Category: Creative Life

A Life of Photos Part IX

Post author By Paul Deaton
Post date November 15, 2025

Sunrise on the state park trail. Taken with my Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra smartphone.

If it seems impossible to curate my life-long collection of analog and digital photographs, that’s because it is. My presumption is of making a useful archive for others to use when I’m gone. However, that is an old school idea poorly aligned with the way photographs have come to be used. I am fine with sharing photos via social media and email. I also believe they have more than transient value. This is at the core of my struggle to make progress in curating my photographic work.

I am interested in technology. My maternal grandmother participated in photography culture and bought a Kodak Brownie and Instamatic 126 at the local drug store. She developed her exposed film at the same drug store. It was a creative outlet for her, creativity being something her family discouraged when she was young. When she asked us to pose in our Easter best clothing, how could we refuse? She had the camera and wanted to preserve the moment. That felt important.

In college, I experimented with a Minolta SRT-101 I bought from one of my band buddies. I got away from posed photographs to the extent possible and captured where I lived, both in my residence and on day trips to neighboring places. I bought a small 35mm camera and a dozen rolls of film to take on my 1974 trip to Europe. When my backpack was stolen in France, I lost all the film and ended up with only two rolls to develop after three months away. When I bought a mobile flip phone, I took a few photographs with the built in camera, notably one of Senator Barack Obama at the 2006 Harkin Steak Fry. In 2008, I bought a Kodak EasyShare digital camera, and then when I converted to a smartphone in 2012 the smart phone became my primary photographic method. There is a whole story in technology. My experience since the 1950s is likely not that different from other amateur photographers in my cohort.

The cultural aspect of my photographic history is more interesting. I was able to own a simple camera because I had an income from delivering newspapers. I became the person in the family called upon to record an event when Grandmother was not available. My early photographs are packed with domestic images of holidays and birthdays, vacations, and the stuff in our lives like pets, houses, cars, and more. In high school, I worked part time at a department store and had means to use photography. I accumulated photographs in shoe boxes and a few albums. Mother had a short filing cabinet on wheels where all of her photographs migrated. Photography has always been a simple, affordable, and happy thing to do. There was always a half life of attention given to photographs. However, we couldn’t bear to get rid of them.

To some extent, my photographs are a visual record of how I lived. At the same time, I have been journaling since 1974 and have given more thought to what I wrote than I did to photographs. As I write an autobiography, I decided to use only one photograph in the first book, and am not sure whether or how many I might use in the second. To avoid consideration of photography as part of my life would be decidedly wrong.

Social media changed how we use photographs. With digital cameras and smartphones, photographs have no operating cost other than the time and attention paid to them. When I take a photograph like the sunrise in this post, I make multiple exposures and edit them to pick the “best” one to post. This form of curation was not easy in analog photography, yet is basic to posting photographs on social media. I archive all my saved photographs on the cloud, yet seldom go back to them.

On social media, we get to know people a certain way. For example, on BlueSky, the 99 accounts I follow post photos and create an account ambience I came to recognize over time. This is a real thing, yet not the same as having an in real life relationship with a person. I submit I have a different relationship with someone I know in real life as compared to their social media account. Both seem valid.

Photography in 2025 does not entail a lot of curation. We take photographs, briefly edit and share them, and then forget them. Seldom do we have a processor make prints. I’m okay with that. When I curate four photos for a post on social media, that suffices to sate my urge toward a creative life. Maybe I will use the same photographs in a blog post, or maybe not. I want to believe there is more to this creative process as I look at thousands of images captured over a life and work to define their meaning and gain insights. Because of my current autobiography project, I am willing to devote time to photography. I continue to believe the words are paramount.

Will I end up with a usable archive? It may seem impossible now, yet I hope it ultimately isn’t. Figuring this out is just another part of my life.

Tags A Life of Photos, Creative Life, creative process, photography, Writing

November Sunrise Photos

I walk for 30 minutes on the state park trail almost every day I’m home. The timing is about 20 minutes before sunrise so I can view the transition in the sky. I don’t think I will ever tire of seeing a sunrise.

