keep my taking pictures. Doing the month project in isolation, and in fact mostly just shooting and not editing, not uploading (at one point I had two full 2g cards that hadn't been uploaded - I think almost two weeks of images. I used to upload nightly) has given me time to think about why I do this anyway.

Really, I take pictures for me, like I think almost everyone does. Not as my life's work, but as a way to keep it together and manage to do that work, whatever it is. Not for others - my pictures have very, very limited potential to improve the lives of anyone but me, so why pretend? I realized this, and was glad to realize and remember it, and to remember that I need to get out and shoot - you can see days in the past few months when I barely managed anything, and about 7 or 8 when I managed nothing. I don't like that - I've realized that not taking pictures is bad for me.

So I'm back, like I knew I would be, and I'm still not going to be the best community member, like I never was, but I think I might not feel bad about it now.

And oh, by the way, I've been watching all of your photostreams, and you're all still awesome. Thanks for that. Expect the usualy biweekly comments from me. :)