All you need is love {still + life}

This has been a big legal week for the US. Our Supreme Court (that's the big daddy of our legal system) heard two cases that pertain to the rights of same-sex couples to marry. Prop 8, a law in California, bans same-sex couples from actually getting married. On Tuesday, the constitutionality of that proposition was argued before the court. The Defense of Marriage Act, known as DOMA, was before the Supreme Court yesterday. DOMA, signed into law by President Clinton in 1996, basically says that marriage is between one man and one woman and therefore denies federal benefits and programs to same-sex couples. These benefits include tax savings, family and medical leave, and Social Security payments. This case was brought to the court on behalf of an 83-year old woman who was forced to pay over $300,000 in estate taxes when her partner of 42 years died, simply because they were of the same sex and could not legally marry.

Well. You all (y'all) probably know how I feel about this. It simply baffles me that I have the legal right to marry based on who I fell in love with and other people don't. And truthfully, it's a bit more complicated than that. Neel's mother was Irish and his father is East Indian, so he's bi-racial. His parents' marriage, which took place in Pennsylvania in 1965, could have easily been impacted by Loving vs. Virginia. That's the Supreme Court Case that legalized interracial marriage. Pennsylvania, however, had already legalized interracial marriage, and was in fact the first state to do so. In 1780. The parallels between the current cases before the court and Loving vs. Virginia are fascinating. The Supreme Court decision in Loving vs. Virginia refers back to the 14th Amendment and its Equal Protection Clause. This clause says simply that "no state shall ... deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."

Equal protection of the laws. Equal. Equality. We are not all the same, but we all deserve equality under the law.

I've talked to you about my friends Mark and Fred (my friend Fred from France) before. While we're watching this closely for so many friends (And by the way, I don't have "gay" friends, I have "friends."), we're watching the arguments on DOMA very closely because of Mark and Fred. On Tuesday, Mark posted this on his Facebook page:

Twenty-three years.
Four children.
Four homes.
Had money, lost money, had money, lost money, working on getting money.
And more mini-vans than you can shake a stick at.
If that's not a "marriage", I don't know what is.

Neel and I were joking with another friend that really, Fred and Mark do marriage better than we do: more kids, more houses, more minivans. They even go to church way more than we do. If you're going to deny someone rights, I'm not sure Neel and I should make the cut! However, because they are a same-sex couple, Fred's immigration status rests in the hands of the Supreme Court's repeal of DOMA and Mark and Fred's family rests in the hands in the repeal of DOMA. How can this be? How can what I take so for granted, the simple ins and outs of daily family life, become a matter of legislation for someone simply because of who he happened to fall in love with? Where would we be if Neel's parent's couldn't have married?

I believe in love. I believe in marriage. I will always, always fall down on the side of more, not fewer, rights for our citizens. If the family is the bedrock of our society, how can we deny anyone who chooses to come together and create one, no matter how, the basic right to do so?

All you need is love.

river view {life}

As many of you know, I'm working on a 365 project this year. You can see my photos (and many other inspiring projects) here. Knowing that I struggle with follow through (ahem), I gave myself a ton of leeway with this one from the get go. I can use my phone if I need to, I'm not going to sweat it if I miss a day, and I'm just going to shoot the things that take my fancy, relying on prompts and themes only if I feel the urge. Many people work best under the constranints of a structure (how do 365 self-portraits sound to you?!), but I'm trying to go a little easy on myself here.

One thing that I started, almost by accident, was taking pictures of the river near our home. We are just a few blocks from the Elizabeth River, an easy walk, and my Friday commute (I generally run Callum to school on Friday before my hikes with my friend Tracy) has me coming up on the river at unexpected times of the day. So one Friday I took a picture. And then another. And then I started to think, maybe this will be a little mini project within my 365. Fridays on the river. When Callum had his ski accident, that plan went out the window, but hey, I'm giving myself some leeway, so my Fridays on the River became Weekends on the River, and now we're nine weeks in (I started a little late!). Some days the wind was whipping, casting white caps on the water, and one day the tide was out, allowing me to hop down on the sand. One Sunday morning I woke up to the distant, mournful tones of the fog horn on the water. Before anyone was up, I grabbed my camera and hopped in the car (jammies still on!). That's picture number four above.

I've done a little research on projects that take a photo a day at the same place, and if I start to feel myself getting stuck, I'll do more. Right now, this one is my favorite. What I'm doing is nothing like that! What I know is that water calls me, and even when I think I can never get another interesting shot from this same spot at the end of the street, I have but to walk down there, and there's something new to see.

For each shot I pick for my 365, there are dozens that don't make the cut. Sometimes there are obvious reasons, and sometimes it's hard to make the choice. Sometimes the outtakes are just as lovely as the photo I choose; they simply aren't the story I want to tell on that particular day. For the River Shots, that's particularly true, and I thought I'd share a few of my outtakes here today.

