270.

Some days I really just want to sit on the train or on the bus and photograph all of the interesting people I see. Unfortunately, I have an issue confronting complete strangers with my camera. I suppose that's something I should probably get over.

Amy contacted me today. I haven't heard from her in years. I've tried calling and sending letters but no reply. My mom thinks that I was a reminder of Sydney and that eventually it would get hard for her to spend time with me. She is planning a five year anniversary benefit for late June and wants me to help her with it. I can't believe that it has already been this long without her. After talking with Amy I was immediately reminded that Sydney is the reason I'm here. One day she wrote me a note in our notebook about how excited she was to develop her own film. I knew nothing about photography but I knew it had to be exciting because she was my artistic idol. Come to think of it, I idolized almost everything about her. So I waited until my sophomore year when Photo I was available for me to take. Now I'm at Columbia majoring in it. That girl affected so many people's lives in the short fourteen years she lived and it is incredible.

269.

After three years of black and white photography, it has been hard for me to see with a color eye. I have an appreciation for well done color photography, it is just more difficult for me to find color photographs worth taking that I think could be well executed. So far my professor thinks I'm doing well. The assignment for last week was to shoot one color roll- half of it as if I were taking it in color, half of it as if I were taking it in black and white. Then we had to choose two negatives from the roll and print both in black and white and in color. My class thought that my photographs were effective both in black and white and in color, which wasn't really the assignment, but I am glad that there is an appreciation for my work. The project for this week is two shoot a series of twelve photographs that are abstract and represent a single emotion. I have never been one for abstraction, so this will probably be somewhat difficult for me but I look forward to the challenge. I'm glad that we are getting more interesting assignments now that we have learned about color theory.

I love finding new photographers. The following photographs were taken by Anastasia Cazabon.

268.

I've been feeling really good about myself lately. I'm enjoying myself, breaking out of my shell slowly but surely. Color photography is hard, just as I expected it to be, but I am up for the challenge and I enjoy a challenge. I never really have much to say in my journal anymore, which I almost consider a good thing. Nothing is really going wrong. It would be nice to have some sort of companionship, but that is something I can wait for.