#i had a whole anecdote ready about how i got a book about the weather in 2003 in the netherlands bc a hot air balloon knocked over our fence

[russell-crowe]

i tried to make a more sentimental post but as someone with the weather (and by extension space weather) as my special interest i am so so so so happy seeing all the posts from people who got to experience this rare solar storm <3 it makes me so happy when people get to witness how beautiful (space) weather can be!!!

[theculturedmarxist]

This book will concern itself least of all with those unrelated psychological researches which are now so often  substituted for social and historical analysis. Foremost in our field of vision will stand the great, moving forces of history,  which are super-personal in character. Monarchy is one of them. But all these forces operate through people. And monarchy is by  its very principle bound up with the personal. This in itself justifies an interest in the personality of that monarch whom the  process of social development brought face to face with a revolution. Moreover, we hope to show in what follows, partially at  least, just where in a personality the strictly personal ends – often much sooner than we think – and how frequently  the “distinguishing traits” of a person are merely individual scratches made by a higher law of development.

Nicholas II inherited from his ancestors not only a giant empire, but also a revolution. And they did not bequeath him one  quality which would have made him capable of governing an empire or even a province or a county. To that historic flood which was  rolling its billows each one closer to the gates of his palace, the last Romanov opposed only a dumb indifference. It seemed as  though between his consciousness and his epoch there stood some transparent but absolutely impenetrable medium.

People surrounding the tzar often recalled after the revolution that in the most tragic moments of his reigns – at the  time of the surrender of Port Arthur and the sinking of the fleet at Tsushima, and ten years later at the time of the retreat of  the Russian troops from Galicia, and then two years later during the days preceding his abdication when all those around him were  depressed, alarmed, shaken – Nicholas alone preserved his tranquillity. He would inquire as usual how many versts he had  covered in his journeys about Russia, would recall episodes of hunting expeditions in the past, anecdotes of official meetings,  would interest himself generally in the little rubbish of the day’s doings, while thunders roared over him and lightnings  flashed. “What is this?” asked one of his attendant generals, “a gigantic, almost unbelievable self-restraint,  the product of breeding, of a belief in the divine predetermination of events? Or is it inadequate consciousness?” The  answer is more than half included in the question. The so-called “breeding” of the tzar, his ability to control  himself in the most extraordinary circumstances, cannot be explained by a mere external training; its essence was an inner  indifference, a poverty of spiritual forces, a weakness of the impulses of the will. That mask of indifference which was called  breeding in certain circles, was a natural part of Nicholas at birth.

The tzar’s diary is the best of all testimony. From day to day and from year to year drags along upon its pages the  depressing record of spiritual emptiness. “Walked long and killed two crows. Drank tea by daylight.” Promenades on  foot, rides in a boat. And then again crows, and again tea. All on the borderline of physiology. Recollections of church  ceremonies are jotted down in the same tone as a drinking party.

In the days preceding the opening of the State Duma, when the whole country was shaking with convulsions, Nicholas wrote:  “April 14. Took a walk in a thin shirt and took up paddling again. Had tea in a balcony. Stana dined and took a ride with  us. Read.” Not a word as to the subject of his reading. Some sentimental English romance? Or a report from the Police  Department? “April 15: Accepted Witte’s resignation. Marie and Dmitri to dinner. Drove them home to the  palace.”

On the day of the decision to dissolve the Duma, when the court as well as the liberal circles were going through a paroxysm  of fright, the tzar wrote in his diary: “July 7. Friday. Very busy morning. Half hour late to breakfast with the officers  ... A storm came up and it was very muggy. We walked together. Received Goremykin. Signed a decree dissolving the Duma! Dined  with Olga and Petia. Read all evening.” An exclamation point after the coming dissolution of the Duma is the highest  expression of his emotions. The deputies of the dispersed Duma summoned the people to refuse to pay taxes. A series of military  uprisings followed: in Sveaborg, Kronstadt, on ships, in army units. The revolutionary terror against high officials was renewed  on an unheard-of scale. The tzar writes: “July 9. Sunday. It has happened! The Duma was closed today. At breakfast after  Mass long faces were noticeable among many ... The weather was fine. On our walk we met Uncle Misha who came over yesterday from  Gatchina. Was quietly busy until dinner and all evening. Went padding in a canoe.” It was in a canoe he went paddling  – that is told. But with what he was busy all evening is not indicated. So it was always.

And further in those same fatal days: “July 14. Got dressed and rode a bicycle to the bathing beach and bathed enjoyably  in the sea.” “July 15. Bathed twice. It was very hot. Only us two at dinner. A storm passed over.” “July  19. Bathed in the morning. Received at the farm. Uncle Vladimir and Chagin lunched with us.” An insurrection and explosions  of dynamite are barely touched upon with a single phrase, “Pretty doings!” – astonishing in its imperturbable  indifference, which never rose to conscious cynicism.

“At 9:30 in the morning we rode out to the Caspian regiment ... walked for a long time. The weather was wonderful.  Bathed in the sea. After tea received Lvov and Guchkov.” Not a word of the fact that this unexpected reception of the two  liberals was brought about by the attempt of Stolypin to include opposition leaders in his ministry. Prince Lvov, the future head  of the Provisional Government, said of that reception at the time: “I expected to see the sovereign stricken with grief,  but instead of that there came out to meet me a jolly sprightly fellow in a raspberry-coloured shirt.” The tzar’s  outlook was not broader than that of a minor police official – with this difference, that the latter would have a better  knowledge of reality and be less burdened with superstitions. The sole paper which Nicholas read for years, and from which he  derived his ideas, was a weekly published on state revenue by Prince Meshchersky, a vile, bribed journalist of the reactionary  bureaucratic clique, despised even in his own circle. The tzar kept his outlook unchanged through two wars and two revolutions.  Between his consciousness and events stood always that impenetrable medium – indifference. Nicholas was called, not without  foundation, a fatalist. It is only necessary to add that his fatalism was the exact opposite of an active belief in his  “star.” Nicholas indeed considered himself unlucky. His fatalism was only a form of passive self-defence against  historic evolution, and went hand in hand with an arbitrariness, trivial in psychological motivation, but monstrous in its  consequences.

“I wish it and therefore it must be —,” writes Count Witte. “That motto appeared in all the activities  of this weak ruler, who only through weakness did all the things which characterised his reign – a wholesale shedding of  more or less innocent blood, for the most part without aim.”

Nicholas is sometimes compared with his half-crazy great-great-grandfather Paul, who was strangled by a camarilla acting in  agreement with his own son, Alexander “the Blessed.” These two Romanovs were actually alike in their distrust of  everybody due to a distrust of themselves, their touchiness as of omnipotent nobodies, their feeling of abnegation, their  consciousness, as you might say, of being crowned pariahs. But Paul was incomparably more colourful; there was an element of  fancy in his rantings, however irresponsible. In his descendant everything was dim; there was not one sharp trait.

