But I can’t look at the New Year as being full of promise and possibilities. I see another year of hard work, another year of two steps forward, one step back. I don’t mean to sound pessimistic; in fact, it is actually liberating to know that “these things take time.” I had a unique opportunity to participate in a 6-week project with a group of smart people over the summer. I identified a few achievable goals to work toward during that time, and I failed to meet any of them in any meaningful way—yet I came away realizing that meeting goals takes a lot of time, which I guess was the lesson all along. 2013 is going to be a hard year, but there is a lot I’m looking forward to: my brother’s wedding, continuing to teach, traveling, making our home a more beautiful haven and gathering place, finding balance (something my friend Deedee and I talked about on New Year’s Eve).

Over the past few months, our world confounded me. Every senseless act of violence felt like a punch to the throat, every misunderstanding and wrong word spoken made it difficult to breathe. … I am glad to put those months behind me, behind us. I hope we do better in the future. We have to do better. We must change.

Last summer, Robbie and I planted six hydrangea plants like the one in the picture below. The color is “Little Lime.” I doubt they will all return in the spring; we had a very hot summer, and despite the recent snow, we’re experiencing a very dry winter. Still, there’s a chance they will make it. You guys, I hope all of the flowers we planted will return in the spring.

No resolutions, but I am planning to change up this space. Reinvention was and still is a major theme in my life, but it’s a limiting theme for a blog. We stay the same more than we change, I think, and there’s more I want to talk about and share. There are good parts of myself to lean into, parts that have been there all along.

At 23 years old I weighed 255 pounds but managed to lose a total of 110 pounds over the course of 4 years. When I tell people this fact many shake their head in disbelief and more often than not I am asked the simple question “How did you do it?” My typical response is “Thermodynamics. Burn more than you take in and something has got to go. That and I worked hard.”

I knew immediately that I had to feature Christine’s story of reinvention here. We work for the same very large company but are based in different states, so I e-mailed her and asked her to respond to a few questions. We have been corresponding ever since, and I am so thrilled to share her story. I love stories about healthy living!

Introduce yourself! Who are you, where do you live, and how would you describe yourself?

My name is Christine Rudzinskas, I’m 28 years old and live in the Highlands of Denver. I consider myself an active person and engage in many different interests and hobbies: ice hockey, softball, hiking, camping, biking, rafting, snowshoeing, skiing, golfing, paddle boarding, dancing, fishing, playing guitar, reading, writing, drawing, painting, singing, running, weight lifting, and just smiling and being alive!

I’m very introverted but enjoy the relationships with the few close friends I have. Sharing my story was a difficult thing for me to do, namely because I do not like to draw attention to myself, but if it helped just one person then I consider it well worth the minor embarrassment I experienced.

What was the impetus for reinvention or change in your life? How did you handle it at first, and how did you adapt as time progressed?

If I had to pinpoint one catalyst to me beginning my weight loss journey it would have to be the doctor’s bills that were stacking up in my mail box. It wasn’t so much the monetary strain that was worrisome but more or less the realization that most people my age (23 at the time) weren’t in and out of the doctor’s office every month. Being constantly sick was a wake up call. I ran through the gamut of illnesses (bronchitis, pneumonia, colds, the flu) and depression. I was unhappy with my life and what was happening to me. I felt out of control. I knew something needed to happen, but I was afraid to face the truth. Being “obese” or “fat” is a touchy subject. One that is often “swept under the rug” by loved ones in fear of hurting the subject’s feelings. Thankfully, I had a doctor who was able to reach me in a direct, honest matter about my condition that was void of any judgment. To be blunt, she scared the crap out of me, but it worked.

You must have experienced some major obstacles and struggles in the process of losing so much weight. How did you work through the struggles? Can you share any particular examples?

