I drew this in my sketchbook in July, 2007. It was an idealization of happy times I had where 4th Place and Court Street meet in Carroll Gardens.

I shot this last night:

In the blindest sense, if I told you no story about either image, you would be free to decide COMPLETELY for yourself what they mean. Since you knew more from the outset, ask yourself how it affected your perception of the images.

I’ve found that the same goes for past vs. present. Memory is a funny thing, subject to our own chemistry, prioritization process, and more… I know of so many examples where two people have completely different memories of an event, but neither is wrong or right, it’s just different elements of what happened that are remembered for strictly personal reasons.

Now apply this to your friends list (online or off). How many of these friends are 10+ years? 20+ years? Think about how you have both changed since you first met. Dredge up the first impression you got and hold it up over your current memory of this person. Does the outline fit? Bet not. It may be a stroke here, a color there, but life happens - people grow and change. Leave room for it in your beliefs of others.

The images above are of a building. Sketch includes some people, some questions… The photo has renovation and garbage. Perhaps those questions got answered and they are in process of moving on to the solution. ;)

And last night at the party, it snowed such beautiful, happy Chrsitmasy snow. The below was on a car at home.