Introduction Reboot: What’s It All About?

(Continued from Getting Creative: Technical Difficulties)

Featured Photo: “De Markt Viewed from Belfort” Bruges, Belgium—2015

You’ve probably heard the saying: “A picture is worth a thousand words.” In this blog, I hope to bring you BOTH. Each of my posts will include a FEATURED PHOTO (along with a few related photos) AND a thousand words (give or take a few hundred) to tell A STORY connected with the photos. Some stories will likely turn into a series of posts, so I can say everything I want to say.

That is the first paragraph I wrote for my website page, “About This Blog.” In the final days before I was ready to launch, I was doing some online research into what makes a successful blog. Having an “About This Blog” page was a frequent recommendation; it made perfect sense, but I had not thought of the helpful addition to the blog site menu. I looked at a couple of blogs I occasionally read and, sure enough, there it was.

So, I started my “About This Blog” page, with the paragraph above; then I got curious. While in research mode, I investigated the origin of the saying—essentially the namesake for my blog. I learned that, “A picture is worth a thousand words,” has been labeled a Chinese proverb and attributed to the 6th century BCE philosopher, Confucius. That information was inspirational—such a notable history for my blog! However, additional online research pointed to a less significant origin: it seems the saying is actually an American expression, generally attributed to Frederick R. Barnard, who published an article in 1921 on the effectiveness of graphics in advertising. Hmmm.

Somewhat humbled, I returned to my “About This Blog” page, and realized I should add some photos, since my blog was supposed to focus on sharing my pictures and stories. One picture I uploaded to my page was today’s Featured Photo titled, “De Markt Viewed from Belfort”. This picture was from my visit in 2015 to the delightful old city of Bruges, Belgium—a place that truly seems trapped in medieval times. I took the photo looking down on Bruges’ central market square from the top of the bell tower—a challenging climb of 366 steps, but obviously, well worth it. As in my last two posts, I will save the details of my time in Bruges for another day. I want today’s post to give a deeper, more detailed view of what my blog is about.

The “About This Blog” page had me thinking more about how to describe my new blog; I tried to imagine what a new reader might want to know. As I pondered what else to write, I realized it should be something short, informative, engaging, and witty. Oh, and did I mention short? You can probably tell by now that brevity …conciseness …succinctness …pithiness …a general economy of words …are not characteristics that one might readily associate with me and my writing. Anyway, I decided to add another short paragraph to the “About This Blog” page, as follows.

There’s another saying you may have heard: “A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.” I started my journey—my blogging journey—with a series of guest posts about a “Virtual DIY Project,” in collaboration with my brother on his blog site, “One Creative Scientist.” Later—after several years of his encouraging me to start my own blog—I launched “a-picture-and-a-thousand-words,” with my first post in July 2023.

If you’ve read my earlier post about the birth of my blog, you will have gotten the full version of how my blog came to be: the result of a get together with my brother in Montreat, North Carolina back in 2020. Getting back to my “About This Blog” page, I decided to add another photo—the Great Wall of China—from a trip I took in 2018. Upon further research, and with all due respect to Frederick R. Barnard, I felt I was on solid ground with this choice. The famous quote, “A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step,” is universally attributed to the Chinese philosopher Lao Tzu, also from the 6th century BCE. Even though modern scholars apparently regard him as a fictional person, the saying is found in the Tao Te Ching, a classic text, which forms the basis of Taoism. So, my rationale for the photo selection was: Lao Tzu …China …Great Wall …Journey …Long Walk …A Step …Get it?

Still, my “About This Blog” page was proving difficult for me to complete. Even though I thought I had a good idea of what I wanted to write about in my blog, I found it hard to capture the essence in clear, concise language. I considered my blog title: “a-picture-and-a-thousand-words” …Photos …Stories …Travel. And then, the perfect word came to me: “photo-journeyism.” I don’t think it’s a real word—Google did not return any results to my query—and I don’t imagine I’m the first to invent it, but I instantly recognized it was exactly what I hoped my blog would be.

According to Adobe.com, the well-known term, photojournalism, describes “the communication of news through photographs.” The narrative continues, “A picture is worth 1,000 words and can instantly enhance the story that a news article communicates to its readers.” Clearly, both the picture and the words are essential for photojournalism: the picture brings an added, visual dimension to the news story; and the words in the story provide context and meaning for the picture. Together, the “photo” and the “journalism” are meant to provide an informative and engaging news story.

That certainly resonated with me; it was the reason I chose the title for my blog—a picture and a thousand words—together telling an interesting story. But unlike photojournalism, it was an adventure—the story of a journey—that I wanted to communicate through my pictures: photo-journeyism. For my blog, the original inspiration came from the photographs taken on my trips over the years—travel journeys. As I continued to draft my posts, I recognized there were other topics I also wanted to write about—stories of my growing up, of my family and friends, of my passions, of lessons learned—life’s journeys. And in my writing so far, I’ve seen that my travel and life journeys often intertwine.

After I had written the description of photo-journeyism for my “About This Blog” page, I added the following sentences.

Perhaps the photos will inspire you to travel somewhere you’ve not been; maybe the stories will cause you to pause and reflect on a different perspective—a new point of view—that you’ve not considered. Hopefully, you’ll find it interesting enough to bring you back—from time to time—to see and read more.

