Night lights ...

really late at night during an intense snow storm ...

these were way too orange in color, i like them better in black and white, gives them a creepy, "Nightmare Before Christmas" feel ...

Andrew where are you???

this came in the mail the other day and i'm still deciding if it says more about one, andrew carpenter, or the inner workings of the united states postal service.

this guy lived in our house a couple roommates back and apparently he's going bankrupt. so, not only is his life falling apart, at one point he was so pathetic he included directions to his room as part of his address ... and he never bothered to change it.

i know it's just a letter, but my ponderings since it came here are thricefold ... did the other roommates hate him so much he had to clarify that he lived "upstairs right" just so his mail would make it to him? ... is his new address "andrew carpenter, parent's house, basement" and if so, should I forward it there?? ...

did the postman chuckle at the poor bastard everytime he delivered mail here, thinking to himself, "my life is bad, i mean, i'm a postman for cripes sake, but this guy has it so much worse..." ???

so many questions...

There was an immigration raid in southern Idaho this month, 16 men were arrested and most of them are about to be deported back to Mexico. I went to a vigil with the families in Boise to take photos and do some reporting for a project i'm working on.

I love that she wore these shoes, so cool and not at all appropriate ...

Meet Catherine.

(AP Photo/Charlie Litchfield)

By JESSIE L. BONNER - Associated Press Writer
Edition Date: 12/13/08

PAYETTE, Idaho — For nearly a year, Catherine Carlson refused to pay the fine for driving with a suspended license because it was issued to both her and the man she used to be.

She went to jail four times over the ticket that includes both her legal name and the one she was born with, Daniel Carlson. She had surgery 28 years ago to become a woman, the gender she believes should have been assigned her at birth.

Carlson legally changed her name in the 1970s, but police and court records include both in this rural farming and ranching community east of the Snake River in southwestern Idaho.

"The ticket was the last straw," Carlson said.

Her fight against local authorities brought up questions Payette County had never answered before: where to house a transgender person in a jail with separate cells for men and women, which courthouse bathroom should she use, should the former male name be stricken from county records.

"This is a very conservative old-fashioned community, that's just the way it is. This is rural, small town Idaho. This is new to us," said Payette County Sheriff Chad Huff.

During the past year, Carlson repeatedly protested the $841 citation in court hearings on the case. Her struggle for acceptance since the sex-change operation on Thanksgiving Day 1980 has gone on much longer. She chose a life of solitude at a trailer park near the Payette city limits, rejecting a society she feels has rejected her.

http://www.idahostatesman.com/531/story/602863.html

Gulfport three years after Hurricane Katrina

This week I am in Gulfport, MS and I have been blown away by how much rebuilding is yet to be done. The city is still working on cleaning out the storm drains near the beach. Many of the large houses that lined Highway 90 are gone and all that is left are the foundations. So here are some photos from my walk yesterday morning.

Stairs to nowhere

A building that will be rebuilt for historical purposes, I don't know the story.

The Gulfport Library

Josh O'Connor - Gulfport, MS

The ice man cometh...

When I was little my godmother had a pond behind her place and when it froze over she would take us ice skating in the ridiculous cold that is a northern Idaho winter. I was the one who flew out to the middle of the ice, where it was weakest, where no one else would go, and I would wave at the line of cars that slowed along the highway to check out the stupid kid about to fall through.

So, naturally, the 26-year-old version of myself is thinking the sport cannot have changed that much and after three years of tropical living, I should probably give it another try.

I knew it was going to be bad when I saw the Russian skater team doing pirouettes in the middle of the rink, the families huddled on bleachers, the teenagers on really awkward first dates.

And then there was me, the blades of terror strapped to my feet, revisiting a former life and taking mental snapshots.

But then I realized that I would probably never see any of these people again, and I started taking real snapshots. It suddently hit me that one of the truly great things about getting older is that you really stop caring what people think.

So, I did a couple shaky laps, clinging onto the arm of a friend, avoiding glares from the Russian man-chics everytime we accidentally got in their way. The 16-year-old referee would glide by every five minutes to ask if we were alright and I would assure him that no, I wasn't having a seizure, I just hadn't done this in a while. - Jessie

shutter by moonlight ...

Jessie - from the edge of a prairie in eastern Washington.