I think the biggest struggles initially were forcing myself to (A) stop eating the way I was eating, and (B) get my butt up off the couch and into the gym. I didn’t share this in the HSSE article but I was eating terribly. I still remember my order from McDonald’s: 4 double cheeseburgers, an 8 piece chicken McNugget, a large fry, and a large Coke. I would consume it all in one sitting….and that was just lunch. There were days when I would eat fast food and other junk for every meal. I remember one night eating an entire large pepperoni pizza from Pizza Hut, as well as an entire order of 20 hot wings. Food had no judgment, I could turn to it when I was sad, happy, lonely, etc. The first week I stopped eating this way was painful. I had headaches, felt dizzy, cranky, irritable. My body was detoxifying itself, and it was almost as if I was going through food withdrawal. I combated this by drinking water, lots and lots of water. Any time I felt the symptoms I listed above I turned to my Nalgene (which I still carry around with me everywhere). Water helped flush out my system. In addition, it helped subside the crippling hunger pangs I was experiencing.

As for exercise, thankfully our office on the Denver campus has a gym, and that’s where I decided to begin exercising. I figured that anyone who would be in there working out had probably already seen me around campus and that it was less likely that fellow coworkers would make fun of me while trying to navigate an elliptical machine. This was probably my biggest fear and struggle–looking like an idiot while trying to exercise. Two hundred and fifty-five pounds crammed into a t-shirt and mesh shorts isn’t the most flattering of visuals, and I was worried that others would be laughing at me in their heads. I was also afraid of failure, that I would only make it 10 minutes into a workout and already be exhausted and not be able to finish. So, I started slow by walking 10 to 15 minutes on the treadmill and working my way up. I think doing this was pivotal, as it allowed me to finish and feel a sense of accomplishment after each session. I also bought an iPod and made a playlist of motivating songs, this helped battle the insecurities I had about working out in front of others. When Kanye West is yelling “that don’t kill me can only make me stronger” in your ear, it’s difficult to really care about anything else.

Did your plan ever stall or derail? If so, how were you able to get back on track?

After I lost my first 20 pounds I thought, “Wow, I feel great, I’m wearing a smaller size now, I’m done.” But in reality, 20 pounds only brought me down to 235 pounds….still considered morbidly obese. It was difficult to keep going. I wanted to give up. Losing 20 pounds was difficult enough, and I had read that as you begin to shed pounds that it was imperative to increase the intensity of your workouts to continue to obtain results. It sounded too difficult. It wasn’t until I was over at my parent’s house one night for dinner and announced that I had lost 20 pounds that it really hit me that I needed to keep going. My Mom looked me up and down after I proudly announced my achievement and said, “Really? I can’t tell.” I was furious. I had worked so hard but there were no noticeable results to anyone but me. This motivated me. I wanted there to be no mistake, no doubt, that I was getting smaller. That I was becoming healthier.

Describe your approach to change. What philosophies or principles guided your decisions and actions?

I believe that change is the only constant in the world and that labels are damaging. Labels limit growth and change. For the longest time, I considered and labeled myself “a fat girl.” But what I didn’t realize until later was that I was doing myself a disservice. Once you start calling yourself something and identifying as it, your mind follows suit. You subconsciously project that ideal and mindset onto your entire being. This, in turn, hinders your ability to accept transformation and moving forward.

Who or what inspires you?

I inspire me. Through my journey I have learned that I am capable, that I am my biggest motivator, that I am strong. Prior to losing weight I was a pretty meek and subdued person, and just lacked confidence all-around. I did everything on my own during my journey. I did all the research, I did all the calorie counting, I made up all of the meal plans, and I did all of the exercising and work. I am proud of that.

What lessons have you learned throughout the process of reinvention?

I have learned that I possess an inner strength and confidence that I never knew existed. I also learned that anytime someone tells you “you can’t,” they have no idea what they’re talking about. They have no idea what you are made of and what is inside of you. Currently, I feel like I am finally “me.” That 145-pound Christine is me, the real me, through and through. I can’t remember what season it was, but Olivia, the winner from the Biggest Loser, said something once that really struck a chord with me. She was looking at an old picture of herself when she was still overweight and she said “I’ll never be that person again.” And it’s the truth, I will never be the person I was before.

What’s next?

As healthy as I have become, I still have a vice and that is smoking cigarettes. Quitting is next on the list. A good friend of mine told me to just “approach it like you did when you lost weight,” and I’m doing my best. The first thing I have done is stopped calling myself a “smoker.” I have also reduced the number of cigarettes I smoke in day. I know I am capable. We’ll see how it goes

Thank you, Christine! You are an inspiration. You should be very proud of your accomplishments, and I wish you luck as you continue to reinvent yourself and pursue healthy living.

