I received advice years ago from a trusted photographer friend that I should add some things into my life that were NOT about photography so that I wouldn’t burn myself out.  At the time, I wasn’t quite ready to hear the words.  Everything was just beginning for me, I was getting regular client work, I was teaching photography in classrooms, I was volunteering at my kid’s school with my camera in hand, my down-time was spent working on personal photo projects.  Everything in my life seemed to revolve around photography.As the years have gone by, I’ve realized how wise her words are.  I needed to add something in that was “Not Photography”.  A few months ago, I began working 3 mornings a week at a local farm.  They grow every kind of variety of fruit and vegetable that you could imagine.  Things I’d never even heard of before starting this job. They also keep chickens, ducks and goats and they have a barn where they board and care for horses.  The farm is on a beautiful piece of land that butts up against a creek fed from the snow melt in the mountains.  They even have their own colony of bees!  I think one of the things I like best is that all the produce grown on the farm goes directly to the local restaurants they own.Working on the farm has been a good change for me from my usual photographic pace.  I’ve found that it’s allowing time and space in my brain for new thoughts and connections.  And I’m able to better appreciate the simple beauty of being outside in nature, getting my hands in the earth and harvesting the efforts of my labor.

Enjoying my “not photography” job – Angie