Nicholas was not only unstable, but treacherous. Flatterers called him a charmer, bewitcher, because of his gentle way with  the courtiers. But the tzar reserved his special caresses for just those officials whom he had decided to dismiss. Charmed beyond  measure at a reception, the minister would go home and find a letter requesting his resignation. That was a kind of revenge on  the tzar’s part for his own nonentity.

Nicholas recoiled in hostility before everything gifted and significant. He felt at ease only among completely mediocre and  brainless people, saintly fakers, holy men, to whom he did not have to look up. He had his amour propre, indeed it was  rather keen. But it was not active, not possessed of a grain of initiative, enviously defensive. He selected his ministers on a  principle of continual deterioration. Men of brain and character he summoned only in extreme situations when there was no other  way out, just as we call in a surgeon to save our lives. It was so with Witte, and afterwards with Stolypin. The tzar treated  both with ill-concealed hostility. As soon as the crisis had passed, he hastened to part with these counsellors who were too tall  for him. This selection operated so systematically that the president of the last Duma, Rodzianko, on the 7th of January 1917, with the revolution already knocking at the doors, ventured to say to the tzar: “Your  Majesty, there is not one reliable or honest man left around you; all the best men have been removed or have retired. There  remain only those of ill repute.”

All the efforts of the liberal bourgeoisie to find a common language with the court came to nothing. The tireless and noisy  Rodzianko tried to shake up the tzar with his reports, but in vain. The latter gave no answer either to argument or to impudence,  but quietly made ready to dissolve the Duma. Grand Duke Dmitri, a former favourite of the tzar, and future accomplice in the  murder of Rasputin, complained to his colleague, Prince Yussupov, that the tzar at headquarters was becoming every day more  indifferent to everything around him. In Dmitri’s opinion the tzar was being fed some kind of dope which had a benumbing  action upon his spiritual faculties. “Rumours went round,” writes the liberal historian Miliukov, “that this  condition of mental and moral apathy was sustained in the tzar by an increased use of alcohol.” This was all fancy or  exaggeration. The tzar had no need of narcotics: the fatal “dope” was in his blood. Its symptoms merely seemed  especially striking on the background of those great events of war and domestic crisis which led up to the revolution. Rasputin,  who was a psychologist, said briefly of the tzar that he “lacked insides.”

This dim, equable and “well-bred” man was cruel – not with the active cruelty of Ivan the Terrible or of  Peter, in the pursuit of historic aims – What had Nicholas the Second in common with them? – but with the cowardly  cruelty of the late born, frightened at his own doom. At the very dawn of his reign Nicholas praised the Phanagoritsy regiment as  “fine fellows” for shooting down workers. He always “read with satisfaction” how they flogged with whips  the bob-haired girl-students, or cracked the heads of defenceless people during Jewish pogroms. This crowned black sheep  gravitated with all his soul to the very dregs of society, the Black Hundred hooligans. He not only paid them generously from the  state treasury, but loved to chat with them about their exploits, and would pardon them when they accidentally got mixed up in  the murder of an opposition deputy. Witte, who stood at the head of the government during the putting down of the first  revolution, has written in his memoirs: “When news of the useless cruel antics of the chiefs of those detachments reached  the sovereign, they met with his approval, or in any case his defence.” In answer to the demand of the governor-general of  the Baltic States that he stop a certain lieutenant-captain, Richter, who was “executing on his own authority and without  trial non-resistant persons,” the tzar wrote on the report: “Ah, what a fine fellow!” Such encouragements are  innumerable. This “charmer,” without will, without aim, without imagination, was more awful than all the tyrants of  ancient and modern history.

The tzar was mightily under the influence of the tzarina, an influence which increased with the years and the difficulties.  Together they constituted a kind of unit – and that combination shows already to what an extent the personal, under  pressure of circumstances, is supplemented by the group. But first we must speak of the tzarina herself.

Maurice Paléologue, the French ambassador at Petrograd during the war, a refined psychologist for French academicians  and janitresses, offers a meticulously licked portrait of the last tzarina: “Moral restlessness, a chronic sadness,  infinite longing, intermittent ups and downs of strength, anguishing thoughts of the invisible other world, superstitions –  are not all these traits, so clearly apparent in the personality of the empress, the characteristic traits of the Russian  people?” Strange as it may seem, there is in this saccharine lie just a grain of truth. The Russian satirist Saltykov, with  some justification, called the ministers and governors from among the Baltic barons “Germans with a Russian soul.” It  is indubitable that aliens, in no way connected with the people, developed the most pure culture of the “genuine  Russian” administrator.

But why did the people repay with such open hatred a tzarina who, in the words of Paléologue, had so completely  assimilated their soul? The answer is simple. In order to justify her new situation, this German woman adopted with a kind of  cold fury all the traditions and nuances of Russian mediaevalism, the most meagre and crude of all mediaevalisms, in that very  period when the people were making mighty efforts to free themselves from it. This Hessian princess was literally possessed by  the demon of autocracy. Having risen from her rural corner to the heights of Byzantine despotism, she would not for anything take  a step down. In the orthodox religion she found a mysticism and a magic adapted to her new lot. She believed the more inflexibly  in her vocation, the more naked became the foulness of the old régime. With a strong character and a gift for dry and hard  exaltations, the tzarina supplemented the weak-willed tzar, ruling over him.

On March 17, 1916, a year before the revolution, when the tortured country was already writhing in the grip of defeat and  ruin, the tzarina wrote to her husband at military headquarters: “You must not give indulgences, a responsible ministry,  etc. ... or anything that they want. This must be your war and your peace, and the honour yours and our  fatherland’s, and not by any means the Duma’s. They have not the right to say a single word in these matters.”  This was at any rate a thoroughgoing programme. And it was in just this way that she always had the whip hand over the  continually vacillating tzar.

After Nicholas’ departure to the army in the capacity of fictitious commander-in-chief, the tzarina began openly to take  charge of internal affairs. The ministers came to her with reports as to a regent. She entered into a conspiracy with a small  camarilla against the Duma, against the ministers, against the staff-generals, against the whole world – to some extent  indeed against the tzar. On December 6, 1916, the tzarina wrote to the tzar: “... Once you have said that you want to keep  Protopopov, how does he (Premier Trepov) go against you? Bring down your first on the table. Don’t yield. Be the boss. Obey  your firm little wife and our Friend. Believe in us.” Again three days late: “You know you are right. Carry your head  high. Command Trepov to work with him ... Strike your fist on the table.” Those phrases sound as though they were made up,  but they are taken from authentic letters. Besides, you cannot make up things like that.

On December 13 the tzarina suggested to the tzar: “Anything but this responsible ministry about which everybody has gone  crazy. Everything is getting quiet and better, but people want to feel your hand. How long they have been saying to me, for whole  years, the same thing: ’Russia loves to feel the whip.’ That is their nature!” This orthodox Hessian,  with a Windsor upbringing and a Byzantine crown on her head, not only “incarnates” the Russian soul, but also  organically despises it. Their nature demands the whip – writes the Russian tzarina to the Russian tzar about the  Russian people, just two months and a half before the monarchy tips over into the abyss.