And yet, for me, birthdays are often tinged with a little bit of apprehension and regret. I’m a year older, but am I any closer to what I want? As I get older I feel less sure of what I want and more concerned about what needs to get done, what I have to be responsible for. More and more I feel that I have to wait for everything to be just right before I can take the next step, whatever that may be.

This morning I came across Leslie’s post about Neil Gaiman’s commencement speech at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia. Leslie quoted a particularly poignant passage from the speech, and I’m going to do the same, because it struck me as such a true and perfect reminder that as long as we keep in mind an idea of what our lives should be, it is ok if we feel stuck or diverted along the way. We’re still making progress.

…If you have an idea of what you want to make, what you were put here to do, then just go and do that.

And that’s much harder than it sounds and, sometimes in the end, so much easier than you might imagine…

Sometimes the way to do what you hope to do will be clear cut, and sometimes it will be almost impossible to decide whether or not you are doing the correct thing, because you’ll have to balance your goals and hopes with feeding yourself, paying debts, finding work, settling for what you can get.

Something that worked for me was imagining that where I wanted to be – an author, primarily of fiction, making good books, making good comics and supporting myself through my words – was a mountain. A distant mountain. My goal.

And I knew that as long as I kept walking towards the mountain I would be all right. And when I truly was not sure what to do, I could stop, and think about whether it was taking me towards or away from the mountain. I said no to editorial jobs on magazines, proper jobs that would have paid proper money because I knew that, attractive though they were, for me they would have been walking away from the mountain. And if those job offers had come along earlier I might have taken them, because they still would have been closer to the mountain than I was at the time.

…

More photographs on Flickr:

Created with Admarket’s flickrSLiDR.

For years I have asked my dad to build bookshelves with me. His basement workshop was always a place of fascination and refuge for me. There he taught my brothers and me many of the hands-on problem-solving skills we use today. When he told me we were going to build bookshelves that summer, I was thrilled. I didn’t know that he had such a complicated design planned, or that they would turn out so beautifully. I was just glad to spend time with him.

I used the photographs and narrative in this post to publish a small hardcover book through Blurb. I gave it to my dad for Christmas in 2010, and it meant a lot to him and others in our family. I’m sharing an abridged version of that story here.

* * * * *

What do you need to build bookshelves?

First, you need a workshop.

In our case, a workshop in a ridiculously large shed. You also need someone who knows how to build stuff.

If you’re building a complicated bookshelf, you might need a model.

And then you might need to simplify the design.

You need a table saw. And blades. Sharp blades.

You need someone tall and strong to operate the saw.

You need to keep the pieces organized.

At times, you need to stop and admire the cuts. Nice work!

Count the pieces over and over again.

You need volunteers.

You need helpers.

You need to keep your sense of humor.

You need more helpers. This one is good at collecting sawdust.

You need to stop and appreciate the grain.

You need miscellaneous objects to trip over.

And Band Aids. Because you’re going to get hurt.

And a nice view, and a breeze to stay cool on hot summer days.

You need special tools. Tools that make complicated cuts.

You need to take breaks and play with the helpers.

Sometimes you need an extra hand, because it’s hard to do something you have never done before…

…but you also need to learn to do it on your own.

You need someone with steady hands to shape the wood, to make a beautiful curve.

And you definitely need goggles if you’re going to use the sander.

Sometimes, you need to look really badass.

You need to appreciate these moments.

You need clamps to hold the pieces together while the glue dries.

And, voila! When the glue dries, you can stack the individual units to make a bookshelf.

It’s time to grab a beer and lawn chair, and admire your work.

When it’s time, you bring in the staining expert.

You need a super hot guy to help you attach the knobs and lend a hand as you drop the glass into place.

You need someone with a truck to transport the shelves to your home.

Last, you will need books. (But you already have those.) And at the end of the summer, you will have built bookshelves with your dad.

You don’t need anything more.

Thanks, Pop.

One question I wrestled with all weekend was, “Why am I here?” I am not a blogger (at least, not yet), and I haven’t put my full energy into this website (yet). But during the months leading up to the event and especially during our time at Camp Mighty, I felt compelled to be there. It felt right. I came to the tentative conclusion that I was there to figure out whether this is my community.

