Holy Eff Uck! And Jeezus H. Christ on a Spangled Cross! And all that! My 2nd kid did this:

[ConsAreLiars]

This photo is not even possible. Except for him.

He gets befriended by a red fox and turns plant pix into portraits of close friends
and does landscapes we might only see in a barely remembered dream.

For more, see http://www.flickr.com/photos/jonnyhayseed/show/



I consider myself lucky if I get something that looks like a bug in the same shot as something that looks like a damn plant.


(edit to fix and add stuff)

[Celebration]

1. You are right!

He loves doing this. Great talent--love the rainbow through the tree at the end. But really there are too many to just mention one. Chip off the old block, I would say! :)

[ConsAreLiars]

13. He goes way beyond a "chip off the old block."

I love photography as a way to share or just memorialize what each of us sees, and occasionally I've managed to produce a photo that meets that goal. But he has the kind of connection with the natural world that Annie Liebowitz has with celebrities or Weegie had with the downtrodden. I am very much in awe of both kids, and his photos invite us to imagine a world, like his, where such encounters are commonplace events. Impossible magic, as seen seen from here and now, yet he shows that possibility is actually here and now.

[Kind of Blue]

2. Truly Amazing shot.

That's some kid you have. Thanks for your link to more.

[Mira]

3. Talent is where it started. He can really see, and has educated himself.

I saw the others and I can fully appreciate your awe.
Tell us a little bit about him, would you?

[ConsAreLiars]

6. HS dropout, skater, doper, and loser is how he would have been seen by some.

Wrecked or neglected neglected cars into junk, got within inches of a long prison sentence, easily frustrated with a bit of a temper (never directed toward any being or destructive), yet at the same time a very caring and considerate kid. In the decade of independent living he decided to get a GED in order to get into a two year Herbalism program in order to supplement the encyclopedic knowledge of plants and their ecology, lore and uses that he had been compiling on his own through devouring every book that had anything to add. As you can see from that site, his connection to the world of nature is is genuine.

Older sister (now brother) was the exact opposite in some respects, hyper achiever, tops in everything, brilliantly curious and loved the effort of learning, now married with one kid and beginning another, currently doing PhD work at Berkeley, a GBLTQ activist (and on other issues) and invited to meet with Michelle Obama for his work in the campaign.

At the same time he was living in the mountains around Boulder, cart-wrangling in the parking lot of the Whole Foods store there ("I'd rather be outside"), despite attempts to move him up in the hierarchy, and doing the money counts at the end of his shift because he was so highly trusted. Decided to move back to the NW and is now working 15 hrs a week at a B&B in the San Juan Islands in exchange for B&B and the time to explore, and experience what those recent pix show.

Yet they both were taking different paths in the same direction. Both went through the same sequence of public schools, with us as parents picking the most flexible ones, which all did a good job of accommodating the needs and facilitating the aspirations of both. Jonathan Kozol was pictured in the paper with Kid#1 in an article in which he praised that elementary school program. Both are vegetarian, mostly but not dogmatically, and are best friends. Two sides of the best of the progressive movements of the movements of the 60's. Better than the best in some ways. Both dressed hippy-style in HS and have said they felt they would fit in better then, but both are doing better work in some ways than those two aspects of the movement did then - building on the lessons.

A slight misstep or poor decision by either at the wrong time and place and either or both could have ended up in a world of pain. Now I'm boasting about my kids, but every time I feel so fortunate and glad they've survived so well I feel the words and music of Phil Ochs. It's about "you or I" but it is also about out kids.:

Following is from the one truly honest Phil Ochs Lyrics site: http://web.cecs.pdx.edu/~trent/ochs/lyrics.html

There but for Fortune
by Phil Ochs

Intro:

Show me a prison, show me a jail,
Show me a prisoner whose face has gone pale
And I'll show you a young man with so many reasons why
And there but for fortune, may go you or I

Show me the alley, show me the train,
Show me a hobo who sleeps out in the rain,
And I'll show you a young man with so many reasons why
There but for fortune, may go you or go I -- you and I.

Show me the whiskey stains on the floor,
Show me the drunken man as he stumbles out the door,
And I'll show you a young man with so many reasons why
There but for fortune, may go you or go I -- you and I.


Show me the famine, show me the frail
Eyes with no future that show how we failed
And I'll show you the children with so many reasons why
There but for fortune, go you or I.

Show me the country where bombs had to fall,
Show me the ruins of buildings once so tall,
And I'll show you a young land with so many reasons why
There but for fortune, go you or go I -- you and I.
You and I,
There but for fortune, go you or go I -- you and I.

Here's the 90 second video of Ochs performing that song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rTjRPugJ8CA

Well, time to stop my very slow typing because I'm close to recommending/linking to every Ochs song on that Lyrics site and on youtube, and that is way off topic.

