A Photo A Day For A Year

January 1st, 2016
Day 01

This little guy let me get closer than any wild animal has ever let me get before. I figure if a Rabbit’s Foot is considered good luck, then a whole rabbit just sitting still, letting me photograph him like that, has to be something even better.

January 2nd, 2016
Day 02

Spent my day working on my Forgotten Iowa project and hit all the unincorporated communities in Jefferson County. This particular photo is an abandoned house on the edge of Competine, Iowa. It doesn’t seem to matter how many times I come across a house like this, it always makes me wonder what happened to it in the first place. There was no doubt in my mind that this house was constructed intently and with love. The spiral down is long and unending, I suppose.

January 3rd, 2016
Day 03

The worst part of winter is when you’re too far into it to remember summer and too far away to see the finish line. This isn’t a good photo, but it’s all I have in me. My bones hurt.

January 4th, 2016
Day 04

I spent my morning and most of my afternoon working. I fully anticipated that I’d only get time to shoot at night and started to think about what kind of interesting long-time exposures I could do. Wasn’t too stoked about the idea of the arctic chill that was surely going to pass straight through my skin and into my bones, but I’d conceded the reality before my lunch break ended. When I got off work and realized that I still had some sunlight to play with, I was overjoyed that I wouldn’t have to freeze to death in the name of a photo project.

The evening was a hodgepodge of any strange idea that entered my head, and this was my favorite frame from that session.

January 5th, 2016
Day 05

I couldn’t find my coat and spent an hour in a cornfield to get this photo and I’m not even happy with it. I am, however, too cold to keep going. I wonder where my coat is.

January 6th, 2016
Day 06

I hung out with my buddy John and froze on the top of a small bridge that I’ve wanted to photograph from for about two years now. Finally had some spare time and ended up with this (and a couple others). The buildings in this photo are the MUM dorms in Fairfield, Iowa and you can see the MUM campus in the very back if you look hard enough.

All in all, a pretty solid day.

January 7th, 2016
Day 07

Took a late night trip to visit my sister and the coolest niece in the world. They’re making headway on their home renovation and we took Sadie for a nice food break. Her entire world was changed when I showed her the “dip your fries in your Frosty” trick.

January 8th, 2016
Day 08

I woke up and decided to get lost in the dense fog of morning before my shift at work was to begin. I ended up on county road after county road, eventually stopping at a business district to turn around when it was about time to stop shooting. I saw this guy walking in the distance and knew I’d found my photo for this project for this particular day. These are the best kinds of mornings.

January 9th, 2016
Day 09

It’s quite frustrating to spend your entire week looking forward to the weekend and the leisure that comes with it only to arrive there in a cold house without electricity. That was the story of my Saturday morning, and it was spent frantically trying to contact somebody that could remedy the situation. Eventually, the energy company did show up and our electricity was restored.

After that, though, I realized that I was going to have to find something interesting to photograph on another frozen, overcast afternoon. I decided to shoot a photo of my lady-friend using one of my Lomography cameras. For added fun, I included the Instax-Minis that she shot. That might be cheating, but it’s my project so I can bend the rules as I please. Right?

The rest of the day will be spent reheating the house and watching the wildcard NFL playoff games on TV.

January 10th, 2016
Day 10

The temperature never went above 5° F all day, and the wind chill made it feel even colder than that. I’ve never been shy about the contempt I have for this entire useless season, and today did nothing but cement that mentality even further for me. Standing next to this fire did no good and my fingers froze as my eyes watered up, creating small icicles all the way down my cheekbones. Truthfully, I spent about twenty minutes outside shooting this last-minute idea with some dead roses we had in our house. I couldn’t last any longer than that.

The house has been a cozy retreat for a lazy Sunday, almost in spite of all that. We ordered delivery and made some poor lady deliver our food to us (no worries, she was tipped well for her efforts). Also, the Packers won their first playoff game by a healthy margin. Not much to complain about besides the frigid hell that is the Iowa outdoors at this particular moment.

So I’ll complain about that to get my fill.

January 11th, 2016
Day 11

It might not look it, but this was probably the coldest I have ever been while taking a photo. The winds were just brutal out on the county roads in Jefferson County, Iowa. I spent a couple hours driving down them in almost total darkness, almost conceding defeat when I came across this truck sitting precariously between a couple trees. This saved the day and the project for me because I wasn’t coming up with anything else worth sharing.

January 12th, 2016
Day 12

My work weeks have been so jam-packed thus far this year that the only time I seem to have to go out and shoot is when the world is at its absolute coldest and darkest. Tonight was no different. I’m ill-equipped to deal with that reality and spent an hour at a park shivering and shaking a healthy distance away from my camera as to not affect the shot.

I ended up with this. It’s just too cold and I don’t own enough warm clothes.

January 13th, 2016
Day 13

I’ve always wanted to give star trails a shot and finally gave it a go this evening. My poor camera is still recovering from sitting out in the elements for hours on end. I am too.

Fun fact: You see that bush in the lower right-hand side of the photo? On my way back out to finish the shot, I was roaming in total blackness and literally fell into those sharp thorny things. It’s a miracle I didn’t stab an eye out. What a stupid way to injure yourself. You know how they say, “Life finds a way.” Well, I do too. If I can hurt myself, chances are I will.

I’m not bitter about it, though. Ended up with a pretty sweet photo for the day.

January 14th, 2016
Day 14

I shot this photo of my neighbor’s cottage after I got off work this evening. Spent the last few hours cleaning the car out and getting the house in order for the VICE visit tomorrow afternoon. They’re doing a piece about Forgotten Iowa and the plan is to follow Kat and I around as we revisit my hometown in Lee County, Iowa.

I did what I always do and procrastinated on cleaning until the last possible moment and now we’re frantically getting everything in order before bed.

January 15th, 2016
Day 15

A feral cat that is very well-fed. Not much of a story for this one, he just kind of popped out of nowhere.

January 16th, 2016
Day 16

Filmed my piece with VICE today. Woke up at 5:30 AM and spent my whole day in my favorite county in all of Iowa. Explored Powdertown, Rand Park, Main Street, and had some great breakfast food at the 4th Street Cafe in Keokuk, Iowa.

We filmed a load of stuff so I don’t know what’s going to make the cut, but I think I represented Keokuk with honesty and fondness. I hope I did anyway.

Honestly, it was a great experience. A really rad group of like-minded people and I even got to hang out with my buddy Canyon for a little while.

Keep your fingers crossed that I come off as more poignant and less pretentious. It’s a thin, thin line between the two and I’m always dancing around it. That sentence is further proof.

January 17th, 2016
Day 17

I am certain that this is technically cheating for a photo-per-day project, but every one of these pictures work better in a set than they do on their own.

Target announced last year that the company would close thirteen stores across the United States. The one in Ottumwa, Iowa was sadly on that list, and they’ve been trying to sell the store out ever since. Every time we go there, it’s a little more empty, a little less there to look through. The only thing that doesn’t seem to change much is the sale prices.

I was followed around the whole store by an uppity manager, but I didn’t complain. I admit, though, that I didn’t understand why he cared so much about a company that was about to put the man out of a job. I guess it doesn’t matter.

I don’t know what attracts me to this kind of thing, but I constantly find myself documenting things that are intrinsically sad, both to look at and to look into. I can’t help it and, honestly, I don’t even try to anymore. Rest assured, it’s just as much an introspective thing as it is outward.

January 18th, 2016
Day 18

Every day that I go outside to shoot a photo of something and my fingers go numb is actually just another day closer to leaving this cruel and bitter winter behind. This day in particular feels cold and unrelenting. I can’t wait until I can spend more than ten minutes outside again. I’m going to spend so much more time out in the elements this spring and summer and if I feel the urge to complain about my allergies or the intense heat, I will click back to this post.

This is present Cody telling future Cody to stop whining. It’s better than this, I promise you.

January 19th, 2016
Day 19

There are some days where I just can’t seem to get things going. Despite my best efforts, the day ends up being one negative reality followed by another and another and another. Ad nauseam.

January 20th, 2016
Day 20

Went exploring around the property with Kat after work tonight and played with my new Canon 24–70mm f/2.8 lens. A little later, I watched a truck hit a deer at about 65 MPH. The driver must have been okay because he drove right off. The deer didn’t fair as well. He’s still there. Well, pieces of him are still there.

It’s been quite a week. We filmed our VICE special for Forgotten Iowa on Saturday. I was interviewed for CNN on Monday. I’m doing a podcast tomorrow night. KHQA is doing a feature on me Sunday. All this sudden interest in me and my work is both incredibly amazing and bizarre. This was always the goal, you know, to make things that people wanted to see on a regular basis. To gain respect and acknowledgement, to make a name for myself artistically.

Still, after decades of radio silence, it’s a little hard to get adjusted to this life. Young artists get to starve, I guess, and I’m rounding the corner to leaving adolescence behind entirely. Starving at 30 isn’t quite as endearing or romantic as starving at 21 is. I’m glad I’m finally moving beyond it.

And weirded out by it, too.

January 21st, 2016
Day 21

Nothing like starting a morning with a glass bottle of Coca-Cola and enough sunlight to shoot a few photos. I woke up before the sun today because I thought there have been just a few too many late evening / night photos going on with this project. Wanted to shake it up a little.

Unfortunately, my brain refuses to accept that we’re waist-deep into Winter and didn’t account for the cold. For a moment, I felt like an idiot for getting out of bed at 6:30 AM when I didn’t need to be up for at least two hours after that.

Then I realized I could just as easily play inside. So I grabbed my Coke bottle and got this.

January 22nd, 2016
Day 22

Went to Ottumwa, Iowa because I wanted to shoot photos of a few bridges. Ended up getting this and liked it better than any of my bridge photos.

I also realized how far into winter I actually am when I saw that the high for Sunday was 42 degrees and found myself in hysterics about the warmth. Forty. Two. Degrees. Warm.

January 23rd, 2016
Day 23

We had a little pierogi / birthday party at a friend’s house in town this evening. I spent the duration of that party shooting photos and eating fried pastries.

There was some kind of electrical explosion in town, so I didn’t have any internet at the house until about 9:30PM this evening. I’ve often been guilty of being overly nostalgic for the 90’s, but tonight was pretty much what that time period was like and you know what? The world kind of sucks without the internet. I forget about that too much.

January 24th, 2016
Day 24

This is where I grew up. Perpetually jealous of the views that birds get to see every day. I was granted access to the top of Hotel Iowa in Keokuk and climbed atop a ledge to get this photo.

There was also a Sunday Night News special about my Forgotten Iowa project. You can see that here. I also ate my first Dodie-Burger at the famous Harrington’s bar in Keokuk. Can’t believe I’d never been there before. It was delicious.

I’m spending my day today recovering from something I caught yesterday. Fighting the urge to throw up and sleep, in that order, for the totality of my day. I’m hoping that it’s just a 24-hour bug.

January 25th, 2016
Day 25

Nope. I’m full-blown sick. I have no desire to take a picture today, but I’ve already come this far and can’t give up now.

January 26th, 2016
Day 26

It’s my life partner’s 28th birthday today. I woke up way earlier than I normally would bought her a nice birthday cake before she woke up. Turns out, lighting 28 candles is quite jarring and she thought that maybe the house had caught on fire.

Happy birthday, Kat! Love you.

January 27th, 2016
Day 27

Some days after work, I walk around town and look for something cool to take photos of. Very rarely do I come across something that impacts me personally on an emotional level, but today I did.

January 28th, 2016
Day 28

Growing up with George W. Bush as a president made me disillusioned with politics from a very young age. It was a mentality I never truly escaped from until this evening. I got chills several times throughout Bernie Sander’s speech in Fairfield, Iowa tonight. It was so moving that I’ve decided to vote for the very first time in my 27 years of life. I’m going to caucus for Bernie Sanders.

Feeling the Bern and you should too. Let’s help Bernie win Iowa.

January 29th, 2016
Day 29

I can’t wait until I can actually sit outside and enjoy the weather while I do these kinds of photos, as opposed to the numb fingers and runny noses while I shiver my way through them. It might not look it right now, but winter is in full-force. It’s just brutal out there.

January 30th, 2016
Day 30

Hit the road first thing in the morning to continue work on Forgotten Iowa. Lucas County was as vast as it was hilly and I captured a lot of quality shots there. This one is of an abandoned schoolhouse in the town the county was named after — Lucas, Iowa. Kat and I traversed through the towns and finished for the day just as the sun dipped below the horizon.

Most of my night has revolved around getting photos ready for release. All-in-all, I don’t think there’s a better way to spend a blustery Saturday night than this.

January 31st, 2016
Day 31

One month down and eleven more to go. So far, so good. There are a few days where I gave up on getting a good shot earlier than I should have, but what can you do? They can’t all be winners, I guess. Everyone at work is convinced I’ll give up by spring. We’ll see.

I spent my day relieved that the winter storm Southeast Iowa was supposed to get is going to pass just west of us. Dodging a bullet is always a nice feeling. The weekend passed far too quickly, though, but probably because I worked right through it. Oh well. I’ll sleep when I’m dead.

February 1st, 2016
Day 32

The Iowa caucus was tonight and I went for Bernie Sanders. Looks like Hillary is going to win the state by the slimmest of margins, but I feel equally proud that Trump didn’t win the Republican nomination here (just going to ignore the whole Ted Cruz thing for now).

I woke up right alongside the sun and shot photos of our trusty old Taurus in the fog. The day kind of flew right by.

February 2nd, 2016
Day 33

It’s been a long day and there’s a lot on my mind. Been worrying myself sick and I hope everything turns out okay. My stomach’s just been in knots all day.

February 3rd, 2016
Day 34

We dropped way too much money on photography equipment this week, but you have to spend money to make it. That’s what they say, anyway. Right? They do say that, don’t they?

February 4th, 2016
Day 35

There’s been a deer carcass just outside our house being picked and pulled apart for the better part of a month now. Up until today, I’ve resisted the urge to photograph the gnarly scene but today I reconsidered after asking myself, “Why haven’t you?” My philosophy is usually this — if I can’t think of a good reason to not do something, then that usually means that I should probably do it. Even in the arctic chill of this evening, the stench was strong enough that it makes the photo harder for me to look at. What a strange day.

February 5th, 2016
Day 36

Got off work and immediately hit the road with Kat to Winterset, IA to continue work on Forgotten Iowa. It was a long drive that welcomed us through a snowstorm just as we hit the finish line. We ate at a cafe featured in the film, “Bridges of Madison County”, but they seemed way more proud to be the birthplace of John Wayne than they were of that film.

February 6th, 2016
Day 37

A narrow, almost-frozen creek bed in Patterson, Iowa. We traversed through the thick fog that lingered throughout our whole stay and explored every nook and cranny of Madison County, Iowa.

February 7th, 2016
Day 38

Wandered into the ghost town of Hopeville, Iowa on our way home this morning. I briefly thought I might miss the Superbowl for the first time in almost ten years, but I wasn’t as bothered by that as I might have been in years prior.