Tags A Life of Photos, Creative Life, photography, sunrise, Trail Walking

Creative Life

Fog at Sunrise

It is usually quiet on the state park trail during my morning walk. If someone is coming I hear their footsteps, or if they are on the phone or in a group, their talking voices carry a long distance. It was foggy Sunday morning when I heard young women talking. Before long, I could see headlamps bobbing above the trail. It was plenty light, yet the idea of a headlamp gained prominence over whether or not one was actually needed. I wished them a good morning as they passed me going the other way. They returned the sentiment. Even at dawn there is traffic on the trail.

I leave for the trail 20 minutes before sunrise. It is usually light enough to see and the transition period presents great light for capturing photographs. On Saturday I started walking on the boat dock to get an unobstructed view of sunrise. There was frozen frost on the deck and I slipped and fell on my backside. I let loose my mobile device and feared the worst. When I got up it was just less than halfway over the edge of the dock. I had visions of it plunking in the water, yet not this time. I am one lucky guy.

Last winter I walked the trail almost every morning regardless of ambient temperature and snowfall. I expect to do likewise this year. The state park trail is the perquisite that comes with living here I enjoy most. It also provides an opportunity to work on my photography.

Tags A Life of Photos, Creative Life, creative process, photography

Creative Life

Late October Photos

Post author By Paul Deaton
Post date November 1, 2025

It’s hard to believe it is November already. Following are some photos taken in the last two weeks.

Tags A Life of Photos, Creative Life, environment, photography

Creative Life

Friday Photos

Some new colors this week. It’s garlic planting time and when Friday is over, I hope it will be in.

Tags A Life of Photos, autumn, Creative Life, photography

Creative Life

A Life of Photos Part VIII

Post author By Paul Deaton
Post date October 14, 2025

AHS High School Class of 1970 reunion on Sept. 25, 2025.

It’s one thing to take a posed photo — another to decide how it should be used: framed, shared online, or tucked away. That’s what this post explores.

We hired a photographer for our 55th high school class reunion. My instructions were to catch people looking at the lens with eyes open. I count 42 cheerful faces in this group photo. Of a class that numbered 260, that’s a lot still living. A few faces are partly hidden yet the image captures what was most important: proof we were there and together again.

Anyone who uses a camera seems likely to take posed photos. In the digital age it is easy to post them in social media and forget. Likewise, without being tethered to film, we can take many multiple shots of the same pose and then easily pick the best one to use. This is basic modern stuff.

The roots of my interest in posed photography, like so many creative things, lies with my maternal grandmother. I wrote about this in my book, An Iowa Life.

Mae was an influence on my photography. She purchased inexpensive cameras at the drug store and used them to record moments with the family. After researching the Polish community near Wilno, Minnesota, I came to believe her behavior with cameras in the 1960s had its roots in the inner cultural and spiritual realm filled with drama and emotion described previously. The surviving photograph of her sister Tillie’s confirmation is one example of this. The desire to pose and capture a photo was something creative I didn’t understand at the time. We were plain folk and when we got dressed for church, or to attend an event, it was a big deal. Mae wanted to capture those moments on film, consistent with her Polish upbringing. It’s a natural impulse that presents an interpretation of who we were. Of course, we always wanted to put the best foot forward in these constructed frames. (An Iowa Life by Paul Deaton).

When I was a grader, use of a photograph was simple: put it in an album. Such albums were defined more by the time frame in which film was exposed than subject matter. It was as if to say, “I just took these photographs, let’s save them.” On occasion we would make multiple prints of a “good” photo to give or mail to friends and relatives. Anything that did not make it into an album was stored in the envelope in which it came from the processor, along with the negatives. Eventually they accumulated in shoe boxes.

On May 4, 2008, I took my first photograph with a Kodak Easy Share digital camera. It changed everything. In particular, the subject matter of images was less about posing and more about casual capture, landscape and still life. We could snap photos like there was no tomorrow because of the lack of constraints caused by film. The number of images stored on a camera, and then transferred to a computer, exploded. A photograph became less special the way my grandmother understood it. It became a fungible commodity where without close examination everything looked the same. I mean, who had time for close examination of all those digital photographs?

