Why Can I Not Do This Thing - These Things
How often do I show up here, a blank page in a notebook, or staring at a blinking cursor and think to myself, “I have nothing left to share or say. Why the fuck am I doing this?” What do I hope to find in the writing through it? Why can’t I not write? Why can’t I not try to connect to myself through a few words on a page and it takes a second for me to remember how grateful I am for the light that morning on the bicycle commute into the office, how I stopped when I got to campus, parked my bicycle, took off my gloves and helmet, opened my backpack, and shivered as I pulled out my camera in reverence to the light. I wanted to remember the light in that moment–like I am now–and I couldn’t make a photograph. The moment was too large to capture. The air, the sunlight in the bare branches of the birch, the shimmer on the frosty lawn. So maybe that moment is still part of me. Maybe it’s enough to remember and be grateful. Maybe it’s enough when any of us share a moment with another where we saw beyond the light into our beginning.
Sunset Grove Film Festival
We’re still open for submissions for short films that inspire wonder and uplift the consciousness of the people of the planet. If you know any filmmakers of short films, please let them know our regular deadline is March 1. Tell them they can submit via FilmFreeway using the discount code “friendsoffriends” for 50% off the affordable submission fee.
Tickets for our April 18 and June 20 screenings are on sale on the SGFF website too! If you’re interested, get them soon because these are fairly intimate venues. And thanks for sharing this email with folks and filmmakers. It really does help us out a lot.
Here’s a short film called “Johanna” about a woman who swims under the ice in a lake in Finland. It’s beautiful and representative of the films we like to program.
The Morning Ride Pedal Powered Podcast (The End)
The TMR podcast is officially done. I’ve simply run out of things to say in this format. I’m working on another idea though, something a little more considered that may use some ideas from this podcast. Thanks for riding with me all these mornings. For the last episode, I talked through the gear and workflows of how to record a podcast and vlog on a bicycle. All the episodes are on my website at www.jefferyoliver.com. Oh, except that one from last week which was so, so bad.