February 8th, 2016
Day 39

I keep telling myself that we’re almost through with the winter. We’ll randomly get a day where the temperatures rise above freezing and it’s almost as if I can see spring coming. Then it snows all day just a short time later with 50 mph wind gusts and a low temperature in the negatives. That’s when I realize that I’m in hell and there’s no end to it. Groundhog day. Over and over and over again.

Hyperbole, perhaps, but it certainly felt that way today.

February 9th, 2016
Day 40

I just can’t shake this residual sickness. Popcorn is the only thing that I can keep down lately and I’m not exactly a huge fan of popcorn to begin with.

February 10th, 2016
Day 41

It started snowing this morning and was still coming down when I left for my lunch break at work. Stopped at a park and spotted this curious squirrel. He sat there for a good five minutes letting me shoot him while staring directly into my lens.

Thanks, little buddy.

February 11th, 2016
Day 42

Took a long drive to Pella, Iowa to work with some of my favorite people today. I originally had plans to go out and shoot some other stuff specifically for this project, but there just aren’t enough hours in the day sometimes.

February 12th, 2016
Day 43

Setting up backdrops in such a small housing situation is proving to be very hard.

February 13th, 2016
Day 44

It was a brisk seven degrees this morning, but Elena was a trooper and braved the storms for photos that look a hell of a lot warmer than it actually was.

February 14th, 2016
Day 45

Happy Valentine’s Day.

February 15th, 2016
Day 46

I’ve been up since six this morning working on photos of food and now I’m starving.

February 16th, 2016
Day 47

Really burning the midnight oil today and couldn’t think of anything I wanted to take photos of when I still had daylight to play with. When all else fails, though, I can always walk around town until I see something interesting. Found a stack of TVs near a dumpster behind a thrift store. Some days, it just doesn’t get much better than that.

February 17th, 2016
Day 48

If breathing was a conscious decision, then I don’t think I’d have had enough time to inhale today. From sunrise until sundown, I was packed to the gills with stuff to do and almost thought I’d miss the chance to get something shot that was good enough to share. I was preparing myself to feel a deep shame to have only gotten fewer than two months in to this project before failing.

I looked around my house and found an old shoe box, decided to channel my inner Pulp Fiction, and ended up with this. Just in the nick of time.

February 18th, 2016
Day 49

I used to think that my hands were my most attractive physical trait. They’ve aged poorly and now they’re embarrassing to me.

Everything eventually betrays you, even you yourself.

February 19th, 2016
Day 50

Had a great Friday night with Kat, my brother, and a guy that might as well be a brother to me himself. I wish every day could be as carefree and fun as this one was.

February 20th, 2016
Day 51

Bought a mirror. Had to use it.

February 21st, 2016
Day 52

Shot some cute portraits for a family this afternoon and then lazily lounged around and caught up on some much needed rest.

February 22nd, 2016
Day 53

Getting internet installed at our new place. The day was a giant blur of dashing and resting, and I’m hoping one just caused the other and I’m not, in fact, getting sick with something again. It seems like this happens every other year around this time. Come February, every even numbered year, I find myself getting abused with a litany of illnesses.

All I’m saying is that it’s likely that I’ll die in the winter of an even-numbered year.

February 23rd, 2016
Day 54

February comes and goes with a vengeance. It was sixty-five degrees the other night and stayed that way just long enough to make my body believe that it’d made it through another winter. Woke up this morning to brown grass turned white with an icy frost. It served only to remind me that I don’t actually control anything and I shouldn’t get comfortable.

February 24th, 2016
Day 55

There are some days where this project is a huge pain in my ass. I had a full eight hour shift today and then I had to shoot a commercial for a company directly after that. By the time I was done, I was so chewed up and drained that the prospect of picking my camera up again was just dreadful.

I still did it, though.

February 25th, 2016
Day 56

Last few days at the farm. This is my Bon Voyage photo to the last year we spent here. On to new things!

February 26th, 2016
Day 57

“Gotta have opposites. Dark and light, light and dark in painting. It’s like in life. Gotta have a little sadness once in a while so you know when the good times come. I’m waiting on the good times now.” — Bob Ross

February 27th, 2016
Day 58

Did a small bit of work on Forgotten Iowa this afternoon, tackling one of the towns we missed the first town around. This was shot in Kalona, Iowa after we ate lunch in Washington.

February 28th, 2016
Day 59

Continued work on Forgotten Iowa with Kat all day today, this time capturing Marion County. I came across this stray cat in a small, unincorporated town called Flagler. I was happy to come across him because there was hardly anything left in that town.

February 29th, 2016
Day 60

Last night at the cabin on the farm. Spent it playing with light and hanging with Kat and my brother. Seeya later, cabin.

It’s been real.

March 1st, 2016
Day 61

Spent, quite literally, my entire day moving out of the cabin. As excited as I am to live in this new house, I still have this tinge of sadness about leaving this place. It was nice to be so far away from people at all times and I’m going to miss the nights where it felt like my girlfriend and I were the only living beings on earth.

March 2nd, 2016
Day 62

My natural seating position when I’m riding shotgun. I blame the long, gangly chicken legs.

March 3rd, 2016
Day 63

Cold and rainy. Cold and rainy. Every day, it’s cold and rainy.

March 4th, 2016
Day 64

Needed a light-bulb for the front porch. That’s literally the most exciting thing that happened to me on this day.

It’s better than a stretch of bad luck, so I’ll take it.

March 5th, 2016
Day 65

One of my favorite things about photography is how many ways the same exact thing can be photographed to capture a completely different feeling. It’s honestly the freest I ever feel, just outside messing around with the same subject two-thousand different ways.

March 6th, 2016
Day 66

A break from all the bleak, I grabbed my camera and went on a long walk all by my lonesome. Listened to the bats communicate, watched cars drive up and down the street, and smoked a cigarette that glowed orange almost as bright as the halogen light posts. I didn’t stop to talk to a single person. Didn’t have my face buried in a cell phone. Instead, I enjoyed the calm breeze and the stray dogs loudly warning one another of my presence.

They had nothing to worry about and neither did I.

March 7th, 2016
Day 67

Nicest day of the year so far. Spent my evening enjoying the weather and exploring our new neighborhood. The whole week is supposed to be a mirror image of today as far as the weather goes, and I don’t think I could be happier if I had to be about it.

March 8th, 2016
Day 68

These clouds turned into rainfall about an hour after I shot this. Was really hoping I’d get something better than clouds, but I didn’t.

March 9th, 2016
Day 69

I should really shoot more Lomography stuff. I would probably do a lot more of it if it wasn’t so costly to do.

This is a photo of a photo that I shot bright and early this morning. The smell of fresh rainfall was still permeating my nostrils as the sun meekly peaked back through the cloud cover. The nice weather was being choked by those clouds, too, as a tense breeze sent a chill down my spine. Another day. Another day.

March 10th, 2016
Day 70

It’s a thin line between looking totally rock’n’roll and kind-of-sort-of looking like you’ve killed a couple people.

March 11th, 2016
Day 71

sixteen with a few to go
what would I be, I should’ve known
I ate my cake and drank my blood
spilled a bit then I cleaned it up
I guess I should’ve known

March 12th, 2016
Day 72

All it did was rain all day and it wasn’t the kind of rain that is fun to photograph, you know, with large droplets and streaks of lightning that shoot across the sky. No. It was just this cold, damp mess and I spent the majority of it inside my house watching episodes of It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia with the girl.

March 13th, 2016
Day 73

Playing with lights every single day of my life.

March 14th, 2016
Day 74

My buddy Joel came up and helped me set up my new desk. It’s nice to have a real friend out there.

March 15th, 2016
Day 75

While other parts of Iowa were experiencing quarter-sized hail and tornadoes, we were stuck with nothing but thick rain and heat lightning. On one hand, I’m glad that everybody I know was safe and sound. On the other, more selfish hand, I’d really like to photograph a tornado this year.

March 16th, 2016
Day 76

Lots of shallow depth-of-field shots the last couple days, but what can I say? It’s been so dreary and dark every day. I’d rather have a shallow focal length than a high ISO most days.

March 17th, 2016
Day 77

One of my cheap umbrellas broke recently and it happened to be my favorite one. I like it so much, in fact, that I decided to use it in my studio tonight anyway. I need to stop investing in junk and start saving up enough to buy sturdy equipment.

Until then, though, I will use my broken, cheap umbrellas. I made it work.

March 18th, 2016
Day 78

I’m really digging color gels and artificial lighting lately. It’s a good go-to when it’s too rainy or cold to do anything else. I shot this with two speedlites as my only light sources and messed around with different gel combinations. I like the contrast between the orange and the blue the most for this particular shoot. Part of me wishes I’d have lit the right side with a soft fill, but I didn’t have the necessary gear on me to do that.

March 19th, 2016
Day 79

I’m so mentally checked out of winter weather that I find it hard to step outside whenever it’s even slightly cold outside. And that’s pretty much what it’s been like this weekend. Cold, rainy, windy, all variations of the same gross junk I was hoping to be finally done with for a while. What’s worse is that the Iowan landscape is starting to get green again, and that makes me automatically assume that it’s going to be nice. March is a wildcard month and every day has been something dramatically different. We did venture out for a while today, ate some great Mexican food in Mount Pleasant, Iowa, and that was enough for me. On to the next week.

March 20th, 2016
Day 80

I had a lot of fun trying to mimic a streetlight while still setting an ominous tone with only one extra available fill-light. I find that mixing contrasting colors is a lot more fun than just pairing colors that blend well.

March 21st, 2016
Day 81

I occasionally see this guy playing his saxophone in town and I always want to introduce myself to him. Today, I threw a couple bucks in his case and asked him if he would mind if I photographed him.

You could see the joy in his eyes when he saw that somebody stopped to listen for a few minutes.

March 22nd, 2016
Day 82

This first batch of flowers is in for some rough times with all the snow in the forecast. Winter isn’t going down without a fight.

March 23rd, 2016
Day 83

Nothing like a little Bach and Vivaldi to calm the nerves. I keep struggling with this ugly mentality lately, reminding myself that nothing truly matters in life. I’ll be having a great day and then WHAM! Out of nowhere, like a brick to the face, I sink into this familiar pit. Even if I solve world hunger, cure AIDS, and create a masterpiece like the ones I’m listening to; it’s only a matter of time before the slate is wiped clean. Poof, like it never even happened.

It’s only when I reevaluate for a moment, shift my focus back to the absurd reality that anything actually exists at all, that I can climb from the pit and assume even a little normality. Yeah, nothing really matters. That’s a universal truth. Sure. But, after you peel away the first couple layers, that fact is less agonizing than it is absolutely hilarious.

So that’s what I’m trying to do with my night. Keep peeling the agony onion until it stops making me sad and the hilarity returns.

March 24th, 2016
Day 84

I could have sworn it was Spring. It’s all everybody I know has been talking about for the last week or so. Sure feels like winter to me.

March 25th, 2016
Day 85

Shot photos of video game legend Walter Day in my studio today. You can see the interview / photo essay here.

March 26th, 2016
Day 86

Rest assured, when I am absolutely drained from the week and have no desire to get creative with my Saturday, I will always return to these medicine bottles.

March 27th, 2016
Day 87

I quit drinking a little more than four years ago
not because of any perceived health dilemma
even though I wasn’t eating
and looked the best
that I would ever look
thin skin stretched
over an even thinner
skeleton, eyes sunken
whiskey shits
beautiful
bloodshot
eyes

March 28th, 2016
Day 88

She’s growing a collection of herbs in our windowsill. It’s always such a sight to see things grow from total nothingness and how alien everything looks in its early stages.

March 29th, 2016
Day 89

Self portrait on my work to work this morning.

March 30th, 2016
Day 90

Found this creepy doll head at a thrift store for a buck. Grabbed it and quickly did a shoot in my backyard while the storm clouds started to race in.

March 31st, 2016
Day 91

Three months down. Good riddance, March. Now bring on the warm. Please.

April 1st, 2016
Day 92

Gearing up for another county with Forgotten Iowa. This time, we’re going 152 miles away to Dubuque county.

April 2nd, 2016
Day 93

Fillmore, Iowa.

April 3rd, 2016
Day 94

Beautiful day for a walk around Dubuque. This was my favorite shot from the morning.

April 4th, 2016
Day 95

when the sun is in just the right position
hanging low in the sky
like a dead
fruit

making a crime scene of my curtains
scuffed and scratched up
from the previous tenants

for the first time in my adult life,
I am not too broke to exchange them for a fresh set
but I am definitely too cheap,
and that’s kind of the same thing,
isn’t it?

I stare at the scratches
and wonder what
made them.

April 5th, 2016
Day 96

Self-Portrait of a guy with absolutely no inspiration. It rains outside. The birds shiver.

April 6th, 2016
Day 97

Beauty shines through.

April 7th, 2016
Day 98

Had a commercial clothing shoot out in the elements and had to make it look like a sunny day, rather than the overcast, rainy mess that it was. I think I did an alright job.

April 8th, 2016
Day 99

I waited from sun-up to sundown for the UPS man to deliver some electronics. I thought it’d only take a few hours in the morning, but it stretched all the way until evening this go around. And that makes total sense, you know, because I was waiting for something I wanted to play with very bad.

It eventually came and I was able to leave my stoop. Glorious.

April 9th, 2016
Day 100

One-hundred days into this project. This photo isn’t particularly exciting, but I love when I get some company come up from Keokuk. Didn’t even have the time to set up my lights correctly, so there’s heavy shadows everywhere. To be honest, it’s not a very good photo technically at all. Sometimes that’s the best kind of picture to me, though, when it just happens without concern.

April 10th, 2016
Day 101

I can’t seem to wake my mind up today. In a perpetual fog. Gets more and more dense as the minutes drift by. Had a dream that I was shot in the face by a stranger while working on Forgotten Iowa. Woke up with a headache.

April 11th, 2016
Day 102

This day was a long one. Sometimes I get overwhelmed by how many hours I put into work and how little I put into my own stuff. It seems grossly imbalanced.

April 12th, 2016
Day 103

Kat and I took my niece Sadie to her first Hibachi grill yesterday. She was equal parts entertained and terrified.

April 13th, 2016
Day 104

I love when I get hired to do a shoot that requires me to wear protective eye-wear. Shot this for a magazine this afternoon.

April 14th, 2016
Day 105

Wandered around the woods and shot photos in an old style I haven’t employed in far too long.

April 15th, 2016
Day 106

Winter has finally died. I rejoice, but I do not tie my shoes.

April 16th, 2016
Day 107

Best friends.

April 17th, 2016
Day 108

My sister is due for labor at practically any time now. Needed some quality family portraits done before she pops and ended up with some of my best family work yet in Vedic City, Iowa.

April 18th, 2016
Day 109

Once, when I was still a hopeless and lonely teenager, I met a girl that said she preferred dead and dying flowers to the fresh ones. It was a statement that, if I heard it today, I would think that it was coming from the mouth of a shallow person that wanted to sound like an ocean. Back then, though, I didn’t react that way. It sounded as if she was making some kind of declaration about me as a human inasmuch the dead and dying flowers themselves. After all, I was gangly. I was rough around the edges. I felt like people were never giving me my fair shake. I was a dead and dying flower. When she said it, I guess I wasn’t all the way cynical yet. I was, however, looking for answers through metaphors that probably weren’t there. No matter. That statement was about me even if she didn’t mean for it to be. It was valid.