With the rise of social media after 2006, a new place to save photographs began. When I post a photo on my BlueSky account, I do so with the idea other people might appreciate the work. Sometimes one goes viral but most of them get a few likes and then move on in the endless feed. Who knew looking at photos would become doom-scrolling? Social media lacks the permanence of a print or album, yet it is something important.

Most of the photographs from my high school class reunion will likely sit in a folder on the cloud until I want them again. I may get an 8 x 10 version of the reunion class photograph and put it in a standard frame. Partly to keep it handy to evoke its memories. Partly because as one person on our planning committee wrote, “regrettably, we will likely lose more classmates before our 60th reunion.” According to Social Security actuarial tables, 10 or 11 of the people in this photo are likely to die by then. The meaning is obvious. It remains what may be the last time I saw some of my friends. Isn’t this the reason we take photographs?

Tags A Life of Photos, photography

Creative Life

Fall Photos

Post author By Paul Deaton
Post date October 11, 2025

This week was all about the shift to autumn—putting up hot peppers, processing apples, and getting ready for winter. Add a high school class reunion on Sept. 25, and it’s already been a busy season. Here are some of the best recent shots.

Tags A Life of Photos, apples, autumn, Creative Life, creativity, photography, sunrise

Creative Life

Photo Friday

How I view my daily walk is changing, and with it the images captured on my mobile device. Here are ten from the second half of September.

Tags photography

Creative Life

Creativity From the Calumet

Post author By Paul Deaton
Post date September 25, 2025
1 Comment on Creativity From the Calumet

The jump I made in 1989, from working for a top truckload common carrier to working for the ninth largest corporation in the world, freed me to be more creative. I read my journals from that time in the Calumet region near Lake Michigan and find in them the kernel of all that I would become as a creative person.

I am thankful my creative self came up through a grueling career as a transportation and logistics manager. It grounded me in the unpleasant reality that is society in the post-Reagan era. In particular, the more than 10,000 interviews I had with job applicants in transition changed me in a way that would not have been possible without them. For creativity to have been forged in this kind of life gives it an edge.

This passage came from my life experiences in the Calumet.

The book written by Jack Kerouac has the same validity as his presence here. What do the creators of these texts have to say to me? What shall I say from this outpost of civilization?

What becomes significant in this studio is not the clutter in it, but the words and texts produced here and sent into the rest of society. Things take on significance to me, but it is more important that I begin sending things out. Messages in a bottle if you will. (Personal Journal, Merrillville, Indiana, Sept. 15, 1990).

Because of my high level of engagement at work, it was exceedingly difficult to “send things out.” Likewise, there were not many platforms for doing so. I survived on letters to a few friends, trips to visit them, and time in my writing space contemplating life in society. When I could, I spent time in the garage or at the word processor in the dining area being creative. I never gave up being creative and that led me to today.

When I read a book, I image the author as if they were sitting across the room. Sometimes that works and indeed what Jack Kerouac wrote in any of his books is not far removed from his life. When I read one of Robert Caro’s books I imagine him in his workspace in New York, turning every page. When I read John Irving’s writing about Iowa City, I remember the occasional times I saw him near the English-Philosophy Building or visited one of the places mentioned in his books. When I read William Carlos Williams today, I can’t help but be influenced by the time I spent in Iowa City with his publisher James Laughlin. Laughlin got teary-eyed when he spoke of his last meeting with Flossie Williams. I want my writing to be like that: one step or less removed from the reader.

I mentioned clutter and sometimes such clutter gathered from projects of mine, auctions, and the detritus of living a life found its way into what I produced. I’m not sure it was particularly good, yet it reflects my urge to create something new and original. A collage of photographs, old calendar pages, and magazine advertising was something I found visually appealing at the time. That I still have this piece is remarkable.

Livelier than Andy Warhol by Paul Deaton, 1989.

Leaving the trucking firm freed me from my Iowa connections and enabled new ones in the Calumet. I became more of a creative being. When things didn’t work out at my new job I returned to the trucking firm. Yet I did something after leaving that stays with me. I was able to better balance work, creative endeavor and family after the experience. There is a straight line from that realization to today.