Nothing is Sexier than Smart

This is the week of finally being able to share my personal projects that I created throughout the summer.

This project in particular was a creative game changer for me.  It was one of the first times I challenged myself to work with what we, in the photography industry, call hard or harsh light.  It is the time of day when the sun is highest in the sky and most full and it is a challenge to photograph for sometimes even the most seasoned of professionals.

Little did I know that this would change the way I approach light, and really the rest of my life.

I started the session freaking out about if I would be able to create what I saw so clearly in my head, but as soon as I pulled my camera up to my face, it was almost like my fingers knew what they were doing and how to expose the image, how to pose, how to light….the thing I had been most afraid of doing in photography turned out not to be hard at all.

How much of an analogy for life is this?  How often are we so afraid to try something new only to find out that it just came natural to us?  How often do we let fear get in the way of breaking out of our comfort zone?  How often do we let our comfort zone get in the way of breaking through to the next level in our lives?

Now we all know that I am no spring chicken when it comes to controversy, so making the clear choice to feature a Richard Dawkins book was a risk that I was also willing to take in this project.  It is a statement to how I view the world.

(To preface, I may not agree, but I absolutely respect the rights of others to hold their own beliefs and faiths, whatever that may be.)

I can’t help but find the “Magic of Reality” to be the most amazing and magical thing of all. The deeper understanding of what makes the world go round and what makes the stars in the sky shine, it creates a connection between us and the world around us.  To know that we are all made from stardust not only makes me feel like a speck on a speck on a speck, but it makes me feel larger than life and connected to everyone.  Knowing that the same water we drink today is water that was sweat out by our ancestors thousands of years ago through our environments hydrolic cycle….it makes me feel connected to everyone and everything around me.

The deep understanding of how energy and atoms work and the fact that when you break it down to the most basic of principals that we are all made up of the same protons and neutrons all arranged juuuust so to make us uniquely who we are, and that even the smallest of touches to another person is a scientifically proven transfer of energy and atoms…

Let me share a personal story about the day I met my husband.

We were both in our early 20’s. I was 22 and he was 21.  Both living in NYC.  Both dragged to a bar by our friends.  I was dragged kicking and screaming by my friend Annabel, because it was one of her last days living in New York before she was to move back to Los Angeles.

So there I was, dragged out, handed drink after drink by my friend in the dingiest of college bars…surrounded by what could only be described as a bunch of Jersey Shore wanna be’s at a time where wanting to be like the cast of Jersey Shore was all the rage.

As my tequila and grapefruit started to kick in (yes, I am weird, that is my drink of choice) my friend lured me onto the dance floor and that was when my future husbands friend came up behind me to start dancing…already tipsy I threw all caution to the wind and started to dance with him.  Handsom?  Hell yeah!  But then a few songs later, sweat dripping all over everyone in the bar to the point where it was almost palpable, we decided to stop and go grab another drink.

See it is easy to meet someone when you are only looking at them, but the moment you start to talk to them, that is when real attraction takes place.

Now this guy was sweet as could be, but there was nothing brewing “down there” for me from our conversations…that was when I noticed my friend Annabel struggling to talk to this handsom and pensive man standing in the corner.  He was the type of man you looked at and either thought “wow he hates the world” or “wow he really knows something the rest of us don’t.”  I went with the later.

So leaving my dancing partner at the bar to order us drinks, I walked over to Mr. Pensive in the corner, and in true Lindsay fashion, I asked him straight up “Why don’t you speak?”

Without hesitation he responds: “Because I don’t want to talk about bullshit.”  No emotion, not being a jerk, just a pure and truthful answer.  He had me on the hook at that moment.

So, I proceed to ask him: “What do you want to talk about?”

His reply?

“Physics”

So there we stood, in a bar packed shoulder to shoulder so tightly you couldn’t tell if the sweat was your own or the person standing next to you, and we talked about physics.  We talked about the way the world works and the spirituality of it.

And that, my friends, turned. me. on.

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Hair and Makeup by: Erin Marie Artistry

As seen in LiBAREator Magazine.