I didn’t know how to ask this girl out properly and, even though she was showing me signs, I didn’t even know how to bring them up. Hell, I don’t know if I was even catching on to them at all. For weeks, I tried to think of ways to tell her that I liked her and I’m sure she was showing up at my house wondering when the hell I was going to man up, too. Every time I thought I’d gotten to the point, something inside my head would prevent me from saying anything.

That’s when I thought of it. I spent one evening in particular walking to all the flower stores in town, asking the managers if I could have their dead and dying flowers that nobody else was going to buy anyway. One-by-one, they rejected the request outright and told me that I’d have to pay full price for a dozen flowers even if they were already dead. After a while, I conceded to it and offered up what was to me a very large sum of money. For dead and dying flowers. I felt like an idiot, but I did it. I’d made it that far.

I drove to the girl’s house with the absolute intention of knocking on the door and giving them to her. It would be the ultimate of romantic gestures, I thought, and I would finally get over the hurdle of admitting my attraction. I could see her car from four or five blocks out, and in the time it took me to drive through them, I had already talked myself out of it doing it. Again. What would I do if I wasn’t correct? What would she say to me? How much would it gut me? My ego was far too fragile for the awkward conversation that would have inevitably followed it, so I instead put the flowers next to the driver-side door of her car and left a message on her voice mail to get check for them.

That girl and I never did date, but sometimes I’ll see a patch of dead flowers and remember how it felt to be that sad teenager that didn’t know how to go for something he wanted. Years later, I would take a train all the way to Michigan to meet a girl that was sending me all kinds of mixed signals. It was the least sure I had ever been about a person in my life. Honestly, I didn’t even know if she liked me as a human-being, let alone as a romantic interest, so that train ride was especially long for me. I guess I learned my lesson from the girl that liked dead and dying flowers, though, because I let that girl know where I stood right away, the risk of unrequited emotions thrown to the wayside. Because, at the end of the day, who gives a shit? You gotta put yourself on the line if you want a bite.

I’m still unsure if that girl was talking about me when she was talking about the dead and dying flowers. Probably not. I guess it doesn’t really matter. It’s still valid either way. Dead flowers don’t get loved on because they had their opportunity and missed it. I would never make that mistake again.

April 19th, 2016
Day 110

Probably a few too many flower photos in this project lately, but I’ve given myself totally to Spring after hoping for it for as long as it seemed like I did.

April 20th, 2016
Day 111

I haven’t had more than ten minutes of free time throughout the entire duration of this day.

April 21st, 2016
Day 112

Prince died today and the whole world collectively became a whole lot less talented.

April 22nd, 2016
Day 113

“Like a bird on a wire, like a drunk in some old midnight choir; I have tried in my way to be free.”

April 23rd, 2016
Day 114

Shot my first Buddhist wedding today.

April 24th, 2016
Day 115

After two years of living in this town, we finally have some couches.

Hell yeah.

April 25th, 2016
Day 116

I’m a meat and potatoes kind of guy. Grown from the black dirt like a weed in the spring time.

April 26th, 2016
Day 117

A quick frame of the girl watering her flowers.

April 27th, 2016
Day 118

I’m physically exhausted from a long day driving in rainy, garbage weather. I woke up feeling ambitious and excited for the coming storms, but I sit here now deflated. There’s always the next storm, I guess.

April 28th, 2016
Day 119

I don’t know what it is about the day before a long drive, but I always find myself in such a rotten mood. I’m ready to get this over with. Don’t feel like taking pictures. Don’t feel like doing anything at all. Hate days like this.

April 29th, 2016
Day 120

I’ve had a long, deeply-rooted prejudice against the south for as long as I can remember. Despite that, I have traveled through it many times and even once lived in the bayou for the better part of a year. Every time, I hope that my opinions change and I find reasons (besides the beautiful landscape) to enjoy my time there. After all, I know deep down that not everybody down there is hateful. In fact, many of them are quite nice. But the more I find myself there, the more I realize that those people are usually the exception and not the rule (and are likely only nice to me because we share a skin color and I have a cute girl instead of a cute boy attached to my arm). If I didn’t appear to be a heteronormative white male, who knows how I would be treated. Something tells me it wouldn’t be the same. That much I am almost certain of.

Whether it’s a confederate flag with a caricature of Barack Obama being lynched etched into the cheap fabric or just some overheard conversation at a rest stop about the “damn minorities ruining America”. Something always happens that makes me want get the hell out of dodge. Always, 100% of the time, without exception — it happens every. damn. time.

This trip was no different. We made it all the way through Tennessee without incident, and I foolishly thought that maybe this was the trip to finally change my mind. The southern hospitality was in full-effect, after all, and the people I talked to were all incredibly nice to me.

Then we turned on the radio somewhere near Montgomery, Alabama and I couldn’t believe the bullshit I was hearing from the DJ’s and their callers. Open transphobia. Blatant disregard for the well-being of gay people. Parodies of songs where the words were changed to make trans-people out to be nothing more than perverts in dresses (almost verbatim, actually). One guy even said (and I quote), “if I ever end up in prison, it’ll be because I saw some hoity-toity pervert fag in a dress walk into the bathroom after my wife. I will beat them within an inch of their life.” Then him and his inbred buddy laughed like it was the funniest damn thing that was ever said in the history of radio.

For the record, it wasn’t, by the way. And their laughter served to make me all the more upset about it. What a bunch of assholes.

Both Kat and I were fuming. How can people be so openly hateful? How can they be so self-righteously bigoted and take no issue with it? How are they okay with it?

The only answer I could come up with, and it’s an easy one, is that we weren’t in the enlightened north anymore. We were back in the armpit of America and everything suddenly reeked to high heavens.

If our phone wasn’t already dead, we would have called into the station and asked how they could possibly justify the bullshit they were saying. I listened to that show for a good two hours just waiting for one person to call in and say something that wasn’t completely and absolutely terrible. But it never happened. Call after call, a bunch of bigots just patting themselves on the backs. A giant masturbatory circle of hate.

I just don’t understand how somebody can live in a place where the geography is so breathtaking and still have these terrible worldviews. I’m trying real hard to shift my focus and rise above it. To not be inspired to anger in the same way that these people are. But I would be lying if I said I was successful in it.

Florida is pretty cool so far. I like Florida. But the rest of the south is on my shit-list perpetually.

April 30th, 2016
Day 121

I can’t get over how breathtaking every view here is.

May 1st, 2016
Day 122

Somebody was walking around the beach with a flashlight. Only people there besides Kat and I. No idea what they were looking for, but they helped me get a sweet photo. Thank you kindly, strangers!

May 2nd, 2016
Day 123

Spending a whole lot of much needed time doing nothing at all. I needed time to be useless.

May 3rd, 2016
Day 124

the people down there are less uninviting
they can’t see me and i can barely see them
they lay and take in the ultra violet radiation
i sit and suck up carcinogens from the butt
of a half-smoked cigarette. legs are totally
fried, look like a damn lobster and smell
like overpriced aloe vera gel. i like those
people down there. they are some of the
best people i have never met, and i
sincerely hope that it remains that
way with the rest of them. from a
safe distance, i love human kind
like some sort of doped up
strung out junkie in a bliss
i would otherwise only
understand and never
relate to;

it is only when they become bigger,
when i can make out the lines in their
faces, the color of their eyes, the
smell of their body odor and the
way their teeth look when they
laugh

that i find myself uncomfortable
with the thought of people existing
at all. how fucking ugly, the whole
damn lot of you and me, too.
all of us uglier than the one
that preceded

from up here though,
from this particular
vantage point in
this particularly
overpriced hotel
room,

they are all
so god damn
beautiful.

May 4th, 2016
Day 125

Lost my Polaroid Cube somewhere on this day. Still not going to let it drag my mood down, though.

May 5th, 2016
Day 126

Nothing quite makes me feel like a child like feeding some birds. Pretty fantastic evening.

May 6th, 2016
Day 127

This view was a lot better than the food that accompanied it .

May 7th, 2016
Day 128

Caught up on some reading this afternoon.

May 8th, 2016
Day 129

My brother at the top of Edgewater Resorts in Panama City Beach, Florida.

May 9th, 2016
Day 130

Finally got my mom to model for a clothing company I do work for. It went really well.

May 10th, 2016
Day 131

Easily the worst day of our trip, but the sunset was pretty. I miss Iowa and am ready to go home.

May 11th, 2016
Day 132

Our last day in Florida. Had a nice evening watching paragliders do their thing.

May 12th, 2016
Day 133

the beaches of the panhandle
hide behind corporate buildings
two-hundred-dollar-per-night hotels
and other various tourist traps
they loom over you like bad news
cackling from the balconies
like rabid dogs in the middle
of summer and blowing
through the palms
before reaching
your eyeballs
your burned ears
calloused hands
and thinning wallet

it’s the kind of sad display that
can make a man uncomfortable
as he sits at the side of the road
watching the parade go by
waiting for the funeral procession
to roll on through,
just to get a peek
a small glimpse of the endless
azure waves that are always
tucked in like a small child
before another choice event
that allows one to show them off
to feel better about their own
wasted potential

some other man long ago
way before i ever existed
saw paradise where others
saw useless, unfarmable
land and he claimed stake
built a cottage and soon enough
there would be ten cottages
then fifty, then a high-rise
then a five dollar admission
then a ten and so on
and so forth, all the way
until this present moment
when the sight of beach
the views from that unfarmable
useless land censored
beyond all recognition
and all the cottages have
long since been destroyed in
favor of these death towers
where the fat and stupid sing their
hymnals from the top with a view
so beautiful they can likely
forget the fact altogether
and for a blissful, ever fleeting moment
see exactly what that man did
back then way before i ever
stepped foot in the sand

i hit that highway with a
god damn vengeance
happy to leave the
crowded shore
in favor of that
blessed, perfect
black, Iowan
dirt.

No towers to hide behind
perpetually free admission
and anyway,
I enjoy the view best
when no one else
is looking.

May 13th, 2016
Day 134

My sister delivered a baby boy this evening, so I picked my niece up for a little visit while my sister recovers in the hospital. Today’s photo is just a small candid before bedtime, as the vast majority of it was spent traveling, picking my niece up, and getting her ready for bed. Not enough hours in the day.

May 14th, 2016
Day 135

Immediately had to travel to Atlantic, Iowa after driving nearly 2,000 miles in the previous two days for a wedding I was contracted to do earlier this year. Took my niece and my girlfriend along to hang out at the hotel while I worked.

Every day that my niece has been with us, she has begged Kat for “makeovers”. Then, once Kat acquiesces, she turns into a little hyper monster and, in Sadie’s own words, “starts bouncing off the walls”.

May 15th, 2016
Day 136

Finally home. 2,500 miles in less than four days. I am so beyond ready for my life to resume even a semblance of normalcy.

I’ve been feeding this little guy despite being deathly allergic to him. He walks with a limp and is skittish as all hell, but he deserves a nice meal just like the rest of us.

May 16th, 2016
Day 137

I’ve never been able to get so close to a squirrel before. He looked me straight in the eye and didn’t move, didn’t flinch, just sat there and ate his seeds peacefully.

I walk around town sometimes and it’s not uncommon for people to go out of their way to not make eye-contact with me. They will stare at their feet, look at their dead cell phones, sometimes even turn their entire heads around like an owl that just heard a field mouse behind him; anything they can to get out of basic human interaction. The best communication, often, is the lack of any at all. So they don’t. They, instead, go out of their way not to.

It’s a strange feeling when you’re five feet away from a small animal that seems to take more of an interest in your existence than those of your own species. Even stranger to be a giant from their perspective, a potentially fatal threat, and to have them pay no mind to it at all.

Sometimes, I don’t feel much like a person at all. That’s all I’m getting at, I guess.

May 17th, 2016
Day 138

Worked for sixteen hours straight today. Wore out, but did get some rad photos for one of the companies I work for.

May 18th, 2016
Day 139

time is not running out
it stays in stride
moves like a gazelle
and is eventually
eaten in on itself
as a starved
child in a
desert of
sand, rocks
and little
else

but it keeps on
moving, inching
ever further into
the yonder, where
bone and skin
are sorry vessels
for the sudden
onset of eternity

the world will
keep spinning
long after you
stop

every day is not
a blessing, at least
not as much as
it’s a ticking
reminder

that you’re one breath
closer, one step
nearer to the
eventual
grand
letdown.

May 19th, 2016
Day 140

Made a new friend and traveled the back-roads to Rubio, Iowa today. I’ve been wanting to do a shoot with someone at this house ever since the first time I stumbled upon it. Turned out well!

May 20th, 2016
Day 141

There are some times where the air feels too thick to move freely in it, too heavy for any thought to pierce through the hard-wiring of my brain, doesn’t send signals to my joints to operate correctly. I sit aimlessly, hoping for some kind of inspiration to strike. It rarely does.

May 21st, 2016
Day 142

Rad shoot in an abandoned basement in Vedic City, Iowa this evening.

May 22nd, 2016
Day 143

A little bonfire in Lockridge, Iowa.

May 23rd, 2016
Day 144

This is my face after working another fourteen hour day.

On one hand, I’m grateful that I’ve finally found a way to make a decent living. On the other, I’m so tired that the idea of going out to work on my own stuff seemed impossible.

On days like this, there is only me that I’m capable of working of with. And I’m not a great model. But what can you do?

May 24th, 2016
Day 145

It’s supposed to rain for the next six days straight, so I took advantage of the available light while I still could.

May 25th, 2016
Day 146

Still waiting on those storms. It’s been a strange day. It looks like something ominous is about to hit us. The air is thick and hard to traverse through without perspiring, but it’s calm and somehow motionless. The birds aren’t singing. The bees aren’t pollinating. The bugs are hiding under thick patches of uncut grass.

The only thing that can be heard at all is the sound of my shutter firing off, shot after shot, trying to get something worth being there for.

May 26th, 2016
Day 147

storm rolls in
sun’s blotted
playoff basketball
broadcast on a glowing
box from central
california
65–61
warriors over
the thunder
midway through
the third.

May 27th, 2016
Day 148

I bought a new phone that happens to have a couple incredibly impressive cameras built inside them (The LG G5). I decided I would take photos throughout the day and compile them for a cheat day with this project. I know the project is called, “A Photo A Day For A Year” and not, “A Photo Per Day But Sometimes A Collage For A Year”, but that’s not exactly the catchiest name in the world, now is it?

I think it turned out pretty cool. Not something I’m going to make a habit of doing for this, but every once in a while is okay. The only photos that didn’t come from the LG G5 are the two larger long exposures of the storms rolling through. Those were shot with my Canon 5D Mark III.

May 28th, 2016
Day 149

A friend of mine owns a thrift store in town and she allowed me to borrow some of her creepy toys for an impromptu shoot today. I found a rusty nail outside of an empty building and stumbled into my photo of the day.

I really love when things just work out like that.