In contrast to her force of character, the intellectual force of the tzarina is not higher, but rather lower than her  husband’s. Even more than he, she craves the society of simpletons. The close and long-lasting friendship of the tzar and  tzarina with their lady-in-waiting Vyrubova gives a measure of the spiritual stature of this autocratic pair. Vyrubova has  described herself as a fool, and this is not modesty. Witte, to whom one cannot deny an accurate eye, characterised her as  “a most commonplace, stupid, Petersburg young lady, homely as a bubble in the biscuit dough.” In the society of this  person, with whom elderly officials, ambassadors and financiers obsequiously flirted, and who had just enough brains not to  forget about her own pockets, the tzar and tzarina would pass many hours, consulting her about affairs, corresponding with her  and about her. She was more influential than the State Duma, and even than the ministry.

But Vyrubova herself was only an instrument of “The Friend,” whose authority superseded all three. “... This  is my private opinion,” writes the tzarina to the tzar, “I will find out what our Friend thinks.” The  opinion of the “Friend” is not private, it decides. “... I am firm,” insists the tzarina a few weeks  later, “but listen to me, i.e. this means our Friend, and trust in everything ... I suffer for you as for a gentle  soft-hearted child – who needs guidance, but listens to bad counsellors, while a man sent by God is telling him what he  should do.”

The Friend sent by God was Gregory Rasputin.

“... The prayers and the help of our Friend – then all will be well.”

“If we did not have Him, all would have been over long ago. I am absolutely convinced of that.”

Throughout the whole reign of Nicholas and Alexandra soothsayers and hysterics were imported for the court not only from all  over Russia, but from other countries. Special official purveyors arose, who would gather around the momentary oracle, forming a  powerful Upper Chamber attached to the monarch. There was no lack of bigoted old women with the title of countess, nor of  functionaries weary of doing nothing, nor of financiers who had entire ministries in their hire. With a jealous eye on the  unchartered competition of mesmerists and sorcerers, the high priesthood of the Orthodox Church would hasten to pry their way  into the holy of holies of the intrigue. Witte called this ruling circle, against which he himself twice stubbed his toe,  “the leprous court camarilla.”

The more isolated the dynasty became, and the more unsheltered the autocrat felt, the more he needed some help from the other  world. Certain savages, in order to bring good weather, wave in the air a shingle on a string. The tzar and tzarina used shingles  for the greatest variety of purposes. In the tzar’s train there was a whole chapel full of large and small images, and all  sorts of fetiches, which were brought to bear, first against the Japanese, then against the German artillery.

The level of the court circle really had not changed much from generation to generation. Under Alexander II, called the  “Liberator,” the grand dukes had sincerely believed in house spirits and witches. Under Alexander III it was no  better, only quieter. The “leprous camarilla” had existed always, changed only its personnel and its method. Nicholas  II did not create, but inherited from his ancestors, this court atmosphere of savage mediaevalism. But the country during these  same decades had been changing, its problems growing more complex, its culture rising to a higher level. The court circle was  thus left far behind.

Although the monarchy did under compulsion make concessions to the new forces, nevertheless inwardly it completely failed to  become modernised. On the contrary it withdrew into itself. Its spirit of mediaevalism thickened under the pressure of hostility  and fear, until it acquired the character of a disgusting nightmare overhanging the country.

Towards November 1905 – that is, at the most critical moment of the first revolution – the tzar writes in his  diary: “We got acquainted with a man of God, Gregory, from the Tobolsk province.” That was Rasputin – a  Siberian peasant with a bald scar on his head, the result of a beating for horse-stealing. Put forward at an appropriate moment,  this “Man of God” soon found official helpers – or rather they found him – and thus was formed a new  ruling class which got a firm hold of the tzarina, and through her of the tzar.

From the winter of 1913-14 it was openly said in Petersburg society that all high appointments, posts and contracts depended  upon the Rasputin clique. The “Elder” himself gradually turned into a state institution. He was carefully guarded,  and no less carefully sought after by the competing ministers. Spies of the Police Department kept a diary of his life by hours,  and did not fail to report how on a visit to his home village of Pokrovsky he got into a drunken and bloody fight with his own  father on the street. On the same day that this happened – September 9, 1915 – Rasputin sent two friendly telegrams,  one to Tzarskoe Selo, to the tzarina, the other to headquarters to the tzar. In epic language the police spies registered from  day to day the revels of the Friend. “He returned today 5 o’clock in the morning completely drunk.” “On  the night of the 25-26th the actress V. spent the night with Rasputin.” “He arrived with  Princess D. (the wife of a gentleman of the bedchamber of the Tzar’s court) at the Hotel Astoria.”...And right beside  this: “Came home from Tzarskoe Selo about 11 o’clock in the evening.” “Rasputin came home with Princess  Sh- very drunk and together they went out immediately.” In the morning or evening of the following day a trip to Tzarskoe  Selo. To a sympathetic question from the spy as to why the Elder was thoughtful, the answer came: “Can’t decide  whether to convoke the Duma or not.” And then again: “He came home at 5 in the morning pretty drunk.” Thus for  months and years the melody was played on three keys: “Pretty drunk,” “Very drunk,” and “Completely  drunk.” These communications of state importance were brought together and countersigned by the general of gendarmes,  Gorbachev.

The bloom of Raputin’s influence lasted six years, the last years of the monarchy. “His life in Petrograd,”  says Prince Yussupov, who participated to some extent in that life, and afterward killed Rasputin, “became a continual  revel, the durnken debauch of a galley slave who had come into an unexpected fortune.” “I had at my  disposition,” wrote the president of the Duma, Rodzianko, “a whole mass of letters from mothers whose daughters had  been dishonoured by this insolent rake.” Nevertheless the Petrograd metropolitan, Pitirim, owed his position to Rasputin,  as also the almost illiterate Archbishop Varnava. The Procuror of the Holy Synod, Sabler, was long sustained by Rasputin; and  Premier Kokovtsev was removed at his wish, having refused to receive the “Elder.” Rasputin appointed Stürmer  President of the Council of Ministers, Protopopov Minister of the Interior, the new Procuror of the Synod, Raev, and many others.  The ambassador of the French republic, Paléologue, sought an interview with Rasputin, embraced him and cried,  “Voilà, un véritable illuminé!” hoping in this way to win the heart of the tzarina to the  cause of France. The Jew Simanovich, financial agent of the “Elder,” himself under the eye of the Secret Police as a  nightclub gambler and usurer – introduced into the Ministry of Justice through Rasputin the completely dishonest creature  Dobrovolsky.

“Keep by you the little list,” writes the tzarina to the tzar, in regard to new appointments. “Our friend  has asked that you talk all this over with Protopopov.” Two days later: “Our friend says that Stürmer may remain  a few days longer as President of the Council of Ministers.” And again: “Protopopov venerates our friend and will be  blessed.”