[Mira]

9. Thank you for responding and talking about him. There is a lot to say, and you

have had a extraordinary path, and one not easily traveled I dare say. As I was reading I made a mental note to pay more attention, have more respect for the potential and invisible talent in people I encounter, and then came the song.
Thanks.

[ConsAreLiars]

12. My path has been very interesting, in all the best ways and a worst,

but any hint I might have given that he was more a problem than a delight was a bit off. He was, despite that inability/resistance to doing the prescribed duty and stepping far too close to this society's landmines, always one of the most caring, compassionate and loving individuals I have known. Some might have tried to bust him for his transgressions against the established order, but we always saw his beauty. That song was partly a recognition that in another family, one of some fundie authoritarians, he might have been sent to some re-education camp and utterly destroyed.

Thus, again, that song is always with me when I think of the very different good fortunes both my kids have so far found. Not about me, but "there but good fortune go they."

[dixiegrrrrl]

10. I am so glad you shared what you did about your guys.

I have watched both of my sons blossom into what they really want to do, at "middle age" of 40.
And I honestly believe that their love of the Pac. NW was an essential ingredient.
Both were born and raised there, as was I , but they did not inherit the "Momma is a rolling stone" gene,
so have happily remained and discovered themselves.
One HAS to be outdoors, the other is more into puters and chess and microbiology, intensely ( a bit Asperger's,actually)
And both Phil Ochs fans ...that gene they did get from Momma. :D

Your son's eye is truly remarkable. I happily browsed his pics.

I am very pleased you gave us the opportunity to know you and your sons better, and hope we see more pics soon.

[ConsAreLiars]

14. We are both very lucky.

As are our kids. I am sure that you, as we, did everything to support and protect the kids on the path they chose rather than try to beat/punish/shape them into some preordained fantasy of what was imagined/MSMpublicized as the ideal outcome. This is "Jonny's" very first and only camera. He asked for one as a birthday gift a few years back, maybe partly because of the slides I've shown. On the other hand, Kid #1 hasn't shown the slight interest in taking pis beyond the usual family stuff. So, nothing much to do with me, beyond opening a door.

It's truly wonderful to have two kids whose lives follow both paths in the same (seems at first glance opposite) directions that we had presented to us as opposites.

[Tindalos]

4. He's a natural talent

and definitely has good communication with animals. His pictures are amazing.

[dixiegrrrrl]

5. Makes me want to throw my camera away.

[ConsAreLiars]

7. I hear that!

I posted the ssme sentiment to Mira re: one of her pix about tossing my camera into a ditch ( http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=280x55788 ). Take a look at one more reason to go "Oh! MFG! WOW!" But every one of us connects with our subject in the same way, and every once in a while the pix help others share that moment. Keep on using your camera to share the truths you encounter.

Jonny Hayseed's pix are, to me, true real magic, revealing a relationship between us humans and other critters and growing things far more intimate and interconnected than mere words or even the far reaches of our imagination often convey. Using $20-50-100,000 of gear to get a pretty critter pic far in the distance is rather different being the kind of being that gets other beings to approach closely and pose.

[Elfin Yeti]

8. I'm speechless (my husband would never believe that)!

Magnificent! The composition is perfect! The subjects extraordinary! What a talent he has!

[Tuesday Afternoon]

11. His talent is only outnumbered by his patience.

I am in awe of his commune with nature.

[DollyM]

15. I think some souls just need to accomplish more on earth . . .

It is frustrating to them because they don't fit the traditional meaning of what is successful so they get into "trouble" because they are not understood. I had one of those square peg kids too, home schooling him was the only thing that saved all of our sanity and allowed him to blossom with his music. He died in a car accident last month at the age of 19 and I don't think I truly realized how amazing he was until I looked back at his life and the things he accomplished against the odds and the people he impacted.
Somewhere in the back of my brain I think I read that Ansel Adams was taken out of public school by his father because of his frustration there. He allowed Ansel to make the world through the lens his classroom and well, you know the rest of the story. You just have to love those creative souls who need to be able to express without being twarted at every turn as often happens with public education.

[ConsAreLiars]

16. Of course no words or sympathy card could express what we all want you to know.

That song, "There but for fortune...," is always with me in part because one of both my kids' closest friends (but especially close to the circle kid#2 was in), a beautiful and caring young woman who for a while lived with my SO and kids when SO and I were living apart, took one wrong step (heroin) and died very young as a consequence. My 2nd son and his/her friends who have become geographically dispersed have been gathering together on every anniversary to go camping in the nearby forests in memory and love. Your son's circle may not create that kind of remembrance, but I tell you this tale only as evidence that good friendships and good deeds do not end.

Jonathan Kozol has long been an advocate for fitting the educational system to the kids rather that the other way around. Encouraging the unique genius of those who don't fit the current rigid model would improve all of our futures, but sadly that is the opposite objective from that of those who now rule.

[JeffR]

17. That is pretty damn magnificent right there.

WOW!

[Callalily]

18. Your son is very

talented. His pics are magnificent!