May 29th, 2016
Day 150

Both of my dad’s parents were left-handed. I’ve tried to comprehend the statistical anomaly of that happening at all (my grandparent’s generation especially as the majority of lefties were forced to become right-handed as children), and the coincidence just blows my mind.

Neither my dad nor my uncle is left handed. None of my cousins are left handed. My brother isn’t and neither is my sister. I can’t say for certain, but I don’t believe there is any living Quackenbush that is left-handed either. In my entire family tree, I’m the only one (so far) that inherited the left-handed traits of my grandparents.

When I was a kid, I bought into the myth that lefties were more creative. I was also told on a few occasions that my left-handedness was responsible for my introversion and desire to be left alone. None of these things turned out to be true, of course, but I do wonder how much the myth reinforced my personality from a young age. For example, if the myth was that lefties were generally less intelligent, less creative, but instead more outgoing and extroverted, would my personality have molded itself to reflect that? Would I feel more peaceful around people than sitting here in my little box of a room? Would I bother trying to be creative at all? How much of my mentalities were built around some silly thing I was told as a child? Certainly, at least a little bit. There has to be some sort of bridge between then and now.

I used to write poems and read them to my grandma Weber. She used to tell me that I wrote because I was left-handed. She said that’s what made her enjoy writing poetry. I often took her words as gospel and never even considered the possibility that my creativity and love for literature had next-to-nothing to do with the hand that penned the words. And I became the wiser for it. Isn’t that strange?

I guess when it comes right down to it, it doesn’t really matter if those things were just silly wive’s tales. Sometimes, a myth ends up becoming more valid than any truth that stands up next to it. And it certainly made me feel a greater sense of connection to my grandparents, you know, to be the only one that got those genes.

Out of all of us, it was only me. And them.

May 30th, 2016
Day 151

The thunder stays at a respectable distance like a scared dog that just ate a tee shirt.

May 31st, 2016
Day 152

The end of a long month. A tic lodged himself on the outside of my sock at some point during this shoot. I flicked him away and then burned him alive for safe measure.

June 1st, 2016
Day 153

I truly did not think that I was going to get anything worth editing today. Thankfully, I have a girlfriend that finds uses for things laying around our house and that always leaves me with surprises when I’m already burning the midnight oil.

June 2nd, 2016
Day 154

I was side-eyed pretty heavily to get this shot. These people are strangely private, despite having the contents of an entire kitchen and then a few center pieces of a living room set sitting in their overgrown yard.

June 3rd, 2016
Day 155

I decided to take part in a statewide photo project where photographers from all 99 counties in photos shot around their town all for today. I took the spot for my town and decided to do something a little different and photograph local business owners. This is William from The Collectors Store in Fairfield, Iowa.

June 4th, 2016
Day 156

the air conditioner waited
until June to die, one last
grand gesture of spite for
being overworked
and I’d like to get angry
with him but there’s at least a part
of me that wishes I
had the same
testicular
fortitude
as he
did.

June 5th, 2016
Day 157

Making the most out of not being able to be in my convection oven of a house. Had a really couple fantastic shoots this weekend, this being the culmination of those efforts. I’m glad I’m getting back into creative photography and not just trying to get perfect compositions with tick-tack sharp focus.

I wasn’t sure how these were going to turn out because we ended up in a lake with the most direct sunlight possible. But it actually added so much to the results. Very happy with them.

June 6th, 2016
Day 158

The quickest route to the heart
is through the meat
the safest is through the mouth
but it’s rife with politics in there
and ideology, beliefs rooted in
the shallowest of soil
the dullest of pathways
et cetera and so on

and when you do climb in
if you even make it that far
you might miss the
heart entirely, end
up somewhere in the
lower intestines and
become shit
in the
process

the quickest route to the heart
is through the meat
the space between the
prison of a rib cage
where the birds no
longer sing and the skeletons
of before are rotting
in the space between
the never and the
now.

You would be surprised how often
they are one in the same
you know

The quickest route to the heart
is through the
meat

it’s not the most practical way
but it is the most
effective.

June 7th, 2016
Day 159

It’s amazing how much easier it is to leave my house with a broken air conditioner. I’ve been getting more done than ever.

June 8th, 2016
Day 160

As a child, I must have walked to this laundromat five thousand times or more. It was the closest location relative to my house that had a couple vending machines. So many quarters were wasted inside this little, overheated yellow room over the years.

When we drove by it today, something compelled me to stop inside. The exterior looked so different than I remembered it, the vibrant seafoam painted an unappealing, sterile white. The indefinable, seemingly random car vacuum gutted and painted white as well to hide its very existence at all. Even the sidewalks leading up to the door seemed to be a different color than the one my memory paints.

It was such a nice feeling to walk into that familiar yellow room with the familiar decor and the familiar hand-painted warnings about climbing into the dryers. Even the baskets were the same. For a brief moment, I felt like I was at home again.

And that’s a rare feeling that just doesn’t come around very often.

June 9th, 2016
Day 161

Found myself in a dirty creek with a friend of mine. Shoot turned out great and my shower afterward was ten times as thorough as it normally is.

June 10th, 2016
Day 162

garbage day
i’m sorry for the
death of your
furry friend

and i wish i
shared the
sadness
so you
weren’t
feeling it
all on your
lonesome

but i learned long
ago to never
let myself
get too
close.

i love you
though
because
you
didn’t.

June 11th, 2016
Day 163

Accomplished a pretty stellar shoot at high ISO’s and even higher temperatures as the sun descended lower and lower below the earth.

June 12th, 2016
Day 164

I was driving in the car toward Missouri to stock up on smoke bombs for photo-shoots and was listening to the NPR coverage of the Orlando mass shooting. They interviewed a guy whose husband was shot in the back and killed instantly. The man’s voice was quivering, sad to hear from my end, yet totally emotionless from his. I had to pull to the side of the road and sit in silence for a few minutes after it concluded. The poor guy watched his husband die, watched his friends die, and sounded like he had completely lost the will to keep living himself. Survivor’s guilt is something I can’t even pretend to understand, so I won’t, but I’m pretty damn confident that this man was experiencing it. I was listening to the words of a ghost. It was heartbreaking and I felt like crying for him.

I held it together and kept driving on down the interstate, wondering if anything was ever going to change in this violent, dangerous place.

Probably not, I thought. But what can you really do? You just keep going and hope you don’t find yourself in the wrong place at the right time. There’s no rhyme or reason to any of this. And no conclusion in sight.

June 13th, 2016
Day 165

Spent my day doing a commercial photo shoot for a local masseuse in town. It was quite an undertaking, so I didn’t have any free time to shoot much else. By the time I was finished processing these, the sun had already disappeared almost completely.

And to be honest, I didn’t really have it in me to shoot anything else anyway. Some days are like that.

June 14th, 2016
Day 166

Doing a lot of water shoots lately, but I figure I might as well while I still have the weather for it.

When I edit photos while listening to Bob Ross paint, my images end up vastly more colorful than they normally do. Hearing him talk about creating your own little worlds where everything is exactly the way you want them to be is just so inspiring and calming to me. Makes me want to try different techniques.

June 15th, 2016
Day 167

Spent sun up to sun down working all over the state of Iowa. Had an idea I wanted to play with when I got home, but it was already night by the time I was finished. It’ll have to wait until tomorrow.

June 16th, 2016
Day 168

Stay weird.

June 17th, 2016
Day 169

Lit one too many smoke bombs in my garage. Ended up with red eyes, a numb mouth, and this picture.

June 18th, 2016
Day 170

My lovely girlfriend graduated from college today. It was really great to see her finish and accomplish something that she really put her mind to.

Her family came down from Michigan for the event and I got to see her grandma Barb (one of the coolest ladies I know). She doubled in coolness when I noticed she’d brought along a little disposable camera. I didn’t even know that they still made those things.

June 19th, 2016
Day 171

Things I love doing: traveling to take photos of cool people.

Things I don’t love: My car’s air-conditioner no longer functioning on my way to said photo shoots.

June 20th, 2016
Day 172

Today, my girlfriend bought me the coolest pair of shoes I will ever own.

June 21st, 2016
Day 173

The last car that was ever in my name was a brown 1983 Dodge Diplomat. I owned her for the summer of 2010 until I impulsively decided to start couch surfing all around the country in the winter of that year (bad timing on my part, but that’s a story for a different day). I sold it to a friend of mine for an even better deal than the one that was given to me but, at least in my own head, I didn’t care about that much. There would be other times, certainly other cars, but for a while I just wanted to adventure freely and not find myself encumbered by the upkeep of an old car. And, to further confound my mental state, I was already associating the big brown beast with people that I didn’t want to think about. I do that a lot; associate inanimate objects with human beings and give them way more influence than they would possibly obtain otherwise. So I did what any other mentally unstable person would do. I cut all my hair off, sold the car, and I left with nothing but a camera bag full of clothes.

Looking back, I would have appreciated these moments more if I’d known it at the time, but this decision would end up being the last time I would ever walk out of my childhood home. I left all my stuff in there and let the new owners deal with it. As far as I was concerned, that stuff didn’t matter to me anyway. There would be future stuff and there was already present stuff to obsess over. All the other junk seemed like trash already. Let it go. That’s what I told myself for a very long time. Embrace minimalism. Avoid clutter. Don’t look backward and don’t plan ahead. Nostalgia was a liar and the future was an arrogant assumption. All that nonsense that I mostly still believe in (though I don’t practice it as fervently these days).

Here’s the thing about that, though. Those other cars didn’t come to me like I initially thought that they would. My hair grew back. I bought new stuff. Worst of all, those future times took the long way around in reaching me. It would be nearly seven long years before I would have another car in my name. Countless address changes, lifestyles, girlfriends, and me peppering myself all around the lower continental United States like some kind of permanent tourist.

And though I’ve already been driving the old Taurus around for a while now, it was just yesterday that I was able to put it in my name. Walking into the courthouse, I was overcome with this odd combination of relief and indigestion. My stomach was aching, my mouth was dry, and I was absolutely ready to get this over with.

It took me finding the right person and the right circumstances surrounding them for me to obtain even a modicum of normalcy. It’s been a long time since I found myself on the fringes, and though I still identify with the mentalities of before, the only practice I continue is not looking back too far.

It feels weird to have a car all of my own again. And it’s not like I got it due to hard work or anything like that. Because I didn’t. I only own Betsy today because my girlfriend was selfless enough to give it to me rather than sell it for a couple grand (which she totally could have done). That’s not to say that I don’t work hard, I do, but getting this car was almost despite of that. 99% of the good things in my life were not obtained through any measurable goal or statistic. I simply got lucky.

And luck feels just as good as a hard day’s work. Trust me, I live through both of them on the regular. And in the heart of transparency, I must admit: I think I might even prefer luck.

June 22nd, 2016
Day 174

Heat index was 105 degrees Fahrenheit today. I did my quickest photo shoot ever in an even hotter garage, timing in at just under forty-five seconds flat.

June 23rd, 2016
Day 175

Last week was all about water and this week has been all about the smoke.

June 24th, 2016
Day 176

I met Charlie when I was just eleven years old (he was ten) and we’ve remained pretty close through the years.

He was the first person I ever made music with, the first person I ever drew comics with, and the first person I ever wrote stories with.

Some of my favorite memories as a child have this dude in them and I’m happy to still know him and even happier that he still makes art.

June 25th, 2016
Day 177

Continued work for Forgotten Iowa. Found the fallen skeleton of this barn in Mount Auburn.

June 26th, 2016
Day 178

“Iowa became a State in 1846, but sadly, by 1861 the War Between the States had erupted. Like many small towns through out Iowa, Norway sent many of its sons off to fight in that war; it was there that they learned about the game of baseball from soldiers from the State of New York, where the game had its beginnings around 1840. When Norway’s veterans returned home, they quickly taught the game of baseball to family, friends and neighbors… and so began Norway’s long time “love affair” with the game of baseball.”

June 27th, 2016
Day 179

Juggling about twenty different tasks today. There are so many trees in my backyard that I can always find a squirrel or two when all else fails, though. That’s been my go-to whenever I lack inspiration or ideas.

June 28th, 2016
Day 180

Probably my last water-based shoot for a while. Better to go out with a bang than with a whimper.

June 29th, 2016
Day 181

B-Roll photo from a 4th of July shoot I did today.

June 30th, 2016
Day 182

I woke up to these fantastic cloud formations hanging over the landscape like bad news. It was good news for me, though , and I hit the county roads for some lazy morning shooting.

July 1st, 2016
Day 183

Was up at 5 AM for a long drive to Missouri for a colorful wedding. Really need to get the A/C in my car fixed.

July 2nd, 2016
Day 184

Rainy, cold day in July. Did my first job as a second shooter for a wedding ceremony and didn’t have a lot of daylight left to play with when I was done working. Kind of just wandered around the damp puddles of my backyard.

July 3rd, 2016
Day 185

I haven’t had a day off in nearly four months, so I was really looking forward to this particular Sunday morning. No work, no responsibilities; I wasn’t needed anywhere for anything. It was going to be beautiful to finally sleep in. I’m not overstating it, either, the concept alone was the only catalyst to see me through my entire work week.

It was naturally a little confounding, then, to find myself awake and out of bed at 6:35 this morning. Why was I awake? It was as philosophically bankrupt as it was perpetually aggravating, so I decided that the only thing that actually did make sense that early in the morning was to make an event out of it. The clouds were still hanging low in the sky from the day before, lazily making their way through the midwest and stopping in every residential pocket along the way. A thick blanket of warm rain was about to coat the entire landscape, that much was for certain, but I’d woken up before it was ready to fall. And since I was up and I was ready to do something, by seven AM I hit the county roads with a reckless abandon.

One of my favorite things to do in this world is to just get lost for a little while. I turn my cell phone off, throw a CD on in ol’ Betsy, and just enjoy the solitude. When you drive long enough and far enough down these county roads, you can begin to feel like the only person alive in the entire universe. There are no other sounds besides the ones your feet make as they crack the dead branches below your feet. No human beings in overpowered vehicles. If you get out of your car and walk through the woods, you’ll find that the trees block the wind enough that you even avoid it almost entirely, too. There’s truly nothing more instantaneously gratifying than the moment that you know you are far, far away from everything and everybody else.

I walked around for what seemed like an entire day but was really closer to three hours or so. I snapped photos to my heart’s content. And you know what? I think this morning ended up being more refreshing to my soul than sleeping in would have ever been to my body. I’ll sleep in when I’m old.

For now, give me the adventure.

July 4th, 2016
Day 186

Hung out with my family for the 4th of July. Realized pretty fast that I need to see them more often than I presently do.

July 5th, 2016
Day 187

I suppose it’s impossible to find people and think up concepts every single day of the year. When all else fails, there’s always the squirrels in my yard.

I stood out there a little longer than normal today, though. The humidity has come back in full-force and it took about forty-five minutes to defog the lens entirely. Luckily, I sat still enough that I didn’t scare the little guys off.

July 6th, 2016
Day 188

Invested in a drone. Pretty sure I’m going to be obsessed with this for the foreseeable future.

July 7th, 2016
Day 189

I am fairly confident that nobody have ever taken a photo from this vantage point in my hometown of Keokuk, Iowa facing Hamilton, Illinois.

