Sunday Standalone

Melissa Colburn, left, kisses her grandfather's gravestone while visiting the State Veterans Cemetery with family from Hampstead on Sunday, May 30, 2010, following a Memorial Day Ceremony by the Disabled American Veterans. With Colburn was her son, Connor, 8, mother Carole Sullivan, sister, Jennifer Hagerty and her daughter Hannah, 8, and her aunt, Paula Shelly. Lt. Col. Lyle M. Shelly retired from the U.S. Army and was married to Norma Shelly for 61 years before he passed away. "Nothing was ever broken; give it to gramp," Colburn said. "He could do anything," Carole Sullivan, his daughter, added. According to Sullivan, Lyle and his brother Walter were the first in the city of Walthan, Mass., to enlist during World War II, where Lyle was stationed in North Africa and Italy. He was also the personal helicopter pilot for former Massachusetts Gov. John A. Volpe. He passed away in April of 2009.

Graduation

Sarah Fenerty, 18, center, a graduating senior at Coe-Brown Northwood Academy, walks a hallway passing out packs of chewing gum before the start of the graduation ceremony on Friday, May 28, 2010. The 160 graduates were instructed to hand the pack of gum to David Smith, the school's head master, after they received their diploma. Smith is the head coach of the boys varsity basketball team and is known to chew a pack of gum during a single game, Fenerty said. The class of 2010 left several gifts and is David Smith's 30th graduation with the school.

If It Catches Your Eye, It's Worth Stopping

Lucian Salera, 2, rests on the lap of her father, Allan Salera, as he watches one of their 18 goats while the two were relaxing in their front yard along with mother and wife, Toni Salera, right, on Friday, May 21, 2010, afternoon in Epsom, N.H.

Lacrosse

I played lacrosse in high school and quit my senior year because I wanted to focus more on photography and working at the local newspaper in town, something I began as a freshman. On the one hand, I learned a lot, but photographing the games now I wish I could go out there and play.

UNH Graduation- Life is Good

This was probably the most relaxed graduation I've been to. Beach balls flying everywhere, students yelling and cheering during the ceremony, empty champagne bottles leftover from drinks during the ceremony, cigars lit during the ceremony, and Bob Dylan and Beatles covers being played as grads walked to get their diplomas. I'm getting use to using my D200 again.



Jeff Ortakalas, left, from Belmont, N.H., who received a degree in Mechanical Engineering, cheers while Brogan Kisseberth, who majored in Civil Technology, hits an inflatable ball towards the end of the UNH graduation commencement on Saturday, May 22, 2010.



Tom Raffelt, left, from Keene, N.H., holds his recently acquired diploma cover and cap while Mike Bache, from Northborough, Mass., holds a cigar towards the end of the graduation ceremony at UNH Saturday, May 22, 2010. Both graduated with degrees in Mechanical Engineering.

First Post from the Concord Monitor: Finding Her Dress

Jamie Plourde, 21, center, from Pembroke, and her cousin Jillian Plourde, 20, look at a dress she found at "A Day To Remember" dress shop in downtown Concord owned by Helen Dionne, right, Friday afternoon, May 21, 2010. Plourde, who will be a senior at Keene State College this fall majoring in Psychology and minoring in Criminal Justice, was named Miss Wheelchair New Hampshire and will travel to Grand Rapids, Mich., in August to compete in the Miss Wheelchair America pageant.

A Moose!

I've been going up to my family's home in Bethlehem, NH ever since I was born. My grandmother grew up there and we spent summers and winters there. Moving around a lot, it was really the only place I could truly call 'Home.' And every summer for the past 20 years we would leave at dusk and go on moose hunts. My cousin Matt and I would sit in the back of a station wagon surveying the roads we left as everyone else, usually a packed car, looked ahead. All angles were covered. We hit every marshy area or moose damp we could find. Once we saw some bear, some deer, foxes, and all that crap. But never a moose!

I drove up to the house from Concord, about 80 miles give or take, for the night. On my way up, spotted two black bears on the side of a ski slope. I spent today driving around the back mountain roads up to Mount Washington, in the back of my head thinking maybe I'd see a moose. It was always wishful thinking as I'd slow down past rivers and swamp areas. On my way back to Concord this evening, I again spotted the two black bears on a different ski slope and pulled into the parking lot at Cannon Mountain, the ski area about 5-10 minutes from the house. They were pretty close to the bottom of the slope so I decided to drive closer. After about 10-15 minutes I gave up and started backing my car down a access road when I saw the moose in the parking lot. I thought it was a horse and was wondering what the hell a horse was doing in the parking lot. Then it dawned on me and I nearly peed myself out of excitement. I waited, then watched, then followed, then took a gamble and parked my car and stayed still at this boat launch, hoping Bullwinkle would waltz by.