On one of those days when the police spies were counting up the number of bottles and women, the tzarina grieved in a letter  to the tzar: “They accuse Rasputin of kissing women, etc. Read the apostles; they kissed everybody as a form of  greeting.” This reference to the apostles would hardly convince the police spies. In another letter the tzarina goes still  farther. “During vespers I thought so much about our friend,” she writes, “how the Scribes and Pharisees are  persecuting Christ pretending that they are so perfect ... yes, in truth no man is a prophet in his own country.”

The comparison of Rasputin and Christ was customary in that circle, and by no means accidental. The alarm of the royal couple  before the menacing forces of history was too sharp to be satisfied with an impersonal God and the futile shadow of a Biblical  Christ. They needed a second coming of “the Son of Man.” In Rasputin the rejected and agonising monarchy found a  Christ in its own image.

“If there had been no Rasputin,” said Senator Tagantsev, a man of the old régime, “it would have been  necessary to invent one.” There is a good deal more in these words than their author imagined. If by the word  hooliganism we understand the extreme expression of those anti-social parasite elements at the bottom of society, we may  define Rasputinism as a crowned hooliganism at its very top.

[samayla]

An Utterly Impractical Magician

A Jane Eyre/Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell fusion fic. 

Also on AO3

Summary: When John Reed burnt Thomas Godbless’ book of magic to spite his cousin, he had no idea how drastically he would alter both her fate and that of English magic.

This fic is a long term project that I’ve been working on for ages... This chapter has been sitting in Scrivener, ready to go, for about a month, but I didn’t want to post it before I had more done. I don’t have much more ready to post, but I’ve decided I don’t care. Expect sporadic, slow updates on this one, but for those of you who enjoy such things, I hope this fic is worth the wait!

Tagging those of you who expressed interest when I asked all those months ago: @bookhobbit @katie-beluga @bryonyashley @wolfinthethorns @kaethe-nicole @warsawmouse @cassandravision @mythopoeticreality @jmlascar @seriouslythoughguys @pink-lemonade-rose @isawatreetoday @rude-are-food @the-stars-above28 @the-candor-shadowhunter 

I think I got everyone who’d expressed interest. Let me know if you’d like to be included or removed from the tag list!

1 The book of Thomas Godbless

Gateshead House, November 1804

The widow Sarah Reed of Gateshead House was considered by all her acquaintance to be an exceedingly fashionable woman.

Her clothing and speech were always chosen with the utmost care, in accordance with the latest London fashions. Even her remote Yorkshire home, though it could of course not be held accountable for its unfortunate location, was considered perfectly lovely by all the great London ladies. The rooms were well-appointed in all the latest colors. The fabrics and drapes were all of the latest patterns and styles. The furnishings were arranged to create the most charming settings for morning chats and merry luncheons and afternoon teas and grand dinners.

Even her library was well-stocked with a great many titles, all pleasingly coordinated by subject and author and color of binding — though, in accordance with the very latest fashion, Mrs Reed had only the most perfectly superficial appreciation of her collection. In fact, the only book in her great library that ever received much of that fashionable lady’s attention at all was Proscriptions for the Care and Correction of Children by James Wallace Digby, by which she hoped to ensure her children would always do her as much credit as her hat or her mantelpiece.

Though Digby’s book was filled with all manner of valuable lessons and instructive anecdotes, Mrs Reed was in truth far too weak-willed and changeable a woman to make much real use of it. John Reed, Mrs Reed’s eldest and only son, was always well-dressed, and he stood with the bearing of a young gentleman, but he was prone to fits of temper and destructive tantrums. Miss Eliza Reed was pleasing enough to look at, but spent most of her energy imitating her mother’s fashionable whims and hiding from her French tutor. And Miss Georgiana Reed, a doll-like little creature with manners that charmed all her mother’s friends, had little in the way of independent thought, and was easily swayed to either good or ill by her elder siblings, as she could not tell the difference between such acts herself. In spite of their shortcomings, the Reed children were pretty and quiet in company - much like her hat - and so Mrs Reed felt she was quite free to be exceedingly fond of them.

But Mrs Reed had in her charge one other child — Jane Eyre, the favorite niece of her late husband — and this child was as far from her aunt’s ideal as it was possible for a child to be. All those shortcomings to which Mrs Reed was blind in her own children, became glaringly obvious to her in Jane Eyre. Perpetually pale and thin, Jane lacked her cousins’ lively spirits. She seemed to her aunt unwilling to be pleased with anything, and she argued back when she had much better remain silent. Indeed, poor Mrs Reed could scarcely speak in the girl’s presence without being forced to hear how unfair a thing was, or how a thing was really John Reed’s fault, or how Eliza put Georgiana up to it, or how any one or all of her natural children had started the whole affair, and Jane was merely defending herself, or trying to fix it, or uninvolved entirely. The lies she concocted to escape blame never failed to shock Mrs Reed: if it wasn’t the fault of one of the other children, it was that of faeries or ghosts or talking trees!

Her deepest fear was that John or her girls should pick up on Jane’s nonsense. Little harm could come from it in the case of the girls, as ladies were simply not magicians. But John was beginning to talk of possible careers, and his mother could not bear the idea that he might pursue magic, as Jane’s late father had done. She was not sure which would be worse: the stuffy, reclusive theoretical magician, who was prone to unkempt hair and a decided thickness about the middle, or the yellow-curtained vagabonding magician, with his rotted teeth and ragged hat. She shuddered to think on it. So she did her level best to discourage Jane’s fascination with magic, and if her children did not get on with their cousin either, then Mrs Reed was content to turn a blind eye — in the interest of their future happiness, of course.

Jane, for her own part, was quite content to pass the majority of her time in solitary reading.

Another rainy, dreary day in November had forced Jane and her cousins indoors yet again. Jane did not mind the weather in the least, but six days of rain had put John Reed in an increasingly foul temper. Fearful of becoming the object of his ire, Jane had built herself a little makeshift fortress in the library’s window seat. The thick curtains blocked the fire’s warmth, leaving only the chill from the rain-speckled window to pool around her little body, but this was a favorite hiding place of hers. No matter how many times she chose it, her dimwitted cousins never thought to check it first. Even if John was searching for her already, she should have an hour or perhaps more, before he thought to look behind the curtain. She pulled a shawl from its hiding place beneath the cushion and wrapped it around her shoulders. The cushion, she wedged up along the window to guard against the damp glass, and she settled back in the warmth of a stray sunbeam with her favorite book.

The book of Thomas Godbless had no title. A rather enigmatic swirl of gold leaf instead graced the front cover. Whenever Jane ran her fingers over it, she fancied she could almost understand whatever word that swirl was supposed to represent, like a voice half-heard in another room. It was magic, Jane was certain of it. The same magic that returned the book safely to the library every time Mrs Reed removed it. Thomas Godbless was supposed to be illiterate — several of her father’s other books about magic said as much — so Jane had come to the happy conclusion only a few weeks prior that the book was written by magic, perhaps even with the assistance of Godbless’ fairy servant, Dick-Come-Tuesday. She murmured the fairy’s name, reveling in the whimsy of it, and swore she could feel the book quiver in answer.

