if.net

So, I caught on quite a while ago that the entry of most quality or talent does not necessarily make the top five.  As with most of life, it's all rather socially political.  Yes, I'm disappointed.  I like meeting people that support each other but I also like people that can be objective simultaneously.  I've never been a fan of 'scratch my back and I'll scratch yours.'  I guess I've always been able to scratch my own itches.I believe that you should reach for the stars but if multiple people are so clearly more talented than you, why would you want to take the opportunity away from them?  Or, why would you want to keep enabling someone else to do so?  Don't keep supporting people just because they'll do the same for you.  It's a little like government corruption.  Boo.

In other learnings, I'm seeing that even if I could get into the top five for the Costa Rica contest, the likelihood of my own picture securing the prize for me is unlikely.  I'm okay with this because there are many adventure pictures far more bitchin' than my own.  I just hope that it is one of these people that wins, regardless of where I land in the standings.  Winning this one would be cool, but it's not all that much to me.

Don't get me wrong, I want to go ANYWHERE for free.  I love traveling and doing stuff and I never turn down an opportunity.  You could tell me you were sending me on a paid two day vacation to Boston and I'd get excited at this point.

But I acknowledge that my picture is not as amazing as some of the other entries.  It's not that I haven't had some really crazy fantastic adventures.  I just don't ever bother myself with the task or distraction of getting photo documentation.  I also don't want to demand it of whomever I may or may not be with at the time.

I've been snorkeling out past the barrier reefs in Hanauma Bay (there's sharks : ) and octopus!), I've completed 7 marathons within my first year of marathoning and plan to run my eighth this spring (I placed third femal over all in one of them!), I've been to the summit of Mount Monadnock many times and I'll be there again and again come spring and summer, I've been in clashes with riot police at protests in multiple cities, I dumpster dive regularly, the last time I went snowboarding with my friend - he broke his ass, literally and we didn't know it until he finally went to a doctor the next week, I've worked on great film projects and more are on the way, I've been a regular climber at the RI Rock Gym and I host a wicked sweet radio show every Monday and it kicks my ass.  I love it.

I just have never felt the need to get pictures of me doing any of these things.  I don't need proof.  Or maybe when I do take pictures and show them to people later, I don't want to be saying "And here's me in front of the riot police, and here's me leaping off of the freight train, and here's me skeletoning, and that's me and that's me and that's me." In the case of snorkeling, I had a fun with an (albeit old fashioned straight film) underwater camera that I used to pictures of all the cool shit that I was looking at.  That's what I like to show people.  I don't want them looking at me in front of shit.  I want them to see the incredible things that I saw. I've got pictures of the bright red octopus, of the parrot fish, the angel fish, the crazy intricate coral, some bright yellow sturgeons....

Pictures are cool if they're happening.  If someone's got a camera and they're taking 'em, cool.  Hey send me a copy if that's alright, man, I'd like that.  Otherwise, just take in the moments.  You don't need to prove to anyone else that you lived it.