In love with this drone so far.

July 8th, 2016
Day 190

I’ve been working
on closing my wounds.
Those you can see
are the easiest
to heal.

It’s the ones that
you can’t
that are
tricky.

July 9th, 2016
Day 191

I made a mini-documentary today. You can check it out here.

July 10th, 2016
Day 192

Woke up. Watched the rain come in. Worked. That’s about it.

July 11th, 2016
Day 193

I’m only using this photo for my Picture of the Day because I almost lost my drone trying to get it.

I flew it up dangerously high in a moment of brazen behavior that I don’t typically exhibit. I lost sight of it, then I lost the ability to control it via the remote and it just took off until I couldn’t even hear it anymore. Luckily, after pressing the HOME button about two-hundred times, it started to reroute itself.

July 12th, 2016
Day 194

I’m having an awful day. Ripped a hangnail off my foot and now it hurts to walk. Thought wearing my boots would protect it a little, but all it’s done is make them incredibly sweaty.

Had my first commercial drone gig today, but all I could think about while flying it was how shitty I felt. And not just my toe or my sweating feet either. I’m just emotionally and physically exhausted. Beat up. Financially, this year has been very kind to me. But I’ve suffered personally and feel just so absolutely restless. I keep trudging through, though, because nobody really gives a shit anyway unless I suddenly stop, and then they only seem to care because my output has decreased and not because I’m going through some heavy shit internally. I’m more machine than man. And less man than boy. And less boy than machine. You see? I’m a computer. My fan is clogged with excess dust. I’m overheated. Blah blah blah blah blah blah.

It’s true, though. My heart is heavy and my head is swollen. I find it hard to catch my breath. I’m chain smoking like I just discovered that the world is about to end thanks to a giant meteor or like God peered his head through the clouds and warned us all of another epic flood. What’s it matter anyway? There’s just as big of a chance of a meteor striking the earth as there is of God existing at all. No, we’re just worms in the topsoil. Ants on a popsicle stick. No guidance. No nothing.

So I’ll smoke until my heart’s content, which is probably never. The void grows. I keep hanging on, waiting for the meteor. Waiting for God. And getting neither one.

July 13th, 2016
Day 195

I have been shooting more than just drone photos lately, but these are still the most interesting ones to me. I’m going to try to not use my drone for this project for the rest of the week, but it’s a whole lot of fun to just deny myself of.

July 14th, 2016
Day 196

Long ago, back before I was ever known as the dude that took photos, I was kind of known as the kid that played the drums. It’s what I crafted my entire identity around. I was neurotic about it, too, and would practice and practice and practice until the skin on my hands would rip and bleed all over my drum sticks. Even today, some of my favorite memories are the ones where my dad would take me from bar to bar, convincing the traveling bands to allow me a chance to jam with them for a song. I loved the attention. I reveled in it.

And I didn’t want to be anything else. In a sixth grade English class, we had to write a paper about what we envisioned our futures to be like. It seemed that most everybody’s expectations were deeply rooted in reality (something that was profoundly troubling to me, even back then). Some wanted to be doctors. Some wanted to be electricians or nurses or plumbers or cops. I couldn’t ever imagine that kind of life for myself. All I wanted to be was a professional musician. It was rock star or bust for me, at least the way that I saw it, and I would either reap the rewards that came with a lot of luck or suffer in a cardboard box. Either reality was okay with me. If things got too rough, I could always learn how to play the drums on pots and pans. I could beg for change and entertain people even with the barest of essentials. That was fine for me. And so that’s what I wrote about. I remember getting an A on the paper (and my grandma Weber even kept it in her hutch for the rest of her life), but everybody strongly encouraged me to have a Plan B just in case it didn’t work out.

Nonsense! I thought. Plan B’s are for people that don’t believe in themselves!

By the time I hit my twenties, that dream was still alive; but it was starting to dull a little. What once shined as bright as any star had been tempered to a faint glimmer like a low-hanging moon over a shallow pond. I was hopping in and out of bands, playing music that I wouldn’t have ever listened to if I wasn’t creating it. Punk rock, Hardcore, Screamo, Alternative, a little bit of lo-fi Garage Rock and a hint of Progressive Metal here and there. I was trying everything on for size and hoping that something would eventually stick. Meanwhile, I began to fall in love with genres that didn’t even feature drums. I started listening to Woodie Gutherie and Elliott Smith. Then I discovered hip-hop that was intellectually stimulating and by the time I started listening to Eyedea and Abilities, my love for percussion had all but dried up. The light was gone out of my life.

I didn’t know what to do about that. This was my entire identity. Being a musician was not only how others saw me, it was how I saw myself. This time was a terribly lonely one. I traversed through life trying to stumble back into the feeling. That’s the thing about falling out of love, though, I suppose. Once it’s gone, it’s just gone. No goodbyes. No grand speeches. It’s just gone. There’s no getting it back, and even if you do, it doesn’t feel the same as it did the first go around the sun. And even though you know that fact, it doesn’t stop you from trying.

And I’m nothing if not stubborn. I spent the next couple years hopping in and out of bands with increasing regularity, exercising futility in a way that I never had before. I knew I wasn’t enjoying it anymore, but I kept on doing it because it was the only thing that I knew to do. I was suddenly jealous of my musician friends that still had a legitimate affection for the craft. The ones that still loved writing songs and playing shows. I was dead inside. Nothing affected me quite like not being affected did. It was awful.

Eventually I discovered the courage to step away from it. It was very hard on my spirit, in truth, but it was healthy. I was unchained and free to be things that I’d never even considered in all my years prior. This happened to align itself with me starting to find myself photographically. And the rest is history.

I always fear that the same thing will eventually happen to me with this, too. I never could find a way to make a dent musically. My writing has been a narrow one-way road from the very beginning. Never made a dime with a pen and only made a few with some sticks. Photography has been the only thing that has worked. And, in many ways, it is probably my last hurrah artistically. It’s not a rock star lifestyle by any stretch of the imagination, but I have a passion for it that has not faded with time. That’s ten-thousand percent more important than any accolade or having groupies in every major city across the continental United States. Passion is all there is. Without it, what are you?

Nothing. That’s what.

Still, though. What if? What if I lose the heart? What if I have to go through that whole thing again? It’s something that I seriously contemplate and mull over an obsessive, unhealthy amount. I would like to consider myself an artist first. After all, it’s the only thing that I’ve ever been good at. It’s the only thing that’s ever made sense to me in world where very little seems to. But if everything is truly just a matter of time, then how long before I lose this too?

And where would I go from here? Nothing is more terrifying to me than the idea of being a forty-something that has no valuable life skills. In the heart of transparency, I must admit that outside of this realm, I am totally useless. I offer nothing else. I am a one-trick pony in every sense of the word. I can make things and that’s all. That’s it.

There are evenings like this one where the thought is particularly pointed, and it always happens for no particular reason and out of thin air. I’ll be having an otherwise enjoyable day and then BAM! Existential dread. For hours afterward, I just wallow about all the nooks and crannies that I could eventually find myself in, all the ones that aren’t artistic or creative at all. I scare myself to death with it.

What I’ve been trying to do in moments like these is, instead of getting too upset with the potential of tomorrow, I relish in the actuality of the right now. As it is, right here today, I am still in love with the craft. I am still obsessive about getting better. I still want to maximize my potential. The light is still flickering. It’s still bright. It’s still warm. My grandmother used to tell me that planning too far ahead was proof of man’s arrogance anyway. We aren’t promised tomorrow, we aren’t guaranteed even another minute. So why dread?

Right now is all we have. It’s all I have, anyway, and it’s the only thing that pulls me away from that tall, tall cliff of normalcy.

I choose to live there.

July 15th, 2016
Day 197

Spent my Friday working all day and ended up in Iowa City for dinner. Found a few extra smoke bombs in my desk and decided to put them to good use.

July 16th, 2016
Day 198

One of my acoustic guitars fell over the other day and the neck snapped in two. The only thing that I could think of doing was sending her out in a blaze of glory. For a cheap guitar, it took several good whacks before it finally gave way and broke.

July 17th, 2016
Day 199

Every week is beautiful.
Every weekend is soggy.
It’s like I can see the future.

July 18th, 2016
Day 200

Excessive heat warning = not a whole lot going on with me today.

July 19th, 2016
Day 201

The greatest thing I’ve learned from this project is how much the style of my work is influenced by the fluctuation of my moods. I’ve been feeling pretty emotionally detached this week and my photos have all looked very esoteric and detached as a result. It’s fun to watch the feeling evolve.

July 20th, 2016
Day 202

“HOT AND HUMID CONDITIONS DEVELOPING ACROSS THE PLAINS AND MIDWEST ARE FORECAST TO GRADUALLY SHIFT EASTWARD THROUGH THE END OF THIS WEEK. PEAK HEAT INDICES NEAR 110 DEGREES WILL MAKE FOR OPPRESSIVE OUTDOOR CONDITIONS AND AN ELEVATED RISK FOR HEAT EXHAUSTION.”

July 21st, 2016
Day 203

Summer is packing quite a punch, man. Heat index was 113 degrees today.

July 22nd, 2016
Day 204

My girlfriend drew a portrait of me. I love it.

July 23rd, 2016
Day 205

Shot a beautiful wedding today. What you can’t see from this photo: the sweltering 110 degree heat that blanketed the entire day and decided to stick around even through the evening.

Still, a wonderful event. Got to collaborate with my buddy Canyon McCarty on it.

July 24th, 2016
Day 206

Six years ago today, I lost my grandmother to cancer. She was only sixty-seven years old, and even though we all had roughly a year to prepare for her to shuffle off the mortal coil onward to that great white abyss, it still hit me like a stack of bricks from the sky.

Her name was Carol Joy, born on Christmas Day, 1942, and named by a group of hospital nuns in Keokuk, Iowa. She was premature and wasn’t expected to make it through to 1943, but nobody knew how much of a fighter that woman was and even fewer knew how stubborn and strong-willed she would later become. Not only would she survive, but she would live a life that made it seem like her middle name wasn’t even given to her, and that the feeling itself was defined by who she was and what she gave to people.

My grandpa Weber and grandma would meet when she was just a teenager. Gramps became her protector, her chauffeur, and would eventually fall head over heels in love (much to my grandma’s annoyance). She had friend-zoned Jerry hard and they both knew it. C’est la vie, my grandpa probably thought. He was enlisted into the military and spent a tour overseas obsessed with the thought that my grandma would fall for somebody else. It ate at him so much that he concocted a huge lie in one last attempt to win my grandma over. And he delivered it with moxie. “They say I need a wife and if I don’t have one, they’ll throw me in the brig. Won’t you be my wife, Carol Joy?”

They were married shortly after. When my grandma would recollect on that story with all her grandchildren huddled around the kitchen table, she would smile and laugh at how much it embarrassed my grandpa. “Well, that’s what you did, Bud!” She’d say, my grandpa’s hands turned white flag as they waved in the air. “It was cute.” She’d say.

A few years later, my uncle came along and then my father. Fast-forward twenty-four years after that and I came into the picture. Carol Joy would play a monumental role in my life from the moment I was pushed into existence. She taught me how to tie my shoes. She taught me about syntax and grammatical consistency. She embraced my love for art and would always have some new garage-sale find for me to play with and learn on. Once, after she saw that I was reading an old issue of National Geographic magazine, she took me to the Salvation Army and pointed out six entire years worth of issues. “Grab a cart and load ’em up.” I always look back on this memory as one of the happiest moments of my life. When we got back to her house, she helped me load them into a bookshelf on the porch. My grandpa thought she was crazy for buying hundreds of old magazines. “Cody likes them” was the only thing my grandma knew, though, and it seemed totally rational to her. I don’t think I ever completely read through every issue, but I made a huge dent. And I learned a whole lot about aboriginal tribesmen, sharks, the immensity of the universe, and so much more. My brain is packed full of mostly useless trivia and at least half of it comes from those magazines and the discussions we would have after the fact.

I miss her. When she died, I lost the person that I went to for guidance, and I went through a few years there making just the worst fucking decisions. Those years continue to haunt me, even now, and it sucks especially hard because I know my grandma would have pointed me in the right direction before I ever even made that first one. Instead, without her wisdom, I took one wrong turn after the last and ended up in a place where nothing looked familiar anymore. I was 119 pounds of skin and bone, riddled with anxiety and thin bullet-holes of depression. I self-medicated. I became an addict. I didn’t look like myself anymore.

Around 2012 or so, I decided to start living my life differently. I figured I could at least predict what my grandma Weber would tell me, how she would expect me to act, and what I SHOULD BE doing. Wow. What a difference that made. I’ve become infinitely more responsible, more empathetic, braver and more confident. I threw my pill bottles away. I quit drinking. I made a conscious decision to change. When I am overworked and feel like throwing in the towel, I remember all those mornings when she would be over at my house getting me ready for school. I remember how calloused her hands were as she peeled potatoes for lunch. And then I keep pushing through. We’re all so much stronger than we will ever give ourselves credit for. And grandma Weber taught me that.

In that way, she’s still alive. She’s alive in my thoughts, in my heart, and in the stories that I routinely tell about her. Every time I put a comma in the right place, there she is. Every time I write a poem, she’s there. She’s with me forever. In every good part of me, in every artistic gene, there she is. Watering them.

I have saved the last birthday card she ever got me, on my 21st birthday, in September of 2009. She had just been diagnosed after months of complaining about intense back-pains. We all knew that her life suddenly had an expiration date. But she refused to accept that (as she’d already beaten cancer in the past), and fought like hell until the very end. On the day she died, I watched them wheel her out from the old rock throwing hill. I didn’t cry just then, but I felt a sudden void that I knew would never heal. She was gone. I threw a few rocks into the quarry and listened to the birds. They sounded sad, too.

On Christmas day of 2012, what would have been her 69th birthday, I woke up with this card draped open across my face. It fell off the wall somehow and landed gently enough to not wake me.

“Happy Birthday, grandma Web.” I said, kissed the card, and then hung it back up. There she is. There she was. And there she will always be.

July 25th, 2016
Day 207

I realized at work today that my hair is officially long. Feeling pretty good about that.

July 26th, 2016
Day 208

I used to live down this street. Probably drove past this old abandoned factory over two-hundred times and always wanted to photograph it. Some things are just always on the way, I guess, and it never happened.

I worked all day today and was exhausted by the time I got off. I saw a pile of bricks a couple blocks away from our house and something told me that today was the day.

July 27th, 2016
Day 209

My girlfriend always talks about moving to a major metropolitan area someday and it’s fun to entertain the idea. But then we make a trip to Iowa City and I find myself completely overwhelmed by the constant, obnoxious barrage of external stimuli. I can’t get used to all the people, all the cars, the buildings that seem to suffocate the otherwise tranquil and airy landscape. I feel the need to reiterate: I feel this way in Iowa-fuckin’-City. It’s a relatively quaint city (especially comparatively) and you can be back to the familiar cornfields in less than fifteen minutes no matter where you are in the city.

I like to imagine that I’d eventually get used to it, maybe even find things that I actually enjoyed. But there is no feeling more relaxing than that first exit back to the interstate. And I don’t think that’s something I could ever force myself to forget.