She opened the book carefully, ever mindful of the imperfect stitching of its pages, and lost herself in its eccentric spellings and emphatic flourishes.

“Little Rat,” came John Reed’s voice, singsong in the hallway. Jane started and dropped the book, which hit the floor with a resounding thud. “Madam Mope!” John Reed tore the curtain back from Jane’s hiding place. “There you are! Reading again, of course.” He snatched up her book before she could and held it up out of her reach, regarding it with a sneer.

“Give it back!” cried Jane.

Her cousin flipped carelessly through the pages, clearly enjoying the way she cringed at his treatment of the book. “Beg me,” said John. When she did not obey immediately, he turned the book to dangle it by its green leather covers. Jane lunged for the book, but he shook it menacingly, and two pages slipped out of their binding.

“Please, give it back, John.”

He clicked his tongue in disapproval and shook the book again. More pages drifted to the floor, rustling like autumn leaves. “I am Master Reed to you, Pest.”

“Please, Master Reed,” said Jane, with as much subservience as her bold little heart could muster. “Please, give me my book.”

For a moment, Jane thought he meant to return it. He closed the covers and collected the loose pages, tucking them neatly inside, but then everything was stars, and there was a sharp pain in the side of her face. He’d struck her with the heavy volume. “It is not your book, Worm,” said John. He seized her arm to make sure she was paying attention to his next words. “Everything here belongs to me, and I think this looks a great deal like kindling.”

He flung the book into the fireplace.

With a scream, Jane shoved him away. He struck his head on the library table, but Jane scarcely noticed. She threw herself down on the hearth, intent on rescuing her beloved book. Jane plucked a large portion of the book out of the flames, but saw to her dismay that the pages that fell out were entirely blank. Horrified, she looked back to the pages still curling in the flames and frantically pulled them out. Those pages too, had gone blank, but in the sparks and embers and flames flickering around her fingers, she could almost see the words. Could almost hear them in the crackle and pop of the logs. She gasped and inhaled a great mouthful of ashes.

The hot ash was everywhere, in her mouth and nose, her eyes, muffling her hearing. Jane blinked hard to clear her vision, and suddenly, the library was gone. In its place was a vast landscape of open, flat moors and endless, flat sky. Jane felt as if she were a flower, pressed between the pages of some great book, preserved, rather than destroyed by the pressure. A wind rose up, smelling of old paper and dusty leather, and the rustling of the heather became a million million whispering voices. The flat sky became a fathomless depth above her, filling with clouds carried in on the wind. Every curve of cloud was a flourish of ink on the vast page of the sky. Then it was raining, and every drop was a word she could almost understand. The wind whipped around her, pulling the pins from her hair and making a pennant of it. The rain soaked her dress, turning its soft red the color of blood. Then the rain was not rain at all, but ink, and she was black with it: her dress, her arms, her hair.

And then she was back in the library. The howl of the wind became John Reed wailing for his Mama and Jane screaming for her book. Bessie dragged her away from the fire grate, her strong arms wrapped around Jane’s thin waist. Jane’s dress was soaked, and her arms, still stretched desperately toward the flames, were black. The hair straggling in front of her face was black as well. She froze in Bessie’s grip, paralyzed by fright.

She’d just done magic. That other place, with its ink-filled sky, it had been magic, or the place where the magic came from. She wasn’t entirely sure. But in spite of the magic, the book was gone. Pages lay scattered around the grate, blank and half-burnt, and everything was covered in a fine sheen of ash. Jane let out a hoarse sob as Mrs Reed flew into the room and went at once to her son’s side.

“My darling boy,” cried Mrs Reed, her hands fluttering ineffectually about her son’s wounded head. “What happened?”

John Reed raised one quivering hand to point accusingly at his cousin.

“Whatever has that little devil done to you this time?” She didn’t wait for an answer before she rounded on Bessie, who was still working to restrain Jane. “Call for a doctor! And get her out of here! Put her in the Red Room, and have one of the footmen do it, if you can’t manage her yourself.”

The Red Room, as its rather unimaginative name suggested, was a bedroom Mrs Reed had done up entirely in her late husband’s favorite color. It had been his bedroom before his death, and afterward, she hadn’t the heart to change a thing, in spite of numerous updates to the decor of the rest of the house. Mr Reed’s favorite books still lined the little bookshelf in the corner; his clothing still rested inside the bureau; his armchair beside the window still smelled faintly of cigar smoke when the sun warmed the fabric of the cushions. So little had the room changed in the years since her Uncle Reed’s death, that Jane felt quite certain his spirit had lingered too, long after his body had been removed.

Thomas the footman carried Jane to the Red Room, deposited her in the middle of the floor, and fled the room at once, fearful of the usual tantrum this treatment inspired. He locked the door hastily behind himself, but for the first time in her life, Jane had fears that outweighed those of disturbing her uncle’s restless spirit. Her book was gone. It would not be coming back, of that much she was sure. The painful state of her hands dashed any hope that the ancient pages might have survived the flames. Equally certain was the fact that she had somehow become entangled with magic.

A flicker of movement out of the corner of her eye had her heart jumping in her chest. A tiny creature of ink and blood was staring at her from over the dressing table. As its mismatched eyes widened, and a blackened hand rose to its mouth in horror, Jane realized it was her own reflection in the mirror. She had become some fae creature, the changeling child her aunt had always feared. The now odd-eyed stare proved it. Where once her eyes had both been a warm, if unremarkable, brown, the left was now a pale ash grey.

Ink dripped from the singed ends of her hair and streaked blackly from her eyes, and Jane had the notion that she should melt on the spot, become nothing more than an ink stain marring the painfully cheerful rose pattern of the rug. The thought conjured an image of her aunt’s face, and the horror that would no doubt contort her features if she were to find that Jane’s final act in this world was to ruin her beloved rug. She choked, torn halfway between a laugh and a sob, and sank to the floor in a heap of sodden fabric.

As panic gave way to exhaustion, the pain in her hands began to make itself known in earnest. It began as a dull throb in time with her heartbeat, but it quickly grew to the point that Jane felt certain her hands must still be aflame. She bit her lip and wiped them clear of the blackness - soot, she discovered, not ink - using her wet skirt as a handkerchief. She only managed a few fingers before the pain, and a cluster of sparks around the edge of her vision, forced her to stop.

Her head whipped up, but the fireplace was cold. It was always cold, ever since Uncle Reed had slept his last night there.

Sparks flared again in the corner of her eye, by the armchair this time, and Jane staggered to her feet. More sparks by the bed, then by the bureau, then flickering across the ceiling. More and more sparks, until everything in the room was limned in dancing light. It was the fire, Jane was sure of it. The fire that had tasted her hands and consumed her book, had come back to claim the rest of her.

She raced to the door and beat frantically upon it, heedless of the pain in her hands, as she screamed for Thomas to let her out, or for Bessie to come and get her, or anyone at all to come and put out the fire. Bessie at last threw open the door in a great panic, knocking Jane to the floor.

