Tag: photography

the baby photographer

baby sleeping in a basket and a round feather surrounding the basket
Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

She ties them up in woolen blankets,

Baby pinks and powder blues,

With bows around their tiny heads

As they sleep through flashing lights

And shutters clicking in the millions,

Parents standing proudly to the side.

She’s maybe only two weeks old,

Already loved enough for them

To spend that money on those shots

That sit in albums til she’s 21.

But the lady with the camera

Tries each month to have her own,

And each month when dreams are dashed

She cries in pain in bathroom stalls,

Drying tears to meet another pair

Proudly holding baby girl,

The life she wants with all her soul,

The dream she hides each day at work

With smiles and coos and coochy-goos

To mask the hurt inside.

a day with the royals

The leaves are turning as the carriage rides

Down the long road where the bride

Journeyed on her wedding day

With thousands looking on.

I haven’t been out much this half term so it was lovely to venture a little further afield and go to a place that I’ve seen on the TV with several royal weddings taking place there in the last couple of years.

I’d never been to Virginia Waters but I’d been told by several people that it’s a really nice place to go for a walk. And we picked a hell of a week to go because the leaves are just about at their most beautiful at them moment.

We just stuck to a lap of the lake but you can turn off at the top of the lake and go to the Long Walk which leads up to Windsor Castle. The Long Walk was the road that Meghan Markle was driven along before she married her prince.

I did feel awfully regal as we mooched around the water and every time somebody approached on a horse I was hopeful that it might be Kate Middleton (it never was if you were wondering).

I would highly recommend a trip to any part of The Great Windsor Park. There’s so much history and if you hurry you’ll get to see the changing colours of the leaves. I just think Meghan and Harry are bloody mad for giving up a rent free gaff out there!

Much Love

Rachel xx

if you go down to the woods today

After just posting that I rarely have my camera on me I went out for a walk with my phone and made a special effort to take so photos.

We have a beautiful forest not far from us, where we often go for a walk. At this time of year it is always at its most beautiful, with the leaves turning all shades of yellow and gold.

It only holds its colour for about two weeks and then the leaves are blown away. The only other time in the year that the forest is quite so magical is when the sun comes out in the spring and we get a carpet of bluebells.

I’m so thankful that I have such perfect scenery around me and places that I can escape to when I’m struggling with life. The fresh air and the birdsong is enough to lift anyone’s spirits.

i have no photos

three women wearing high heels
Photo by Inga Seliverstova on Pexels.com

I have no Polaroids tucked into boxes,

Pushed into wardrobes or under a bed.

I have no pictures to touch with fingers,

Pointing out memories of summers long gone.

It felt normal back then,

To not have a camera, locked in my hands,

But now I look back at the hazy images

Crowding the corners of an aging mind

And wonder what’s lost through ravages of time.

When I went travelling around South Africa at the beginning of the noughties, I went armed with a disposable camera that eventually got lost, left behind in some awful hostel in the arse end of nowhere.

I sometimes wonder what was on that film and what memories I have lost. There were probably things on there that I have completely forgotten about (and that I was probably a bit too drunk to remember anyway)!

However, those memories aren’t the only ones that have been lost. I’m notoriously bad for not having my phone on me, so I rarely have a camera either. It means that I often live in the moment, but it also means that I don’t capture that moment to look back on years later.

I sometimes feel really sad that I can’t find a single photo of the man I married in South Africa. There are no pictures of our wedding day or the flat that we shared in Durban. And that makes me really sad now.

I also don’t have any photos of when I was pregnant. None of those images of me lovingly holding my bump exist. I sometimes wish that I was famous and got papped so that I had some more photos of myself to look back on, worrying that I’ll become an old lady and have no photos of myself as a young person to look back on.

I’m going to make more of an effort to take photos and films because I love photographs so much. I’ll even make beautiful albums that can be passed down the generations. Or maybe I’ll just keep living my life…..

Much Love

Rachel xx