Silver Linings

I spent Tuesday and Wednesday in Southern Florida visiting with a few clients. It rained buckets almost the entire time I was there and it was quite hot and muggy. Yet, after the cold spring on record in Minnesota, I did not mind the tropical conditions compared to the cold winds at home.

On Tuesday night, I dined with my closest friend near his home in Delray Beach. I called him over the long weekend past only to learn that his seventeen year-old daughter is having an extraordinarily high-risk surgery this next week. I could tell over the phone that he might benefit from the opportunity to talk about it away from his family. And he did. His strength and faith is remarkable and, while I went there to comfort him (and hope I did), I found his belief in a positive outcome comforting to me. I have known his daughter since her birth and she is the sweetest child on Earth. After dinner, we walked in the misty and rainy weather along the beach and our conversation was much lighter, ranging from sports to sharing stories about growing up in the US with parents and grandparents that had immigrated from Italy in the early 1920s. I am delighted I found the time to be with him.

I also had the great pleasure of finally meeting KimD on Wednesday. She has been a dear blip-friend for almost my entire time here. Just as she is on blip, in real time Kim is a joy to converse with. She is bright, articulate, kind and has a bubbly and entertaining personality. She has a smile that warms the heart and her sense of humor was uplifting. Her devotion to her children is remarkable and she loves them with all her might. As two proud parents, we traded stories about the joys and pains of raising children. And we talked about our love for photography. We spent far too little time at lunch, dining at my favorite hole-in-the-wall fish joint in Deerfield Beach, The Whale's Rib. I wish I had been able to set more time aside but had a flight to catch. That said, I bet that this is not the last time the two of us (and hopefully our families) have a blip-meet.

Finally, this glass of prosecco greeted me as I arrived home from Florida on Wednesday just before dinner with my family. Once again, Bonnie made a meal fit for royalty and it felt great to be at home with my family. And, to top the day off, there was an award fixed to the cabinet. It honored Isabella as the "Most Improved Baseball Player" this year on her team. She so deserved it.

This is far from a remarkable photo and I have droned on in words about my days. But this post is not about the image. Rather, I felt strongly about recording the past few days. Amid the dark clouds at work this week, I found silver and amazingly human linings in the skies over my head. I could not let these days pass without recording them for my own benefit and memory in the future.

I took very few photos this week and 95% of them were with film that I finally processed today (it is Sunday, June 2 as I post this). In fact, this image was the only opportunity I had on Wednesday to press the shutter. This image is straight off of the film. This is taken at f2.8-1/30th through a Summicron lens using a Leica M6 TTL and BW400CN Kodak film (not a great film but it is so convenient to process). I will be posting other back blips of this week soon.