“Oh, Miss Jane!” said Bessie. “What a scream! Whatever is the matter?”

But Jane’s tongue tangled on the taste of ashes, and she could not make the words come, only strangled-sounding sobs. She could barely see Bessie for the sparks filling her vision. She crawled toward the door and clawed her way back to her feet, clinging to Bessie’s black skirt as if it could save her from the fire.

Footsteps in the outer passage announced the arrival of someone else. “What is going on here?” demanded Mrs Reed. “Bessie! I’m surprised at you! The doctor is in with John, and all this screaming and carrying on is disturbing his work. I believe I told you I would fetch Jane from the Red Room myself when I was prepared to deal with her behavior.”

“You did, ma’am,” Bessie confirmed over Jane’s continued hysterics, beginning to push her away from the door, back into the Red Room. Jane wailed, and the sparks flared bright, eating away everything in sight. Her last panicked thought before consciousness fled her was that they would all burn.

[themusicenthusiast]

Thursday, December 6th, 2018 – Colter Wall Shares Some Songs of the Plains and Other Tales, Maintains an Intimate, Singer-songwriter Vibe at His Largest Dallas Show Yet

It turned out to be a dreary day in North Texas, the occasional shower and near constant drizzle leading one to want to minimize their time outside. Because of that, the Granada Theater acted as an ideal respite from the gloomy weather, especially for anyone who wanted to see one of country music’s rising stars. Colter Wall is a fascinating figure in the world of country music, given that the genre has largely shied away from its roots, mainstream country artists being pop acts as much as anything. Yet the twenty-three-year-old man from Saskatchewan, Canada is a country purist, one that identifies with the old guard more than anything and has developed a sound to match. And while that may have fallen out of favor with the mainstream crowd, Wall has, rather quickly, won over a throng of loyal supporters through the intricately crafted stories that he tells and the relentless touring he has done to support his albums. His visit to Dallas on this Thursday night was in support of the nearly two-month-old Songs of the Plains (out via Young Mary's Record Co./Thirty Tigers), a near sold-out crowd welcoming him back to North Texas, eager to hear some new music along with experiencing their favorites of Wall’s once more. Presented by Spune, the event boasted a mostly Texas-based lineup thanks to Joshua Ray Walker and Vincent Neil Emerson acting as the supporting acts. The latter has been on tour with Wall and performed as a trio, and while the listeners enjoyed Emerson and company well enough, it was Walker who set things on fire and had people raving. A rising talent within the D-FW music scene, the singer-songwriter acted as if he had something to prove as he made quick work of ten songs. Spectators were shocked to discover he hailed from right in their own backyard; and it was impressive to see a man that practically nobody there was familiar with, armed only with a guitar and his voice, command the crowd in the way that he did. It was evident the songs meant something, many striking an emotional chord, the melancholy tones that pervaded throughout the majority of them making one just want to break down and cry, even if there was no real explicable reason for it. They just had that touch, that emotional weight that allowed them to connect with people; a hallmark of a talented musician. They weren’t the only Texas artists to be seen this night. As the screen concealing the stage was raised, fanfare filling the room to welcome Wall out, concertgoers were instead addressed by Paul Cauthen. The Austin-based musician piled on the praise as he spoke of his good friend Colter Wall, promising everyone an excellent evening before the man of the hour finally emerged. “My name is Colter. I appreciate you guys coming out…” His greeting was followed by an explanation of his first song, his “favorite kind of song”, a traditional one, and one that was a cowboy song no less.