Another sensible internet suggestion for a successful blog was having a separate page titled, “About Me.” I had a fairly easy time with my “About Me” page, since I had already written my first three posts, which summarized my early love of photography, my love of travel, and my life after college, including my career path and family beginnings. So, I plagiarized myself to string together a short-ish introduction into who I am. I also added the following words to describe why photography is so important to me.

Thanks mostly to my job, I’ve been fortunate to travel to 20 or so countries…and I invariably have a story to tell about the photos I’ve taken along the way. Viewing the world through the lens of a camera always provided an added dimension to what I observed—a deeper connection with my surroundings—challenging me to capture not just the image, but also the emotion of that given moment—that particular experience.  …The moment is immediately gone, but that photo survives to be viewed later, enabling me to relive that specific place and time; I can feel again what I felt when I first happened upon the image—a photograph and an experience to be shared. It’s this combination of pictures and stories I want to bring to this blog.

I continued to write on my “About Me” page…

In addition to photos, travel, and stories, I have a passion for my family and my friends. I love music, movies, books, and art. I like to watch baseball.

From the photo below, you might recognize that I like both the games and the scenic venues!

…I delight in trying new cuisines wherever I go. I have a thirst for craft beer.

…I challenge my mind with word puzzles, and I keep active by biking and hiking.

…I expect all these things will appear in my posts. I hope you enjoy the journey.

One more thing was recommended for my new blogsite: a favicon; I’d never even heard of a favicon! If you’re in the same boat I was, a Google search revealed that a favicon is a “favorites icon,” with a definition in the Oxford Languages Dictionary: “an icon associated with a URL that is variously displayed, as in a browser’s address bar or next to the site name in a bookmark list.” Once I found out what it was, the creation of my favicon turned into a wonderful and rewarding collaboration with my two boys.

I mentioned to my younger son that I wanted a favicon for my blog and gave him an idea what I was thinking; I don’t recall my original concept, but it was very simple and rather boring. My son took out his iPhone, opened a digital sketch pad app, traced something on the screen with his finger, then showed it to me, and asked, “How ‘bout this?” I was blown away!

Through his impromptu doodling, my younger son captured the outline of a simple camera and incorporated the “one” and three “zeros” in the number: 1000. I told him it was brilliant—a picture and a thousand words! A few days later, I showed my younger son’s creation to my older son, and asked if he could, perhaps, create a more formal representation of the favicon. He opened his laptop and a few minutes later, he showed me his version, which became the favicon for my website; you can see it on your browser’s tab as you read this post. I’m thrilled to have my boys’ creative addition to my blog!

And now, as I near the end of this post, I’ll give you a recollection from when I was growing up myself. My mom was an avid reader and often had 10 or 12 books—usually mysteries—lying on her bed at any given time, a bookmark in each to help her pick up where she left off. She liked to tell the following story about the joy and agony of insatiable reading. Once, when the novelist Thomas Wolfe walked into the library in his hometown of Asheville, North Carolina, he looked at the shelves filled with books, held his head in his hands and cried out, “So many books, so little time!”

Or maybe it was Oscar Wilde; my memory is not perfect. Either way, I could find no information that confirmed my mom’s story. In fact, everything I found seemed to attribute the saying, unexpectedly, to Frank Zappa—that legendary, wonderful, wacky musician, popular during the 1960s, ‘70s, and beyond, who also warned us not to eat the yellow snow.

I bring all this up because I want to adapt the Wolfe/Wilde/Zappa saying to suit my blog: “So many photos, so little time!” I now have more than 70,000 photos in my iCloud storage, and I’m eager to go through them, one by one. I want to select the best from the bunch to share as a “Featured Photo” for my blog’s Gallery. I want to try and recall the story connected with the photo, decide what other pictures go along with the feature, and weave together a thousand words to tell the story of that photo—of that journey. But with so many photos, where do I start? My head is reeling with possibilities…and I’m excited to begin. And to paraphrase another saying—in the context of my blog— “The journey of a thousand stories begins with a single photo.”

Based on what I’ve written so far in my posts, I realize that, sometimes, my pictures will guide the story, and sometimes, the story that I want to tell will guide the pictures—a merging of travelog and personal reflections. I hope it is all balanced enough to keep your interest. As for my posting schedule, let me share one more paragraph from my “About This Blog” page.

It is my intention to publish a new post every week, on Sunday morning—in honor of my father, who was a minister and preached every Sunday morning for 40 years—and out of respect and admiration for my brother, who has consistently posted on his own blog site every Sunday morning for the past 10 years. For me, that will be 52 posts a year; I think I have enough stories to keep it going. We’ll have to wait and see if I manage to follow-through on my plans.

So, that’s the long answer to the short question; that’s what my blog is all about: pictures and stories. I’ll end this introductory series of posts where I began: my love of photography. It was my original idea to curate and share the photos I have taken; this would be my creative journey. But unexpectedly, this blog—the platform that enables the sharing—has emerged as an additional creative outlet, where I can tell the stories to go along with the pictures. As I’ve said many times already, when I launched this combined, creative pursuit, I discovered it was really fun to go through my photos and write the posts.

Having now begun my blogging journey, I find myself thinking back more than 50 years, to my first camera and those early pictures from so long ago…

…and I wonder if I might, perhaps, somewhere along the way, once again come to know that 11-year-old boy—sitting on the rock in Montreat, North Carolina—full of hope, curiosity, imagination, and potential. I believe I will.