July 28th, 2016
Day 210

We converted a crappy painting into a chalkboard for my niece. I’d say she likes it.

July 29th, 2016
Day 211

Made it to Waterloo, Iowa in Black Hawk County for another weekend hard at work with Forgotten Iowa. We ate at this restaurant with a French waiter that wouldn’t stop talking to us about the dangers of GMO’s. Dude just wouldn’t stop.

July 30th, 2016
Day 212

Forgotten Iowa days are always the hardest to pinpoint a specific photo for this project. I shot nearly 4,000 photos yesterday. I like this one a lot. Shot in Washburn, IA.

July 31st, 2016
Day 213

176 MILES TO E
133,997 MILES
MOVING SOUTHWARD

August 1st, 2016
Day 214

My favorite frame from a shoot I did at Lake Darling in Washington, Iowa late this evening.

August 2nd, 2016
Day 215

What a long day. Woke up early to shoot some commercial whiteboard photos for a company. Had to take my camera in all the way to Iowa City to get its first thorough cleaning after that and realized about halfway there that I didn’t pack a card for the trip. So Iowa City was a total bust beyond that. But the camera came back to me in like-new condition, so there’s at least that.

I just don’t have a lot of energy after everything. Went on a little walk looking for wildlife or something, anything really, to photograph. The best I found was a leftover puddle from a day that couldn’t decide whether it wanted storm-clouds or sunshine and settling for a little bit of both.

And so I settled, too. Some days you don’t have much of a choice.

August 3rd, 2016
Day 216

I got a gig from the city doing some aerial photos. This is my favorite frame from that shoot.

August 4th, 2016
Day 217

I have done nothing but work from the moment I woke up until just now. Was truly skeptical about whether or not I would even get something shot today that wasn’t work-related.

It started storming at the perfect time. I want to kiss the man that invented weather-sealing right on the mouth. My camera survives thanks to him.

August 5th, 2016
Day 218

A trip to Iowa City for dinner and then some urban exploring to settle the stomach.

August 6th, 2016
Day 219

My little brother Jake came up to spend the weekend with me. Quality brother bonding time!

August 7th, 2016
Day 220

Happy 52nd birthday to my dad! Anybody that knows this dude knows exactly how selfless and caring he is and there’s no way I could put into words the extent of those characteristics. If you see him out and about today, make sure to wish him a good one. Dude deserves the world. Wouldn’t trade him for any other human on the planet.

August 8th, 2016
Day 221

Right place, right time.

August 9th, 2016
Day 222

swimming in it and toward it
and inching closer
one way
or another
and another
and another.

August 10th, 2016
Day 223

Had a quick evening shoot in Vedic City, Iowa tonight. I really like using this location and always find myself wondering what the hell that town intended it to be before abandoning it.

August 11th, 2016
Day 224

Football season has returned.
It’s 97 degrees and there are
storms heading my way, and
there are leaves that have
already given up entirely.

There’s a part of me, at least,
that wishes I were
them.

August 12th, 2016
Day 225

Was walking around trying to defog my camera lens when I saw this lone leaf being illuminated by the setting sun. Lifesaver, I thought, because there wasn’t much else around today. I sat and breathed into the glass, gently wiped the foggy smudges from the lens, and crossed my fingers that a stray cloud wouldn’t come in in the meantime and ruin the shot.

It didn’t.

August 13th, 2016
Day 226

Traveled all the way down to southern Missouri to photograph my first same-sex marriage. It did not disappoint.

August 14th, 2016
Day 227

It was a long seven-and-a-half-hour drive home. Somebody stapled these flyers on every tree in my neighborhood. Hope they reunite the pup with its owner. Unless he’s a piece of shit and the dog ran away because of that (which I always suspect to be a strong possibility). If that’s the case, I hope he never goes back and the guy that cared enough to hang these up also cares enough to take him in.

August 15th, 2016
Day 228

My dad started staying at a girlfriend’s house around the time that I turned fifteen or so. This gave me complete and total access to the house as I saw fit, and naturally, it turned into a fucking disaster real fast. It started off with photo-shoots in the living room. After a few of those, there were red stains embedded deep into the wood from all the fake blood drying and coagulating for days until somebody (probably not me) decided it would be a good idea to clean it. After a while, the whole house started to look like an active crime scene. When my dad decided to remodel the house in 2008, I suddenly found myself without a place to push my creativity. I loved the idea of having lush carpets and new couches, but I almost hated the idea of losing the chaotic mess just as much. It was gross, sure, but it was my gross. Still, come May of that year, and I lost access to it forever.

The Dungeon, 2009

That’s when I turned to the Dungeon. At one time, it was just a little hole in the ground that my family would run to when the Tornado sirens went off (which they seemed to do three — four times every year), but it quickly became my sanctuary; a brand new place to test stuff out. And my dad didn’t seem to give a shit either, so we used it a lot. There were entire walls caked in fake blood, powder, spray-paint, and anything else that we might have had laying around the house at that time. And I loved the hell out of it. To this day, I remember the smell that would hit you like a truck the moment that you opened that door. You would make your way down the stairs (also caked in different kinds of acrylic paint and Karo syrup that your feet would stick to) and enter into a place that looked straight out of a serial killer’s wet dream. I’ve never had anything like it since and I strongly doubt I will again. There was a brief moment today when I was working on this photo where I felt that same frantic energy that I used to regularly feel back then. It was like an old friend showed up unexpectedly or something and it was nice to see him. But then, just like that, he was gone. It was a really heavy feeling.

It’s definitely a double-edged sword and there were a multitude of health issues that arose from it almost instantly. A common element to some of my early conceptual shoots was flour. I’d lather it all over a subject’s body and shoot rapidly as they shook the dust off. It created a cool effect and I couldn’t seem to get enough of it. I probably went through fifty bags of flour in less than three months. It never occurred to me to actually clean the mess up afterward, though, and I had a weird interest in seeing the shoots down there blend together anyway. Naturally, the flour molded and eventually the entire dungeon was covered in this thick, furry green substance. And we just stopped shooting down there around that same time. Chalk it up to a loss, I thought.

That mold reeked havoc on me, though, man. I was wheezing and hacking up large strands of phlegm that would stick to the back of my throat. My asthma was at its all-time worst around that time, and my skin would routinely break out in these weird hive-like bumps that I never saw a doctor for (when I moved out, they went away). I was literally living on top of my own disaster for the better part of three years. I was so consumed in my own self-hatred back then that I never drew a connection between the basement and my health issues. Honestly, I felt like I was sick because my brain was sick and it was manifesting in these new and strange ways. The basement never even entered my thoughts. It just sat down there the same as ever, thick pockets of mold taking over the entire place.

When I remember that, I don’t miss the dungeon as much. And I think that’s a pretty apt description for most things that have come and gone in my life. I get so wrapped up in the right-now that I often don’t think to clean my messes. Real or imagined, it’s all the same, really. And when you let stuff fester like that, you’re bound to get sick from it.

I paid the price enough to have hopefully learned something from it all. That’d be progress on a base level, right? It’s something.

August 16th, 2016
Day 229

Once every couple years, all my clothes seem to hitch a grand idea and run away together. I discovered that this had happened yet again while trying to do my laundry last night. What once was an extensive collection of ratty t-shirts, stained jeans, and the like had suddenly dwindled to about four t-shirts and two pairs of pants (both missing the button).

Decided to bite the bullet and invest in some new clothes today. Felt good. Feels good.

August 17th, 2016
Day 230

A coworker and friend of mine prepping some clothes in the trenches.

August 18th, 2016
Day 231

I must have walked seven miles watching the storm roll on in. It was nice.

August 19th, 2016
Day 232

Kat’s finally home from her Lasik surgery and her eyes are temporarily super crazy looking.

August 20th, 2016
Day 233

Hanging out with my buddy Joel tonight. He’s having a rough one, so we’re just chilling.

August 21st, 2016
Day 234

Just another afternoon in Iowa City.

August 22nd, 2016
Day 235

Weather has been wonderful. Mood has been not.

August 23rd, 2016
Day 236

Today, I found out that my main job has an expiration date and now I am questioning if I really want to stay in this town.

August 24th, 2016
Day 237

As my time at my job comes to a close, my mind has wandered to the inevitable. Where do I go from here? School? Travel? What’s next? I’m anxious about all of it.

August 25th, 2016
Day 238

The worst feeling in the world to me is when I feel like I am wasting my energy doing futile things. Hard to get excited professionally when it all seems pretty hopeless.

August 26th, 2016
Day 239

Traveled three hours north to continue work on Forgotten Iowa this weekend. It seems like it’s raining every time I pick a day to do it.

C’est La Vie.

August 27th, 2016
Day 240

The rain made for some really fun compositions. I was irritated with it when I’d woke up to a complete and total downpour, but I was really happy with how well it seemed to work.

August 28th, 2016
Day 241

The rain followed us all the way home. I’m fine with it at this point.

August 29th, 2016
Day 242

The storms continue. I wish I still lived somewhere with a view.

August 30th, 2016
Day 243

Fairfield has the prettiest alleys in Iowa.

August 31st, 2016
Day 244

I’m feeling a little ill tonight. Tried to go on my nightly photographic walk, but my stomach ache cut it short. Got this, though. On to September.

September 1st, 2016
Day 245

Anxiety. All damn day.

September 2nd, 2016
Day 246

In Fort Dodge to continue work on Forgotten Iowa. This is becoming a pretty familiar view on my Friday and Saturday nights.

September 3rd, 2016
Day 247

We got a little lost near this unincorporated town called Lanyon when I saw this old house buried behind years and years of overgrowth. It ended up being my favorite photo from this trip.

September 4th, 2016
Day 248

I helped Kat set up her new drawing table and shot some photos of her breaking it in. All in all, a pretty successful day.

September 5th, 2016
Day 249

The Dakota Access Pipeline is tearing up all my favorite childhood driving spots. Selfishly, it really upsets me.

September 6th, 2016
Day 250

Work is increasingly more difficult for me to get through knowing that the end is coming up. Luckily, I have my music to look forward to.

September 7th, 2016
Day 251

Went for my daily walk when it started raining like and I started sweating bullets in a lengthy sprint home. I want to kiss whoever invented weather-sealing right on the lips.

September 8th, 2016
Day 252

This project is a real chore some days.

September 9th, 2016
Day 253

I have nothing to complain about today. Gimme a minute and I’ll find something.

September 10th, 2016
Day 254

I hope to drive this car until the wheels fall off. I want a crystal ball to see my future self in ten years just to make sure I’m still driving it.

September 11th, 2016
Day 255

Well, in an hour or so, I will be experiencing my last day on earth as a twenty-seven year old. I guess now would be a good time to recap what I’ve done, what I’m proud of, and where I hope to go in my 28th year as a living skin bag.

What I’ve Done:

1.) Got some major publicity on my Forgotten Iowa project. Was featured on CNN, The Des Moines Register, and had both an article on VICE.com and a Daily VICE mini-documentary.

2.) On that note (and arguably more important), I photographed over 400 separate small towns in my 27th year. More than one a day if you were to stretch it out and use the laws of averages and stuff. I think that’s a pretty good haul. I haven’t lost interest or given up and I think that’s paramount for somebody that can count his finished projects on two hands and would need a room of no fewer than 20 people to count up the ones that he gave up on.

3.) I finished a book that I spent over two years laboring over. This is more of a personal feat than a professional one (as I don’t think thousands of eyeballs are ever going to be glued to it), but it’s still one I’m majorly proud of. I’m hoping that my 28th year finds me as a published writer, but that’s still hazy.

4.) Held down multiple jobs and haven’t had a nervous breakdown in the process. And yes, I realize that this is something that damn near every adult does, but I’m weak and often surprised at my own perseverance when it comes to this. Money has never been my motivating factor in anything I do, so prioritizing it has been a real life-changer for me. I’ve done pretty well considering that.

5.) Have taken a photo every day of 2016 (and counting!). This will bleed into a few months of my 28th year, but the vast majority of it has been done in my 27th, so I feel like it applies.

6.) Did not get a haircut. And thank you genetics for allowing me to grow it still when most of my friends have to rock the Heisenberg at this point. I’m hoping this trend continues well into my 28th, 38th, and 48th years. *crosses fingers that I got my dad’s hair genetics.

7.) Kat and I have recently crossed the goal-line of our 4th year together. Seems crazy that that much time has passed since meeting her. Still feels like we’re a relatively new couple some days. I think that’s a good feeling to have, though. It’d be a worrying signal if it felt like we’d just crossed our 20th anniversary off. Right?

What I Want To Do At 28:

1.) I’d like to go back to school. I want to learn something. I want to grow. I have felt intellectually stagnated over the last several years and I’d like to get back in touch with the part of me that enjoys learning new things. Problem is, even approaching 28, I have absolutely no idea what I’d want to go to school for. Business School, maybe? It’d be nice to be my own boss eventually and I have absolutely no business acumen as is. My only fear about that is my complete incompetence in mathematics. I have some kind of math dyslexia, and I’m sure of that. Numbers don’t relate to my brain the same way that words do and I often find myself switching digits even at a base level. It’s embarrassing, but I don’t really know how to remedy it either. Still, I’d like to get off the idea and move onto the actuality. I would feel better about myself if I had some sort of degree.

2.) Get 75% of Forgotten Iowa done with. As much as I love this project, I’d love it even more if the end goal was in sight.
3.) Explore the west coast a little. I’d like to visit LA or San Fran at some point this year.

4.) Get in shape. I mean REAL shape, not the two ill-defined extremes that I’m thus far familiar with. I’d like to make a friend in Fairfield that devotes their life to this kind of thing because the only thing I’m worse at than math is building my body. I’m utterly hopeless and I don’t know where to begin. I either indulge way too much or I starve myself. I’ve yet to find an in between that works, but I’ve seen it work for other people, so I am determined to figure out how to do it.

5.) Start a novel. I’ve always wanted to write one and I think I could do something great if I put my mind to it. It’s just coming up with a story and not writing myself into a wall.

6.) Learn how to get creative again. So much of the last few years has been about becoming a technically sound photographer. The thing that I’ve compromised is my artistic output. If a photo isn’t super sharp, if it isn’t as near-perfect as humanly possible, then I will never show it to anybody. I need to learn that a perfect photo is not always technically perfect. I need to use my heart more and my brain a little less.
And that’s about it, really. Honestly, I’m kind of surprised that I’ve made it this far. As a kid, for some reason or another, I always thought that I’d be dead by the time I was 25. Now, 30 is rapidly approaching and I’m still puttering around. My whole, “live fast and die young” thing doesn’t look like it’s going to pan out, so I should probably try to find a Plan B. Maybe “get kind of old and see what happens”. Yeah, I’m going to go with that.

Thanks to everybody that’s supported me over this last year. I’ve done a lot of growing and changing, and it’s nice to know that someone can spark change in themselves and not lose everybody that knows them as a certain thing that they once were. It’s seriously appreciated.

Here’s to 28!

September 12th, 2016
Day 256

Here is a guy in a suit. I do not know him, but he walked like he had places to be.

