It’s New Year and I’m reflecting on the journey I’ve taken, and am still on, thinking of where I am, what I’ve done, where I’ve been, things I’ve accomplished, and all the things I have. My thoughts  return me to the past….

1993…From my Journal page 1:

The wind blew across the bay, across the land, through my house and though my heart. It blew away all the trees, all the roofs, everything I owned, and everything I knew for the last 23 years.In the morning when the wind stopped blowing, the only thing still left standing was me.

Today…is the first day of 2024 and I’m still standing. For that I am grateful. The wind has given me many lessons and taken me many places. I learned what is truly valuable and who merits value in my life. That morning when I stood in the only Jeans I had, I learned what freedom is when you have nothing left to lose and everything ahead to gain.

In Chinese, the written word for crisis and opportunity is the same…

#Hurricanes

Maybe it was the tomatoes or might have been the vino that made me think I was Italian.
Living in Florence, for two Summers, Italy made me hum opera, talk with my hands, tell everyone prego and scusi and come stai? Mornings were spent savoring a Macchiato along
with lemon cream filled pastries, later to be followed in the afternoons
with a Aperol Spritz and finger foods at Gillis Happy Hour while talking to the
people there, me in broken Italian, them in good English.

I strolled the cobblestone streets walking into small cafes and stumbling
out feeling welcomed… just another amico.
Everything became bella or bello, and I was Marcello … a standing joke at Gillis.
I took it all in enjoying the maddening rush in the train station, jumping on buses, visiting other towns making new discoveries.

With every buongiorno and ciao I felt Italy,
its pulse, its tempo, its heart and I was breathing
in its soul, I saw pictures everywhere… I was in
love with a feeling and sense of being, and
belonging.

For all it’s worth,

I was matteo pace fotografo

#Italy#Florence#photography#www.matthewpace.com

Hometown U.S.A.

It was the Fourth of July and we were home. I’ve been home in many houses, towns and also countries. I’ve also been home in other people’s houses, but this time home felt different for me.

It’s our first year in Leesburg, Florida. We’re still newbies. Feels like a long way from Miami or New York much less Paris. What seems like a small town takes takes in a very large area, full of, farms, groves, ranches, some industry, John Deer tractors, a variety of people, blue collars, cowboys boots, and yes artists as well. Settling here has been like breaking in a new pair of shoes, a little stiff at first but the longer you wear them, the more comfortable they feel.

We decided to watch the fireworks being sponsored by a local car dealer here, taking place from the town’s baseball field. Arriving early and we were surprised to find that a game was being played. We sat in the stands right behind home plate and cheered the Leesburg team on. I downed a Coke while Leesburg won and afterwards we took our chairs and sat in the infield to watch the fireworks.

I’ve traveled a lot here and abroad with many great adventures but on that evening it dawned on me. I had an American experience… Baseball, a Coke, and fireworks on the Fourth….

I was home and this was my town…hometown USA.

#matthewpace#FourthofJuly#baseball#hometown

My other Blogsite

Sandwiches

Sometimes the Universe tries to tell us something:

As I entered the store and received a greeting in group harmony as I walked in…” Welcome to (name withheld) “ .

Approaching the counter, I looked at the elderly woman and said
” Thanks, how are you?”
She replied…” Living the dream.”

As she continued making sandwiches, it left me to wonder, what was the dream? It couldn’t have been this job, everyone else went back to grumbling after singing out their robotic “welcome ”.
Despite them, she seemed happy, smiling as she slapped down more ham on her piece de resistance. I tried to envision what it could have been, was she the owner, or someone just happy to be able to make a few bucks, or just have something to do? …

It got me thinking. Life is an ongoing collection of dreams. Some we achieve, some we can achieve, some we don’t. We all have them. They become the anesthetic to the mundane. They pop up throughout life sometimes changing along the way with some alterations. For some they’re daydreams, for others fantasies, for most… goals.

We all need dreams in life to help making sandwiches a little more tolerable. I’ll have mustard and mayo on mine.

I am happy to announce a new site and direction:

They say a picture is worth a thousand words, but sometimes a thousand words is worth a picture. This was one of those times.

I was standing in line waiting for my bucket of chicken. In front of me a grungy man and an elderly woman, with no relationship to each other , were “seemingly” having a conversation. He went on telling her about his last job, a very challenging floor installation he just finished, describing how he went about it , along with some pantomime to demonstrate the efforts he made (actually very funny).

She stood there intently, staring at him and said, “ I like their hot sauce, I always get it.”

Without skipping a beat he replied, “ I had to park my loaded truck by the door.”

This “ one hand clock” conversation continued until their order finally came up, and then they both left like an evaporating fog without a word.

There are no cameras to capture something like this, just a mental snapshot of what just took place. It struck me, don’t know why but I kept reviewing this scene. Were they talking to each other or just thinking out loud? Are most conversations in life like this, is anybody listening? Lost in thought, my order came up. A robotic girl handed me my bucket of chicken and said, “ Have a nice day ”. As I was inspecting the floor, in my own fog , I looked up and said “ I’ll try the hot sauce.”

The scene replayed… I guess I was listening and now became part of someone else’s picture.

Turning a Turtle

It doesn’t take much to drive slowly on a backroad to nowhere, just a beautiful day, some great farm scenery , green hills, ( yes there are some in Central Florida ) , and a turtle struggling to cross it.

He was big, couldn’t miss him. He strained to push and pull his way as fast as he could, as a cars and trucks swerved around him. A carload of kids, pulled alongside to watch him strugggle…must have been lost tourists curious by seeing something wild, not from Disney nor in some small zoo , but in real life, a bigger zoo where the animals roam free, or at least they think they do.

I had to stop, right in the middle of the road, flashers on, doors open, arms waving like a bird in flight, to stop the next car or two. I had found a mission, to save this turtle. He was a little too big to lift and he looked frantic when I approached him. I tried to ask him where he was going, but he shrugged me off picking up speed, at least one mile an hour.

I tried to herd him away form the middle of the road, as another family stopped to watch through their car windows as though they were watching some TikToc episode, and for all I know I might be starring in it, thanks to one of the kids in the back seat. Then I started pushing him, until he finally made it to side of road and back into the woods. By this time, a line of very patient cars swung around us and I got back into mine.

Tada…A life saved, mission accomplished. I put away my super hero cape and returned to civilian life.

It was a few miles later, while I was enjoying the serenity that long drives on country roads bring, that a thought came to mind. What if that turtle was trying to go the other way ?

Isn’t life like that at times ? You head out one way and get turned to another? How often do we set out with a great idea, a goal, a project, when something or someone alters our path and we find ourselves going in an opposite direction?

Photography has those moments…you set out to photograph a given subject, maybe a place, then your original heading and goal gets altered. Now you’re on a new course and you discover something totally different, not your original plan, not what you had in mind, maybe even opposite from your initial intent. Something unexpected is revealed to you, a new road to pursue, a new subject so discover, that wouldn’t have happened had you not started going out in the first place and that’s what’s important….getting started.

Even if you don’t get to where you were going, going there is what counts. It becomes your point of departure and that is a necessary ingredient in finding something new.

As for the turtle, who knows whichever direction he was heading to, hopefully it became to be the right one.