These final three are all from last Friday night. I wanted shots from the shipping yards as the lights came on, but we lucked out with a gorgeous sunset too. How do you choose? And what do you do once you've gathered them all together?

river view {still}

Weekend recap, March 25 edition

1. Tracy's lovely house | 2. Back at the hike | 3. My favorite part | 4. Unexpected date night | 5. Chow, Norfolk | 6. Local oysters | 7. Selfie | 8. Front row seats | 9. Unexpected lunch | 10. - 12. One of our favorite spots | 13. Late night drop off | 14. Chesapeake sunset | 15. Hardworking doggies | 16. New drink | 17. Photo of the day | 18. MSL inspiration | 19. Fireside day | 20. Fireside supper | 21. Winter's last gasp

What a SHORT weekend it was. Thank the good lord I started it with a hike with my friend Tracy. Seriously. We'd gotten off track with those (life gets in the way), but we seem, after both agreeing that our families like us better when we hike regularly, to be back at it. She had to drop her kids off at school before we went and I had a few minutes to myself in her sun-filled living room, and that was just lovely. I read. A book. Life is good.

Callum had a crazy-busy baseball weekend this weekend with an away game on Friday and a tournament on Saturday. It's a bit of a rite of passage, these away games. You leave school early and ride a bus with your team. On the way home the team stops at some grocery-type-store thing (this is still unclear to me) and gets "dinner." All I know is that Callum had chicken, and one kid had six cupcakes. On Saturday we were gone ALL DAY. Our kids did well. Won two, lost one. All good. Callum is still on the cusp of this and that's okay. Sort of. It'll sort itself out. However. As soon as Neel and I realized that there was a THREE HOUR wait between the second and last game, we high tailed it the hell out of there and off to our favorite restaurant in the area. One we never get to. Go us.

I had this weirdest realization last week when I stepped on our upstairs landing and figured out that if we reconfigured the rooms (like majorly) we could easily live just in the upstairs of our house. There's plenty of room. That's like, ridiculous, people. And then I read an article in this month's Martha Stewart Living about a family who completely down sized their lives. I totally want to do this. It's not happening anytime soon, but someday. Now, I don't see myself carrying mason jars into store when I go shopping, but. I have dreams, you guys. I'm feeling restless and daydreamy, and my next big mistake was watching House Hunters International while I cooked all afternoon. Nothing irritates me more in that show than when people move to Europe and look at gorgeous flats in Berlin or Stockholm and say things like, "That's the refrigerator? It's so small!" Or, "I don't think our king size bed will fit here, honey." Good grief. But Copenhagen? I'm sold.

And then it snowed! It's all gone now. Cold sleety rain today. (Yuck.) But it was pretty while it lasted. Yes, of course it's almost April and we're ready for spring, but the snow is so exciting and pretty around here. What was the most exciting thing that happened to you this weekend? That might have been it for me!

And if I thought we had a rough and busy weekend, we had nothing on our three dogs. They crack me up. Apparently there is some sort of critter in the wall by our fireplace that requires total vigilance. Complete concentration. They wore themselves out guarding us from it. With all the staring.

Five things, march 22 edition

1. I think I'm so glad that baseball season has started around here. How about my lucky #14? All he wanted to do was play for his school and there he is. His lack of experience is showing a bit (it's only his second spring to play, remember), but he's out there, working hard. That's all we ask. Ever, really. He's loving every bit of it. Practice after school, leaving early for games, all the gear. It's fun to see him so much in his element. Thriving.

2. I think, however, that the temperatures need to be more reflective of baseball weather. Ahem. Snow flurries on Thursday. Cal will be playing in 40º temps this afternoon, and a three game tournament on Saturday will be much the same. Momma's chilly. Also, whose idea was it to make baseball pants white? Buying stock in Oxyclean.

3. I think I will be spending much of tomorrow thinking of this dear friend and wishing her merry. Spare a thought for sunny skies and many blessings for Annie and her beloved.

4. I think I need to give a shout-out to my twice-monthly photography group. We met yesterday, somewhat diminished this week, but this collection of like minded folk never fails to energize me. For various reasons, I've missed our last several sessions, but I work hard not to. Even when we talk about silly stuff, I come out inspired and energized and I always learn something new. Thank you, my friends, for teaching me so much.

5. I think I'm finally starting to shake the dust off. Got some stuff done that I'd been dreading (doesn't that feel good?), and wrote out some lists of things I need to do (doesn't that feel good too?). Our food photography workshop has been canceled for March and scheduled for May, but that's okay. We have lots of company and fun coming down the pike. The days are longer and the weather is warming up. Nothing but blue skies ahead. Happy weekend, my beloveds.