The first few cuts were all him and his acoustic guitar, evoking a singer-songwriter vibe, one that was conducive of storytelling. The chattering that had been ongoing during the previous two acts ceased. The rare clank of a beer bottle being thrown into the waste bin was the only noise that punctuated the music and even that was done carefully as the near one thousand patrons gave Wall their absolute attention. His rendition of “Bury Me Not On The Lone Prairie” was stunning. Mournful and teeming with emotions he made it feel like something he had penned, giving credence to the notion that Wall is an old soul; his booming voice and heavy drawl creeping out as he assumed the identity of the character he was singing about, leaving the nonchalant demeanor of his own persona that he had displayed well behind. He shared some anecdotes for the two originals that proceeded that opener, speaking of how “John Beyers (Camaro Song)” came together, noting that it was about two guys who drove around in matching Camaro’s who had their differences and ultimately took it out on one another’s car. (It was an early highlight of the set.) He then earned some laughs upon mentioning the idea for “The Trains Are Gone” came to him after reading a book, quipping, “If you can believe that,” regarding the reading part. That segment seemed to have been carefully curated -- even if those tracks were recorded as bare-bones numbers. Live you could experience the full scope of what they were going after, such as mortality in the case of “The Trains Are Gone”, and just how powerful they were. All by himself Wall had proved himself to be a force to be reckoned with, one capable of captivating a sea of spectators, and that was sure to only be bolstered by the addition of his band. From a drummer and bassist to a pedal steel guitarist who dabbled on a dobro as well as a backing vocalist/harmonica player, he welcomed his band mates to the stage as they proceeded to raise a more of a ruckus. The autobiographical “Thirteen Silver Dollars” did just that as the quintet dove right in to the lead track from Wall’s self-titled release. They livened it up immensely, to the point that the tune about an unexpected run-in with law felt like a party anthem, something that felt as if it were indicative of how the remainder of the set would play it. To an extent that was true, though the rest of this 74-minute long set was much more nuanced than that, the primary focus not being on invigorating the listeners so much as it was immersing them in the stories that were being shared and making them feel authentic enough that everyone could believe they had lived it. The attendees were all the more enamored with that approach as it better showcased Wall’s natural abilities. While comprised largely of original material, the setlist was fleshed out by more than half a dozen covers. It was a surprising move, considering most artists keep covers to a minimum, if they’re even included at all. In most instances I would say that was excess, but in Wall’s case that actually worked. Be them old traditional songs or ones from respected singer-songwriters, they all fit well within Wall’s wheelhouse and were spread out; “Big Ball's in Cowtown” being one of the country music staples that received a subtle makeover from Wall and had several people dancing along. Yet at other times, even with the bolder sound the full band brought, patrons remained still, utterly transfixed by the character driven songs like “Thinkin' on a Woman”. The reflective nature of it was heightened significantly as Wall placed everyone in the passenger seat of that big-rig with its driver as he assesses his failures. That was what made this night so special: the remarkable vividness of the tales that unfolded. Wall injected a certain amount of character into them that made them transcend a standard song, instead standing out as a compelling story that was artfully guided by his strikingly smooth and rich voice that echoes back to a bygone era. His rendition of Wilf Carter’s “Calgary Round-Up” was another incredible example of that as he embodied the persona of a cowboy out on a cattle drive; while the haunting murder balled that is “Kate McCannon” found Wall channeling his inner Johnny Cash more so than any other number this night, cheers erupting from the crowd as soon as they recognized the gentle chords that got the song underway. With about a third of the set yet to go Wall and company continued to make quick work of things, mixing in some covers of revered Texas musicians with his remaining originals, even pairing things back momentarily where he was accompanied only by the pedal steel guitarist for “Wild Dogs”, which was nothing short of breathtaking. Throughout the night a handful of fans were adamant about hearing one particular song, routinely shouting its title, hoping that might accelerate things. To wrap it all up Wall and his band mates finally got to “Sleeping on the Blacktop”, much to the audience’s delight. Fans frequently sung along to various track this night, though that was just about the lone one where nearly everyone seemed to chime in, the fans taking it a step further and even stamping their foot along to the percussion. It was one of those classic concert moments where for the time being everyone was unified. No one needed any sort of direction, that was just something they all felt compelled to do in that moment, and it was amazing to witness. That was a rousing way to conclude the show, though no one was ready for that to be the end. All of that stomping and hollering had subsided only moments before it again filled the Granada, this time as a way to demand an encore. “ENCORE! ENCORE!” went the simply chanting that steadily grew louder until Wall and his fellow musicians reemerged, happy to oblige the request. There would be a lone encore, and it was possibly the most crucial song of the night. Wall was deep in the heart of Ray Wylie Hubbard country – the institution of the Texas music scene even having graced the stage of the Granada numerous times over the years – so to do one of his songs was a sink or swim moment. It was a resounding success, at least based on the way the spectators enthusiastically sang along with the refrain of “Up Against the Wall, Redneck Mother”. The boisterous sing-along moment encapsulated the joyous spirit that was felt at every turn during this performance, summing up the overall fun atmosphere that had been cultivated (even during the more poignant numbers); the slightly updated spin Wall put on the song, changing “hippies” to “hipsters”, earning some hearty laughs. There was no better room in Dallas to have hosted Wall. The acoustics are topnotch and highlighted the natural talent he was overflowing with as he made this whole endeavor appear effortless. Despite the sizable room it felt more like club show. I dare say that out of the sixty plus concerts I’ve caught at the Granada that none have had quite the intimate feel that this one did. The way Wall initiated it was instrumental in that as he offered everyone a glimpse of himself not just as a musician but a person thanks to the dialogue he engaged in, providing some insight on his songs and those that resonated with and shaped him. He worked to develop that rapport with everyone and it persisted throughout the night, that same charm punctuating several songs even after he transitioned from solo artist to frontman. It felt like he was baring his soul to each individual in attendance, and that connection made him absolutely riveting. This was the first time that I had the privilege of seeing Colter Wall, and what you hear is precisely what you get. Even though he has drawn inspiration from some more recent influences Wall has forged a sound that evokes such a sense of nostalgia that it almost sounds too good to be true. His mighty set of pipes accented by a heavy drawl demand one’s attention; and none of that is aided by any “studio magic”. It’s all raw talent that grips you when listening to Wall’s recorded works and is downright arresting when experiencing it live. He is, indeed, a purist. There were no sorts of frills involved, nor were they needed. The music carried the show – as it should; Wall’s gritty yet refined talent shining through at every moment, the emphasis constantly on his impeccable storytelling. Clearly, there are still people who care for and prefer music with substance and meaning over something that’s catchy. Colter Wall is living proof of that, at least based on the strong turnout of avid supporters that he had this night. He champions those merits that used to be prerequisite for any act to make a significant impact in the music industry; his work ethic also reflecting those ideals, given that the road is more or less a second home to him. A genuine musician who still has his whole life to invest into his career there’s no doubt that Wall will continue to raise his profile, and in time, he may well come to be as revered as the greatest of the greats of the country and folk genres. He more than possesses the potential. Colter Wall’s current tour will run through December 14th when it concludes at the El Rey Theatre in Los Angeles, CA. He’ll return to the road in mid-January, that leg kicking off on the 17th in Portland, OR at McMenamins Crystal Ballroom. Some of the other dates include a performance at The Showbox in Seattle, WA (January 20th); the Mystic Theatre in Petaluma, CA (January 26th); and the Scoot Inn in Austin, TX (February 7th). A European tour is also slated for March 2019. A complete list of Wall’s upcoming tour dates can be found HERE. And if you haven’t yet purchased Songs of the Plains be sure to check it out in iTUNES or GOOGLE PLAY. Set List: Solo 1) “Bury Me Not On The Lone Prairie” (Traditional; cover) 2) “John Beyers (Camaro Song)” 3) “The Trains Are Gone” 4) “Night Herding Song” (Traditional; cover) Full Band 5) “Thirteen Silver Dollars” 6) “Saskatchewan in 1881” 7) “Big Ball's in Cowtown” (Hoyle Nix cover) 8) “Thinkin' on a Woman” 9) 10) “You Look to Yours” 11) “Calgary Round-Up” (Wilf Carter cover) 12) “Motorcycle” 13) 14) “Kate McCannon” 15) “I Been to Georgia on a Fast Train” (Billy Joe Shaver cover) 16) “Wild Dogs” 17) “Plain to See Plainsman” 18) “White Freight Liner Blues” (Townes Van Zandt cover) 19) “Burn Another Honky Tonk Down” (Wayne Kemp cover) 20) “Sleeping on the Blacktop” Encore 21) “Up Against the Wall, Redneck Mother” (Ray Wylie Hubbard cover)

[laurenhasalittlelamb-blog]

6 months into my life without Carolyn and i thought it would have gotten a bit easier by now but it currently seems to be the opposite. Maybe it's because I'm on my fourth heat or furnace issue in the span of two months. Or because all I do is worry myself sick about money and bills and driving and providing a cat who your dearly departed mother loved sooooo much and provided her with the luxe life she has grown accustomed to in her 4 years of cat life. I've tried to describe my mom in words before; just listing adjectives but she deserves more than "sweet" and "caring" She deserves annoying run-on sentences filled with personal anecdotes and enough descriptors to describe Oprah's house. Carolyn didn't just belong to me or Matthew, yes she was our mother so if she were an investment we'd have the most shares of her, but she had a way of leaving herself with almost everyone she came in contact with. If she met or talked to a female, she'd affectionately yell "Hey, girl!" and give them her sweet little smile and joke with them as if she'd known them for years. And if she did know them for years, they could pick up and have a conversation even if they hadn't seen each other for months or years. I've only really felt comfortable enough to do that with one or two people. And it wasn't just women who she charmed, there were men. How could one person be so magnetic? How could she deal with the small talk that came from the bank customers? I can only deal with a few sentences about the weather before I'm rolling my eyes praying for an excuse to get away from customers. She was the kind of woman you'd want to be more like. She was the kind of woman you'd write a song about. Maybe not a love song, but a song for a good friend who was always happy despite any circumstance that came along, the kind of woman who would give you the shirt off her back even if she'd only met you a handful of times. I've said it before but being her daughter made me feel like the child of a celebrity. I wouldn't say I know how it feels to be one of Angelina Jolie's kids because I thankfully don't have paparazzi following my every move, but Carolyn was pretty popular and well known thanks to her careers in customer service so if someone saw me in the restaurant, I would get a "How's your mother? I just love her!" Like, me too, get in the fucking line.  I hope to be more like her one day. Maybe I'll finally conquer the art of small talk and kick some of this shyness to the curb to be able to joke with anyone. I don't see that happening anytime soon, but I have a lot of work to do on myself and I've got bigger fish to fry than shyness. Grief is a total bitch; each day is different, one day I'm fine and I don't get misty-eyed when I look at my mantle and see the portraits of my parents from the funeral home and don't complain about anything at all, one day I just want to stay home and have my mental breakdown that I'm convinced will cause the heart attack that I've been convinced is in my future since the day mom had her first heart attack (July 7, if you're curious) and ready to take a page from Britney's book and shave my head even though my dad made me self conscious about how big it is when i was about 9 years old (he didn't understand why I got so upset about it since he informed me that I got the big head from him) I was actually ready to get a dramatic hair cut back in November but the lack of self confidence kept me from my Adele-inspired wavy bob. But that self confidence thing is a whole different thing that I'm not ready to tackle yet. One that existed when both mom and dad were in the land of the living. I used to feel holier-than-thou when I'd see or hear someone reading a self-help book but look at me now: currently reading one and with a bunch more on my to-read list. And what about those people who say mantras daily? I'd judge them, too. But now I'm learning that it doesn't hurt to try. And that's why I'm blogging. Do I expect to reinvent the blogging world? No, not going to happen. But what if it makes me feel better? Maybe one day I'll find my perfect mantra. I'll keep you updated.

