Double-Take: When NASCAR felt like home again

Imagine exploring an unfamiliar environment. Everything seems new and unexpected, even if you feel twinges of familiarity here and there. But there's this feeling of shock and confusion that happens when you round one more unfamiliar corner, only to realize that you suddenly recognize your surroundings. That all this time, you've actually been closer to home than seemed possible, just moments prior.

That was NASCAR, for me.

Now don't get me wrong; I've watched plenty of NASCAR over the years, and there've definitely been times when the whole thing had felt like it made sense.

But stereotypes have a way of pulling you away from the things you used to enjoy. In part because they're just pernicious like that, but also because they often have a kernel of truth, and sometimes it makes you worry…

But when the Toyota / Save Mart 350 rolled around in June of 2014, I finally had a chance to look back and recapture some of those feelings I thought I had left behind.

Spirit of the Wok (Annie — People Making Cool Stuff)

"To me, the sounds of a wok are very… very homey? They may or may not be pleasant, objectively… But the sound of, like, when the steel hits steel? Like, when you're moving things around… And you know, when you bang on it sometimes to get things off the spatula?

"It all just goes with the… kind of the spirit of the wok, y'know?"

Some things are difficult to put into words. And in the times I've been fortunate enough to watch my friend Annie cook, what's stood out for me have been the clarity of her intentions, the creativity of her choices, the pride in her craft, and other traits that speak of the soul of cooking, in a way that words don't always reach.

Life, Death, and Lack of Experience: Another struggle of the inadvertent historian

A few years ago, I wrote "Life, Death, and Lack of Closure," about a seemingly-inevitable trap of living life after becoming an inadvertent historian: that because inaction — the decision to not document something — is in itself a form of curation, you never really escape from the anxiety of not putting time into documentary work. That is, the awareness that you could be documenting things, but aren't, lingers like a specter throughout everyday life. Even as I described it then, I still feel it now.

I've gotten better at seeing the opportunity and not just the cost — "I am deciding to be present in this moment," rather than just "I'm deciding not to document this moment." But I think some people have a sense of ease at letting moments pass by which I've never managed to recapture.

But I just discovered a new form of this trap.

Second Wind

It's kind of funny to think that the last time I saw my DSLR, it was looking back at me. February 29th. My life had just taken a huge turn — after 22 years of pole vault, I decided to retire, and I went to the photo studio to take some self-portraits that would hopefully capture how unmoored and adrift I felt in that moment.

Little did I know, another huge turn was just around the corner. Little did I know that "unmoored and adrift" was going to be the theme of the year.