I am glad we still celebrate Memorial Day in this country. Somehow it seems that as the political correctness of our culture takes over everything we end up loosing an understanding of what made this country great in the first place. It sickens me to see stories like the one of the Iraq veteran who displayed the American flag in his apartment window and was told to take it down or face eviction due to the fact that the flag is offensive to some of their residents.
Charlie Price of Wisconsin served 8 years for his country in Iraq and Kosovo to find that he isn’t even allowed to fly the flag he fought for in his own window. The couple is now fighting to amend the Freedom to Display the American Flag Act of 2005 to include renters, and I hope they are successful. Sometimes it seems that you are no longer aloud to hold an opinion in this country because it might offend someone. Who are these idiots who have now decided that we need to be a country of brown plain-jane, average, robots, who all believe in the same thing and can never disagree with anyone else?
There is no greatness in average, no conviction of ideals or principles in living a life of medium gray, and these types always seem to get the headlines. It gets tiring to hear the moaners, whiners, and complainers beat the drums of complacency and strive towards moving the country to be average, but sometimes they seems to be yelling the loudest. Now, instead of being the innovators and inventors, we are having to rely on Russia and Russian built rockets to take us into space, who would have thought that 20 years ago.
It is still the greatest country in the world, I just wish some of it’s residents would take a history lesson and see that America was not built on being average. The History Channel just finished an interesting series called America The Story of Us. Though some of it was a little subjective, it showed the overwhelming story of how much innovation, determination, and sacrifice people made because they believed in themselves and what this country stood for.
My family has had people who fought in the Civil War, WWI, both of my grandfathers served in WWI (see Son of a Son of a Photographer), one flew a B-24 Bomber in WWII in Europe, my dad served in the Air Force, and my cousin decided to go into the Navy after 9-11 and is currently serving in the Navy on a nuclear submarine. I am thankful for their service to this country. Because they served, my wife and I are able to enjoy living in this great country.
I hope everyone has a wonderful Memorial Day. It has been quite a stormy weekend with some crazy weather but I managed to get outside and take a few photos (and some of the dog of course). The heat is definitely on its way, the pasture, trees, and everything around has taken on the brilliant green of summer.
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We all just need a place to hang out sometimes. Of course, we can’t all balance like this guy. I love macro photography, it gives you a chance to look at something very close and expands the number of subjects you have on any given day. This grasshopper is not very large as you might be able to tell by the enlargement of the barbed wire fence. Many photographers below true macro photography starts when you photograph something at a 1:1 ratio, if so, this is pretty close.
I really love macro photography. I makes you look at things totally different and there is always something to shoot if you look close enough. This image was taken with one of Nikon’s true macro lenses, the Nikkor 105mm macro lens, but you can do “macro” or close-up photography with a lens filter on just about any camera you already have there at the house. Look for something called a close-up filter in your local camera store and make sure it will fit on the end of your lens (usually with screw on threads). Many newer digital point and shoot camera also have a “macro” setting in the menus that will allow for closer focus than you otherwise get with standard mode.
Image Specifics
Nikon – n90s
Lens – Nikon 105mm Macro
Film – Fuji Velvia