September 13th, 2016
Day 257

My girlfriend bought me a macro lens for my birthday. It’s officially the greatest present I have ever received. And now I will likely only shoot macro for the rest of the month.

September 14th, 2016
Day 258

One unintended consequence when photographing bugs: They start feeling like your little friends. Can no longer smoosh them. Carry on, little buddy.

September 15th, 2016
Day 259

I was chased by a brigade of bees for three entire blocks shortly after taking this picture.

September 16th, 2016
Day 260

Holy hell. So there’s this couple that lives behind our house and it seems like they are constantly fighting. The girl is convinced that the guy is cheating on her. It’s like an episode of Maury every day.

Today was no different except that it happened right outside of our house. Kat and I didn’t think much of it until SEVEN COPS SHOWED UP AT OUR HOUSE THINKING IT WAS US.

Dude pounded on the front door like he was trying to punch it down. It was actually pretty damn terrifying.

Eventually we got the group of them to believe that we were actually having a nice Friday evening at home. But Christ. Doesn’t that all seem like a bit much for a couple arguing anyway?

September 17th, 2016
Day 261

So much of my life revolves around these little dials.

September 18th, 2016
Day 262

Broken camera, good advice.

September 19th, 2016
Day 263

I thought we were going to get one last round of violent storms. Didn’t end up happening.

September 20th, 2016
Day 264

Today. I stopped at my favorite cemetery in the world and walked around for a while. I always get so overwhelmed by the realization that all of these stones are just placeholders for people and stories. And how many of them will never get told. Worse yet, many are so old that even the names are worn off. It wasn’t a depressing day or experience. Just a momentary depressing thought.

September 21st, 2016
Day 265

I photographed my white whale! Finally, after almost two years of only seeing this fella when I didn’t have my camera on me, it happened. And though he definitely thought I was a weirdo for asking him, I couldn’t pass up on the opportunity. He had a freshly rolled cigarette that he wanted to smoke, but refused to let me get a photo of that because, “it looks like a joint and I don’t need that documentation.”

I didn’t have the lens attached that I would have liked to use for this, but beggars can’t be choosers. The best lens to use is the one you have attached anyway.

September 22nd, 2016
Day 266

Symmetry is satisfying.

September 23rd, 2016
Day 267

Having a bad day. This will do.

September 24th, 2016
Day 268

Experimented with alka-seltzer.

September 25th, 2016
Day 269

The Packers won today, but the ants outside didn’t seem to care much. They were frantically looking for shelter from an incoming storm. Made me really thankful that I’m a human and not a bug.

September 26th, 2016
Day 270

My father just finished signing the papers on an historic building in the main district of my hometown of Keokuk, Iowa. I’m incredibly excited for him and arguably even more excited about everything I’m going to be able to shoot in there in the meantime.

A little bit of history I discovered on the property itself:

“From about 1909 to 1915, it was the location of the Orpheum Theatre,
1940′s to mid-1950′s, it was McGlaughlin Firestone Tire Sales & Service,
A Spiegel Catalog Order Store into the late 1970s.”

September 27th, 2016
Day 271

Everything seems safer from way up.

September 28th, 2016
Day 272

Drip.

September 29th, 2016
Day 273

Hung out with my sister and her kids today. I love my family.

September 30th, 2016
Day 274

“My mama always said you can tell a lot about a person by their shoes. Where they going. Where they been. I’ve worn a lots of shoes. I bet if I think about it real hard I can remember my first pair of shoes.”

October 1st, 2016
Day 275

October begins wet.

October 2nd, 2016
Day 276

I’ve developed a real fear of having my photo taken. What better way to get over that fear than force myself into intense close-up self-portraits?
I think it’s working.

October 3rd, 2016
Day 277

My best macro work yet!

October 4th, 2016
Day 278

My brother got jumped recently by a group of douchebags. He’s dealing with some personal stuff so we’ve been distracting him with good BBQ and Super Nintendo.

October 5th, 2016
Day 279

There are reports of clowns harassing people all over my state lately. My little brother incidentally had a clown mask in his closet. One thing lead to another and this photo happened.

October 6th, 2016
Day 280

The first cold day of fall has arrived.

October 7th, 2016
Day 281

Classic abandoned house photo shoot tonight. Somehow, my RAW file format switched to .JPEG and not even at the highest quality .JPEG allowed. So that was a bummer. Shoot turned out pretty good all things considered, though.

October 8th, 2016
Day 282

Maternity shoot this evening.

October 9th, 2016
Day 283

Tried feeding this exhausted moth some sugar water, but he didn’t want any. He’d gotten into our house somehow and I set him outside in the leaves. Went to check on him a half hour later or so and he had vanished. I’m choosing to believe that he just flew off and wasn’t eaten.

October 10th, 2016
Day 284

It’s suddenly fall out of nowhere. Summer went by too quickly just as it always does.

October 11th, 2016
Day 285

I always get depressed come this time of the year. I can physically feel it coming on. The rest of this project will likely be quite a test. Wish me luck.

October 12th, 2016
Day 286

Yup. I was right. It’s here.

October 13th, 2016
Day 287

Something a little different for my Photo of the Day. This is every hour I was awake on this day (Minus the drive from home to work because using your phone while you drive makes you a jerk). All photos shot on an LG G5 cell phone.

It still blows my mind that my phone can take photos that don’t look like garbage.

October 14th, 2016
Day 288

In Minneapolis, Minnesota for the weekend. Going to relax and take a nice break from focusing on photography. I need it. Burned out.

October 15th, 2016
Day 289

St. Paul Minnesota and Minneapolis, Minnesota. The twin cities. For the record, St. Paul is definitely more my speed.

October 16th, 2016
Day 290

It was a long drive home, but I was welcomed by my old spider buddy. After eight hours on the road, I am just too exhausted to look for anything else. And this guy is quite the looker anyhow.

October 17th, 2016
Day 291

It’s ninety degrees outside. Feels weird.

October 18th, 2016
Day 292

I like the town I live in, but man is my neighborhood boring.

October 19th, 2016
Day 293

Had an idea to write mini poems on this marquee I found on eBay. It arrived in the mail today.

October 20th, 2016
Day 294

Especially when you are busy every damn day.

October 21st, 2016
Day 295

Arrived in Lansing, IA to continue work on Forgotten Iowa.

October 22nd, 2016
Day 296

A small church in Dorchester, Iowa.

October 23rd, 2016
Day 297

Ludlow, Iowa.

October 24th, 2016
Day 298

I really hate how hopelessly stupid I feel most days.

October 25th, 2016
Day 299

A minute or so after this photo was taken, I shot another from a more “directly above” angle. One of the kids tossed the pile of dirty leaves right at my face and a small chunk of something flew directly down my throat and blocked my airway.

A moment or so after that and I was on my knees hacking and wheezing like I was going to die. I puked all over the ground and the kids just thought it was the funniest thing they had ever seen.

October 26th, 2016
Day 300

66 days left.

October 27th, 2016
Day 301

I leave for Texas bright and early tomorrow morning and have spent the majority of my day getting my camera gear ready for it. Decided to go for a little walk to take a break from that and used that time for a double exposure while I enjoyed a cigarette.

October 28th, 2016
Day 302

The long all-day drive to Texas starts now. Here we go.

October 29th, 2016
Day 303

Wedding in Allen, TX.

October 30th, 2016
Day 304

Forgot to change my battery on my way out the door of the hotel today. Had to make due with what I could get before the camera died.

October 31st, 2016
Day 305

It’s amazing how hard it is to find something to photograph when you spend your entire damn day in a truck with tinted windows.

November 1st, 2016
Day 306

It was unusually warm in Iowa today. I think the heat might have followed me back from Texas.

November 2nd, 2016
Day 307

Goodbye, fall. Hello Satan.

November 3rd, 2016
Day 308

I am not a big baseball guy, but I did watch the world series finals this year (for the first time ever). This seemed historically significant.

November 4th, 2016
Day 309

Commercial shoot for a clothing company.

November 5th, 2016
Day 310

Spent my day in Des Moines, Iowa with the girl.

November 6th, 2016
Day 311

I broke my favorite tripod shooting this.

November 7th, 2016
Day 312

I fully anticipate the whole damn country to lose its mind tomorrow. Until then, let’s stay real lucid!

November 8th, 2016
Day 313

I have intentionally went out of my way to stay out of it politically with this project and, instead, have just went for it on a personal level. But there’s a couple things I need to say and this is the only place I feel like it makes sense to say it.

I feel so much shame for our entire country today.

To every gay, bisexual, LGBTQ person that I reassured of the sheer impossibility of Donald Trump becoming the president of America — I want to apologize to every one of you. No way, I’d tell them. We just aren’t that bigoted of a society. I was wrong. We are.

To every Muslim or Mexican immigrant that follows this project, I want to apologize to you. You are loved and supported by a whole lot of people and we will continue to fight for you. I am sorry that the fight is going to get a lot tougher, but we won’t relent. You deserve to pursue happiness just as much as any natural-born citizen does. All of our grandfathers were what you are now. Some of us don’t forget that.

To every woman that tried to tell me of a rape culture, of a glass ceiling, and of an unfair standard that I consistently disagreed with — I want to apologize to every one of you. Those things not only exist in this country, but they are now being openly encouraged. I feel sick to my stomach about it and I hate being wrong, but I was. I was just so wrong.

To the planet that we are about to destroy with the deregulation of American industry — I want to apologize to you, too. To all the marine life that we are about to lose to rising sea temperatures, to all the animals in the depleted rainforests, to the inevitable destruction of our ozone layer — I am sorry. Global Warming is not a Chinese hoax. It’s an unavoidable reality. The silver lining might be the loss of Florida coastline and its eventual reality as a seafloor, but even that is only a temporary relief. Our people are overwhelmingly selfish. We are the makers of our own demise and it’s not fair to any of you that we are also the reason for yours.

I feel a deep shame this morning. I can’t just pretend to love this state as much as I thought I did. Though we only had 5 electoral votes, we still squandered them on this orange charlatan. We are part of the problem. Hell, we are the problem.

I struggle with a new idea that maybe these small towns aren’t the magical doors to America’s soul like I thought they were. What if they are actually the keys to our own deranged sense of entitlement? What if we are more racist, most bigoted, more extreme and fundamentalist? Is my pride misplaced? Is my desire to reach a deeper truth fruitless? Is that ocean of thought a mere puddle? How could a state with such a rich history in progression be this painfully misguided?

I am not proud to be an Iowan today. I am not proud to be an American.

The next couple weeks are going to be about healing for a lot of us and I’m going to try very hard to wash this deep layer of shame off of me. But I don’t got it in me to go around and photograph these places for the moment. I canceled my plans to tackle a county this weekend (something I have never done). I have lost my spark for a minute.

I am sure I will get it back soon, so bear with me in the meantime. But I am just so sick to my stomach about this. Hillary Clinton wasn’t the answer. That much is obvious. But the implications weren’t nearly as dire as the alternative. To all of those protest voters, I would like to revisit you in two years to ask if this election was worth the protest vote to you. If so, then so be it. Maybe I am wrong. Maybe you are right. Maybe nothing will change at all and Donald Trump will end up being a fairly centrist president. Somehow, though, I sincerely doubt it.

Stay strong, America. I know firsthand just how god damn hard that is to do on a day like today when hate won and hope lost. We are the makers of our own demise, but we are also the potential great change against it. I love you. I don’t love this country as a whole so much today, but I love you.

Keep your chin up and I’ll try to right alongside you. Don’t give up on the good fight. We are gonna need all the help we can muster.

About this photo: I shot it the very moment I knew that it was over. 10:35PM.

November 9th, 2016
Day 314

I can’t even pretend that I care about this project at all today. This whole country is embarrassing to me at the moment. I’m ignoring it the best I can with good tunes.

November 10th, 2016
Day 315

Everything hurts and nothing makes sense. Giant life changes are hard enough on their own, but I’m getting hit with a double with this sudden political shift.

I have no desire to continue this project, but I am trying to fight the impulse to give up. I generally think it’s been a healthy thing for me to utilize that thought-process in everything else. Don’t let the light burn out. Shield it from the wind. Keep throwing in tinder.

I found myself in Quincy, Illinois last night after a long drive in silence on my lonesome. Don’t know why I went there, don’t know what I was trying to find, and didn’t find anything of note anyway. I struggle to be specific in this feeling, but it’s a gravity I have not felt in some time. I want to be okay. I will be okay.

Breathe. Breathe. Keep the fire lit.

November 11th, 2016
Day 316

A short high-key shoot with my friend Taylor tonight.

November 12th, 2016
Day 317

Fall has arrived and punched me in the mouth
I opened it for summer, but no warmth came out.

November 13th, 2016
Day 318

“Supermoon 2016: The brightest supermoon in almost 70 years rises tonight” — The LA Times

November 14th, 2016
Day 319

Got a new winter coat today. Happy holidays. Starting to feel more like myself again.

November 15th, 2016
Day 320

A promotional photo I did for a wedding company in Des Moines, Iowa today at Shimek State Forest in Croton, Iowa.

November 16th, 2016
Day 321

Spotted this in Des Moines, Iowa tonight. Thought to myself that it might just be a little late for this idea at this point. Sorry, sidewalk crusader. For now, hate has proven itself too strong.

November 17th, 2016
Day 322

This photo makes me nostalgic already and I just shot it today.

November 18th, 2016
Day 323

It was eighty-one degrees yesterday and tonight is down to the thirties. The wind is blowing at nearing forty miles an hour and the streets are completely uninhabited in this weird little hippy town.

I stayed inside and took photos of the Christmas tree. The season of long walks through town is over. The season of despair winds on slowly.

November 19th, 2016
Day 324

I leave for Colorado in the morning for no other reason than to shoot photos of the Rockies for this project.

November 20th, 2016
Day 325

Fourteen hours later and we arrive in Boulder, CO.

November 21st, 2016
Day 326

A tender moment between strangers at 8,500 feet up.

November 22nd, 2016
Day 327

I know the phrase, “Make America Great Again” is all the rage in this country right now, but I have a hard time pinpointing when that ever was to begin with. Remember, a society is only as great as it is to its most unfortunate members.

Last I checked, this has never been a rare sight in America.

“When you’re stepping over a guy on the sidewalk…does it ever occur to you to think, ‘Wow, maybe our system doesn’t work?’” — Bill Hicks

November 23rd, 2016
Day 328

I ran away to the mountains to rediscover my love for America. It worked.

November 24th, 2016
Day 329

November 24th, 2016
Day 329

This is the face of a guy that just spent 14 hours on the road with a girl sick with food poisoning and puking into a bucket in the passenger seat.

November 25th, 2016
Day 330

Creepin’ Lincoln.

November 26th, 2016
Day 331

I don’t feel well today. Just sitting at my desk and listening to records.

November 27th, 2016
Day 332

A short self-study on this rainy November day.

November 28th, 2016
Day 333

I guess I’m just into collages this week. This is the result of a very wet walk through my yard this afternoon.

November 29th, 2016
Day 334

It was a root-beer float kind of night. I’m very stressed out with some personal family drama right now, but trying my hardest to keep my head above water.