Not Wasting Any Time

First Post from Concord

I'm sitting in a coffee shop in downtown Concord, about 5 blocks from my new apartment.

I haven't had much time in between packing and unpacking and cleaning and changing addresses to really think much about what I left in Midland. But things are slowing down and it's a noticeable feeling that I have broken out of a routine that I found myself in Midland. I love it. But at the same time, I miss what was there.

Midland was my first full-time job out of college after several rounds of interning over summer breaks. I first heard about it when I was a freshman at Missouri, but always pictured it as this intangible place, way out of my league. One of those ideal places. And it was.

I graduated in May 2008 and arrived in Midland that September after an internship in DC. I knew I wanted to "do" photojournalism, but I always felt lost. One day I would look at portraiture from Avedon or David LaChapelle and think I should push myself in that direction. Another day I would see work from Richard Billingham or Anders Petersen and think that I should push more towards the real, the raw life because everything is so contrived these days. So plastic. I was, in every sense of the word, lost and each day was it's own day, not working towards any sort of idea, any definitive vision. I was a blundering idiot.

Midland changed all that and I have Ryan Wood to thank. Having once viewed Midland as this 'magical place' that transforms you when you step through the door, and then having actually worked there, I can assure you, there's nothing in the water. There's no fairy dust you sprinkle over yourself and keep in your camera bag. If there was any magic, Ryan Wood is the guy pulling rabbits out of hats or vision out of blundering idiots. Like everything, it is what you make of it. I was fortunate to have a job in photojournalism and that was on my mind most days when I was out on assignment. Granted, you forget about it now and then and it's a humbling feeling when you remember how fortunate you are to be surviving doing something you love.

We went through cuts in staff. After 11 years and 33 interns, the internship program was eliminated. Neil Blake came on as a freelancer in his last semester and after graduating from Central Michigan University, was a huge help. He is now interning at the Jasper Herald. But with cuts in staff, came cuts in stories. We, at least in photo, never had a mentality of quantity over quality. Cuts in staff meant cuts in Sunday assignments, unless a freelancer could do it. We still shot only 1-2 assignments a day. Nathan Morgan, the other staffer and I, worked flexible shifts if something came up last minute or one of us needed time to work on a story or project. Ryan was awesome with the schedule to insure we had personal lives too.

We did some multimedia here and there, but it wasn't a focus. Personally, I will do it and I'll try to learn as much about it as I can, but I'll never subscribe to it as a saving grace or as something that trumps the still photograph. There's been too many gimmicks hitting the newspaper world. So much so that I'll be as bold to say it's changing the way things are covered on a daily basis, adds sensationalism, and adds alternative motives and incentives for covering stories. And to put it bluntly, even if it's the bees-knees, I generally don't spend more than 20 seconds watching any video on a newspaper website or multimedia production on any site. It's just boring. That's just me and maybe I'm an odd-ball. I just don't get it. And don't get me started on the iPad being some saving grace in the journalism world. Our saving grace is chucking the gimmicks, getting back to the roots of journalism and doing it well. Not trying to keep up with this TMZ notion of flashy things and tweeting every possible thing that hits your cranium. Blah Blah Blah, right? Done with my 10 second rant.

So, as I'm sitting in Concord thinking about the future- where I'll start at the Concord Monitor on May 18, I can't help but think about the past and a place that showed me a direction. A focus to this whole mess of photojournalism and its infinite routes. No matter how many times I was beat over the head with the concept of capturing moments, it didn't sink in until Midland. Pretty compositions and nice light is kind of boring if there's no moment, mood, or feeling. If there's no intimacy. And it doesn't happen all the time, but it's something to work towards. Staying through those awkward moments and that downtime when it's so easy to pack up and leave. Not just shooting a portrait to have something to fill some space, but planning ahead and figuring out when things happen. Putting yourself in a position to capture a decisive moment, a mood, an unguarded feeling. All things I learned in Midland and am still learning and striving towards.

In college, I had this drive to be a foreign corespondent. I just turned 25 and thought I'd be riding on the back of a camel by now or living in an Australian rainforest high in the canopy. I turned 25 in my 1 bedroom apartment in Midland, Michigan and I have no regrets. For now, those world travelers can have the world and I'm fine with having Concord for the foreseeable future. There's so much to explore in backyards and in the lives of people in your neighborhoods. It took my time in Midland to realize that stories are everywhere and every assignment is important to someone. The last year and-a-half was great and I can't wait for what's to come and what I can learn from Alex Cohn, Katie Barnes, Max Bittle, the reporting staff and the interns in Concord.

I was born in Boston and all my family, except my parents and sister who live in Virginia, live around New England. So this feels like I'm finally coming home after moving around my whole life. A chance to find my roots and learn from a great staff at a great paper. Through covering the community, I became attached to Midland and I can only imagine what the future holds in Concord.