[mariellemichelle-blog]

A Unique Style of Wedding Photography

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A Unique Style of Wedding Photography

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When you consider engaging a wedding photographer to photograph at your wedding it is important to remember that every photographer has a different ability. With the advent of sophisticated digital slr cameras at affordable prices there has been an explosion of individuals who have purchased a medium range or even a fully professional digital slr camera and set up shop as a wedding photographer. Some of these photographers are actually extremely good at what they do, even to the point of being able to make it as a professional photographer. However the vast majority do not have the technical expertise or understanding that will enable them to capture the perfect wedding picture time and time again. Wedding photography is actually one of the most difficult areas of photography because there is so much that is out of control of the photographer. From poor lighting to crowded venues, from a tired bride to a screaming child, inclement weather to guests who refuse to have their photograph taken there are literally hundreds of things that can cause a problem for the average amateur. Everyone needs to gain experience but do you really want them gaining the experience at your wedding?

Every wedding is unique and your wedding is no exception. You can find a really cheap photographer who may well have an expensive digital slr camera but unless the photographer actually understands how to use and control the camera then there can be a real problem that will affect the results of your wedding photographs. Most of these amateur photographers use the camera in either full automatic mode or programme mode. For taking snapshots when you are on holiday the his options are fantastic for the amateur, letting the amateur photographer create decent images just like using any other point and shoot digital camera. A little anecdote at this point may help to illustrate an extreme of this happy amateur photography. I was taking photographs of a newborn baby when the mother said that her oldest daughter was at college studying photography. She asked if her daughter could take some photographs two, of course I said yes, I’ve always try to accommodate the requests of my clients as long as it does not affect my work. I asked her daughter what camera she was using for her photography course. Her reply was something of a surprise, “I use an iPhone” she remarked. I’m not too sure I was able to hide my amusement, but you could just imagine the reaction I would have got turning out to photograph this new baby if I then pulled out my smart phone and started taking photographs. There is far more to photography can simply pressing a button and this is especially true when it comes to events that can never be repeated such as weddings.

Every bride and groom has an idea, or should I say usually has an idea of what they expect from the photography that their wedding photographer will give them. Unfortunately there are so many bride and groom’s who have been so disappointed with the results of the photography they have received from a so called professional photographer who actually was an amateur who set up his own or her own website after purchasing a digital slr camera. Some brides want the photographer to capture the whole day from having their make-up and hair done right through till the first dance. For others they are only looking for the wedding ceremony to be photographed. Occasionally the bride or wants photographs of the groom getting ready rather than herself; as I said earlier I’d try to accommodate the wishes of the client and when it comes to the photography that they require. I have been known to arrive in order to photograph the groom and best man getting ready for the wedding only to be turned away due to the fact that they were still in bed and an asked to return in a couple of hours when they have finally sorted themselves out.

Sometimes the bride and groom are happy to be led by the photographer and when this is the case there is a real opportunity for the photographer to really show why it is of such value to book an experienced wedding photographer. There are of course some cheesy photographs that some brides asked for, the one that is often requested is where the bride is lifted horizontally by all of the groom’s man. I’m perfectly happy to take said photographs but for myself I never suggest it. Now there are some images that I have taken that I get requested by a other bride and groom’s to take because they think the images are perfect or standing or original. The problem with anything that is original is that the venture he is copied. So I’d try to take some images at each wedding where the bride and groom are happy to let me have a little free rein, that are as unique to that wedding as the bride and groom our unique. Sometimes of course when you client sees a particular image they can’t understand why such a photograph would be taken or indeed why somebody would want to have a particular image. This is perfectly understandable, but because I spent a time getting to know each client I have never taken and image where the client has said why have you taken that. This again is something that comes with experience as a wedding photographer. I once had a couple of clients who were getting married near Leicester who only wanted what they termed ‘traditional wedding photographs’. The groom commented that one of my images from a previous wedding was a “waste of a photograph.” So what was this disaster of a photograph? It was a picture of four Bride’s Maids all of whom were under 12 years of age. Needless to say they had no children at their wedding; they were not an old couple but were in their twenties.

So having established with the client exactly the style and result that they are expecting from their wedding photos I then set about trying to be as creative as possible within the boundaries and constraints that are set by the bride and groom’s expectations. The purpose of wedding photography is to capture the story, joy and the uniqueness of the wedding day. There is nothing better than bringing a sense of delight to the bride and groom when they recall the events of the day while looking through the wedding photographs I have taken for them. By understanding how to control the camera in order to get the very best results possible by using the Manual settings and customising the results for each photograph of a professional wedding photographer is able to produce a record of your wedding that can far exceed your expectations. You may have ‘uncle Bob’ with his new super duper digital camera standing over the shoulder of a professional photographer taking almost exactly the same photograph from the same place in the same light, yet each with totally different results due to the fact that the professional wedding photographer understands how to control the camera to create the result that is designed, while uncle bob simply takes a snapshot with inexpensive camera.

Any real professional photographer will have developed a particular style of photography, but with an understanding of the client he or she also has an expectation that may require that style to be subtly altered in order to create the effect and results that are expected by the photographer and exceeding expectations of clients. There is a lot of advice on the Internet regarding finding the cheapest possible wedding photographer, but I would recommend that you consider the fact that this is one day there will not be repeated and therefore you need to make sure that you have booked a photographer that has the technical ability and artistic creativity to capture your wedding or other event in such a way that will give you the very best memories.

Please ensure that your photographer is a member of a professional photography body.

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