November 30th, 2016
Day 335

We have almost made it through 2016 and I think every single one of us deserves a pat on the back for such a Herculean feat.

December 1st, 2016
Day 336

I woke up last night and couldn’t catch my breath. It felt like I’d just ran up thirty flights of steps, ran down them and then back up again without a moment to stop and rest. It felt like there was an elephant sitting on my chest with just enough force to not shatter my rib cage and just enough to cut off my airway. I rolled around, shot up like a bottle rocket and took a long walk around the cave of my house. It was pitch black down there, but I didn’t turn on any lights and instead navigated the map of my house on instinct alone. Eventually, about an hour or so later, after a long game of cat-and-mouse with my lungs, I finally caught up to my breath and inhaled sharply. Then I returned to bed.

A little while after that and I woke up again without the ability to move. My arms were glued to the sheets and my legs were shackled to the bedpost. It felt like the mattress was sliding up and down simultaneously, growing at both ends infinitely, and pulling my dead limbs like a Stretch Armstrong doll. I did not feel anything except the static of my useless body and the terror of a conscious mind stuck inside of it. I tried to scream but my mouth wouldn’t open. I tried to slide out of bed but my brain wasn’t sending the proper signals to my confused and dead leg muscles. My eyes felt like they were pried open with a pair of mint-flavored toothpicks and I sat there for what felt like an eternity. And then, like I was jump-started by a set of battery cables, my ability to freely move returned. The gap between my mind and my body shortened and then became one again. I took another walk around the dark house (though the moon shining in through a window made it considerably less dark than my first walk of the night) and then went back to bed.

The alarm clock started screaming a little while after that. I fought the desire to stay there in bed forever to continue waging war on myself. My feet hit the carpet, I walked down the stairs, brushed my hair and my teeth, grabbed my car keys and headed to work.

My head has been in a fog all morning. It’s a strange feeling to want sleep and fear it at the same time. I know what’s on the other side of it, you know, but it’s the in-between that really fucks with me.

There is no way out of the war. No foxholes. No nothing.

Just me vs me.

December 2nd, 2016
Day 337

Macro study of one of my old journals. The most use it’s ever going to give me.

December 3rd, 2016
Day 338

Went out to the bar with Dakota last night and met up with some old friends. Good times.

December 4th, 2016
Day 339

My sweet, reliable ol’ Betsy. How thankful I am for your continued existence.

December 5th, 2016
Day 340

Another Monday. Bleh.

December 6th, 2016
Day 341

There have been a lot of self-portraits this month, but it’s too cold to do anything else and I’ve been stupid busy. It’s better than nothing at all!

December 7th, 2016
Day 342

My girl.

December 8th, 2016
Day 343

I don’t think I will ever again make a new friend. I’m too paranoid. Too weird. I make acquaintances all the time and have actually met some really wonderful, pleasant people in the last few years of living in this weird, little hippy town. But I’d never call them if life got suddenly heavy for me (even though I’m certain some of them would answer). I’d never reach out to them like that. I’ve dug myself a hole and I have seen fit to spend the rest of my days hunkered down in it. It’s not anybody’s fault but my own. I dug it, I furnished it, and I have remained down here for the longest time. Call it self-preservation, call it cowardice; it’s probably somewhere in between the two. I prefer the clarity of never to the fog of potentially tried and failed. It’s easier to digest, easier on my stomach, I don’t find myself waking up in a cold sweat after inevitably sabotaging it. I’m not overwhelmed by guilt. There is a peace in all the numb. It’s real quiet. Real static.

The pragmatist in me says that I will regret the isolation someday. That there will come a time where nobody is there for me anymore, when there will be nobody left that cares and no number to call. The possibility will shrivel and disappear if the door is left open long enough (and at the very least, a breeze somewhere will eventually close it for you). The idealist is saying otherwise, but history has shown him to be consistently wrong on all accounts. I wish the two of them could meet in the middle somewhere. I’m sure they would be friends.

Isn’t that something.

December 9th, 2016
Day 344

We’re back to square one. Everything is frozen and I am running on fumes.

December 10th, 2016
Day 345

Snow fell gently all morning and the people of Fairfield collectively lost their mind. Dogs broke away from leashes, squirrels lazily lounged in bare trees, and cars skidded up and down the back roads.

I ventured out, grabbed a coffee, smoked a cigarette and watched the chaos from the warm comfort of my cave.

December 11th, 2016
Day 346

“The things you could do, you won’t but you might.”

December 12th, 2016
Day 347

The holiday season has arrived.

December 13th, 2016
Day 348

This shoot was a recreation from one I did with a broken Canon 20D back in September of 2009. I like doing this kind of thing from time to time just to assure myself that my skill-set has improved dramatically in the years since.

I also really like the phrase “a photo is worth a thousand words” because that’s the other medium I find myself constantly obsessed with. Between the two, I’d like to believe that I’m stumbling upon something special.

December 14th, 2016
Day 349

This project has been a great thing for me, but I am more than ready for it to be over. It’s too cold to do anything exciting. The high today is four degrees. If anybody remembers how whiny and upset I was at the beginning of the year, I would like to use this time to explain the seasonal depression that hits me like a truck like clockwork every year.

My personal life is in a state of flux right now to further confound my anxiety. I’m really glad that this is the last month of the year because I’ve had enough of it.

December 15th, 2016
Day 350

About to do some changing myself.

December 16th, 2016
Day 351

It’s snowing lightly. Temperatures are steadily dropping. Blew through an entire check for a bed that’s now hogging up space in the living room. Lots of changes. Lots of changing.

2016 has been a rough one.

December 17th, 2016
Day 352

Wind chill advisory, cars wrapped around telephone poles, shivering rodents digging canals into old homes. A quiet room full of junk I don’t need, old men shoveling sidewalks, wind picking up, snow falls more violently, trees shake and sway in the distance. Eat for the first time in a couple days, shower, brush my teeth. No toilet paper. No conditioner. Out of soap. Waste of time. The steam is thick, though, and the water is scalding. I wish it could get hotter. I want to melt.

The house is quiet and dark. I crank the thermostat and lay back in bed. My jaw hurts. My bones are dry. My soul is tired. Everything is tired. Everybody is.

The snow keeps falling.

December 18th, 2016
Day 353

thrown to these uncharted waters
where the frigid wind does blow
will we see the rising sun?
nobody really knows.

December 19th, 2016
Day 354

It’s been a weird day for photos.

December 20th, 2016
Day 355

This kid used to be terrified of me. I mean genuine, cower-in-fear-and-hide-behind-mom levels of scared. For years, she wouldn’t come close to me and would scream her head off if I paid her any attention at all. This was especially confounding to me because I generally think I am good with kids. They usually like me. Sadie, though, did not. She feared me.

Sometime in the last few years, though, I turned into her favorite human being on earth. When I make a surprise visit to my sister’s house, her eyes light up and she doesn’t leave my side for the entire duration of my stay. When I have to leave, she pouts and tries to think of reasons for me to stay. It’s really sweet.

I’m super thankful for this person’s existence and I’m glad she got over that irrational fear of her uncle.

December 21st, 2016
Day 356

I can handle the loneliness. It comes in waves, usually in the hours following sunset and it usually comes to an end as the sun rises in the morning. It’s the ocean of time in between those moments of lonely that really do me in. The numb. The void. Staring into the abyss and it staring back at me.

I want to have a third gear between those two things, to unlock a door to some magic world presently outside of my grasp. It doesn’t have to be permanent. Doesn’t have to be anything at all; I hold no expectations. I just want to feel something other than this. No matter what is beyond that door, even the most mundane of emotion will surely turn vibrant in its wake. Blues so deep that they become transparent, turn yellow and then orange.

I feel like I’m on the cusp of that some days. Other days, I feel further away. There is a thick layer of dirt that has stuck to me through the years. To finally wash a little away would be so huge.

I just want something to feel important again. Anything.

December 22nd, 2016
Day 357

Nine days left. I’m starting to believe I can get through this year.

December 23rd, 2016
Day 358

I gave myself a gnarly blister trying to lay bass lines down for a new song. I have the itch again and it feels great to scratch it, blisters and all. Man, how I have missed making music. First new stuff in almost four years!

December 24th, 2016
Day 359

Christmas at my mom’s house was a blast. It’s the one part of my childhood that I can still stubbornly cling to when I’m feeling particularly dusty and old. It’s also the one time of the year that can guarantee my siblings and I will all be in the same room together, poking fun and giving one another zingers like we always have.

December 25th, 2016
Day 360

No snow on Christmas this year, just a lot of rain and the occasional roar of thunder as the clouds roll through eastward. Today would have been my grandma’s 73rd birthday and it still burns my ass that the universe took her away from us so early in life. Meanwhile, there is a literal Nazi somewhere that’s celebrating their 95th birthday surrounded by family and opening presents. Sipping hot cocoa. Getting brand new socks. And it just doesn’t seem like the world is balanced at all sometimes.

And I suppose that it wasn’t ever supposed to be. The big fish eats the little fish and the little fish has a belly full of minnows. The better of a person you are, the more inherent is your disadvantage in this weird place. And what does it even mean to be good anyway? I find myself falling into this moral absolutism lately and it’s driving me insane because I know it’s intellectually bankrupt. But I can’t help it. I’ve reached such a black-and-white point in my life where evil is all encompassing and goodness is one hundred percent devoid of it.

But that literal nazi celebrating his 95th birthday today, in all likelihood, probably has somebody out there that views them as a moral compass the same way that I do with my dear and dead grandma. They probably helped someone change a tire as their car sat dead on the side of a German highway. They could have been charitable, friendly, kind. They could be good people that did absolutely terrible things. What is good for the spider is evil to the fly. What is good for the fly is irrelevant to the spider.

That pendulum is confusing for me because I have been trying to judge myself by those same standards. If I can empathize with someone that looked evil in the eye and openly embraced it, if I can look beyond that and see that they are more than the worst things they ever did, it makes me wonder why I can’t give myself the same privilege? I constantly wage war on the good parts of myself with the never-ending weaponry of the bad. The good parts of me don’t even bring guns to the fight. They’re outnumbered, outflanked, and defeated on a regular basis.

What my big fear about this is losing my ability to separate the two, to embrace that ugly moral absolutism that has already started to stain my thoughts on other people. It’s already happening in little ways. A slight against me is turning me away from people to the point of it becoming a non-entity. I’m finding it more difficult to see the good, to find the compassion. For all my self-destruction, I have always been able to at least do that. If I lose that, then I fear losing my perspective of what good means. It’s all too relative.

The world is criminally imbalanced, after all. Merry Christmas. Happy birthday, grandma.

December 26th, 2016
Day 361

Shot these before I dusted them off after unboxing all of my music equipment from years ago. Hung my guitar holders on the walls and set up an old PC to use as a music workstation.

Lots of things aren’t going well in my life at the moment, but at least I have this to cling to in the meantime.

December 27th, 2016
Day 362

Tried to do a little shoot with my niece, but I didn’t have a way to mount my fill flash. Thought a little duct-tape on a monopod could at least help the situation, but then Sadie became interested in the flash itself and didn’t want to pose. Just wasn’t going to happen.

December 28th, 2016
Day 363

Sadie’s been begging me for weeks to pick her up so she could spend a little bit of time here. Less than a day in, she’s already begging to go home.

Kids are something else, man.

December 29th, 2016
Day 364

I wrote an article about exploring the dead mall of my youth. You can read it here.

December 30th, 2016
Day 365

Wow. After tomorrow, this project comes to an end. 2016 packed quite a wallop, man. I had more than a couple mental breakdowns and became even weirder and more isolated than ever before. I worked myself to the bone and became normal, too, simultaneously somehow. There is a real wedge between my personal and professional lives. One end is a mess and the other is an endless ladder than I’m finally starting to climb.

It hasn’t been all bad. I took a long twenty-six hour drive to Florida and waded around in the Atlantic ocean for a couple weeks. Went to Texas and had the opportunity to see my mom’s side of the family all in one central location again (a minor miracle in itself considering I hadn’t done that since I was a young boy). Traveled to Colorado and looked at the world from the top of a mountain. I stayed at a hotel in Minneapolis and watched some British crooner captivate the audience in a way that made me equal parts jealous and ashamed of my vanilla Midwestern accent. Forgotten Iowa was featured in Vice, The Atlantic, The Des Moines Register, USAToday, American Pickers, Around Iowa, and about two dozen newspapers and magazines. I was paid to write for the first time in my life (I still haven’t cashed the check because I never thought I’d see the day). My favorite photographer acknowledged my work and has followed it in the time since. I’ve found some real successes since separating what I make personally with what I do commercially. I filled in a lot of the blind-spots in 2016 and have had both my professional and personal work seen and printed all over the globe. There are literally millions of people that were exposed to something I made this year. In my wildest dreams, I never saw that happening…but it did. And I have a real fire to maintain that as 2016 comes to a close and 2017 welcomes us (hopefully with the scent of flowers and not napalm).

I also answered a lot of questions that have been lingering over my head for a very long time. Things like, can I dedicate myself completely to my craft? Can I maintain multiple jobs at the same time and not burn out? Can I be anything other than a lazy bastard at any point in my life?

The answer to all three was a resounding yes, by the way. I always found safety in failure and never really tried very hard as a result. If sadness and failure were my natural points of existence, then there was no further that I could drop. But as time rolled on, I started to ask myself, “What would happen if you actually did try, though?” I’m not ashamed of that, by the way, because it stripped me of any fear that I might have otherwise felt. I can try and fail with grace because I know what it’s like to fail by proxy. It’s a lot worse.

How I lit the shot above.

Therapy has been a big motivating factor in my continued recovery, too. I am slowly learning how to appreciate myself. I’m still a long ways away from self-acceptance, but I can at least see some merit now as 2017 comes creeping up. I already see that as a huge success and I’m suddenly interested in a new question for the new year.

What would happen if I thought better of myself?

In 2017, I hope to start finding that out.

December 31st, 2016
Day 366

I did it. I shot photos every day for an entire year. It’s over. I chose one of the most turbulent and fucked up years to give this a shot, but I got through it. I did it.

I didn’t accomplish much today. I wrote and wrote and I wrote and wrote and wrote. Wrote so much that my index finger started to bruise. My therapist told me she’s finding it hard to really dive in with me because I’m so scatterbrained when we talk. I jump from trauma to trauma, from subject to subject, and it’s been hard for her to get her bearings on me. At her suggestion, I spent an entire day writing out every big event in my life in chronological order and ended up with ten pages of grief, bad decisions, birth, death, love, and all the little things in between.

There are some things in there that I think about every single day of my life and others that I hadn’t thought about in ten or fifteen years. The end result of this effort was expected. I’m sad. I’m mopey. I’m in a bad mood. I strongly feel that it’s going to be worth it, though, when I come out on the other side with a little bit of clarity and understanding.

For now, though, on the last day of 2016, I find myself in a dark room. I’m bummed out. I’m down. My thoughts are darker than the room is and I have brought a lot of my own darkness to the forefront of my head. I suppose this is all part of healing, though. Always darkest before the dawn and all that nonsense.

Good riddance 2016.