It is easy to feel comfortable around the types of people who attended Camp Mighty. Some attendees wrote about feeling nervous or timid, but I felt at ease almost immediately. Maybe that’s because I’m largely a newcomer to online publishing, and haven’t formed the impressions (or insecurities?) others seem to have about the blogging community. Maybe it’s because the roller coaster I’ve been on these past three years has forced me to develop some emotional intelligence–at work and in my personal life. I have arrived at the comforting realization that being nice* is the foremost important interpersonal quality because it establishes a tone for everything that follows, and if others can’t begin with or return that simple gesture, it’s more a reflection of their emotional state than mine. Happily, I met many, many nice people at Camp Mighty.

What I was most interested in at Camp Mighty was the idea of identifying and working toward goals. For the Mighty enterprise, that means creating a life list. I actually started writing my life list more than a year ago, when I needed to feel more in control of my destiny and excited about the future, and it has been a tremendously positive experience. But the list itself isn’t as important to me as the realization that I can grab life by the tail. Sometimes I can direct it, and sometimes I just have to ride along. I like to quote some of my favorite old ladies: Eleanor Roosevelt said “In the long run, we shape our lives, and we shape ourselves. The process never ends until we die. And the choices we make are ultimately our own responsibility.” Maya Angelou said “If you don’t like something, change it. If you can’t change it, change your attitude.” She also said, “I can be changed by what happens to me. I refuse to be reduced by it.” A big part of writing the life list and going to Camp Mighty, for many of us, was becoming empowered to improve the quality our lives, to change the things we can control, and to change our minds about what we can’t.

So, about Camp Mighty! It was cool. Period. I met people whose blogs I have been reading for upwards of 10 years (Heather and Jon Armstrong, Alice Bradley, Eden Kennedy) and others through personal connections with people in Milwaukee, like Amber Marlow Blatt who knows Tracy Apps (man, are they two peas in a pod or what?), Lisa Congdon, who knows Faythe Levine, and Stevie Koerner, who made one of my favorite pieces of jewelry and is only a train ride away in Chicago. I made new friends in Leslie, our team cheerleader, Jill, Anna, Erica, Alicia, and Jen and Chris, who are so smart and sincere and adorable together that you can tell they make the best kind of friends. People really do make it better.

I was inspired by the speakers, like musical artist Kenna, who realized that he was waiting to do something important until others had determined his importance, and took action by organizing the Summit on the Summit. And Evany, a content developer at Facebook who talked about being open to new experiences, and explained that part of her determination to have the best life for herself stemmed from the realization that as she gets older, she wants to lean into the best parts of herself, not the worst. And I was especially inspired by artist Lisa Congdon, whose personal reinvention involves consistently showing up for and supporting others in her circles.

Robbie and I had a ton of fun in Palm Springs. Our space costumes were a big success. We took time to participate in activities and also to just relax. (I don’t think I have ever spent so much time in a hot tub.) On Sunday, when most people headed home, we drove our rented Ford Fiesta to Joshua Tree National Park and spent the afternoon walking among the funky trees and climbing on the rock formations. It was a much-needed break from the everyday, especially as the days are getting darker and colder here in Wisconsin, and a chance to process what we had learned.

Camp Mighty made me think about what I want to do with this reinvention stuff, and mainly about how I want to frame it. When I talk to people about featuring their stories, they are intimidated by the word “reinvention.” They say, “Well, what I’m doing isn’t really that impressive” or “Maybe when I have met my goal, but it’s not reinvention, yet.” I realized that I need to find a better way of defining (or not defining?) reinvention. It is the mindset driving reinvention that I find most impressive, probably because it is such a new way of thinking for me.

I want to dig into that mentality and figure out what makes change possible, what has to click for someone to decide that the time is right–that the time is now–to make a change, of any magnitude. At the same time, I want to help people see that they are reinventing themselves, that what they are doing is significant and worthy of being shared. I think the next step will be reconfiguring this website to separate my own writing from the stories of reinvention. That way, I can say more on the side and let the reinventors shine. If you have ideas about how to do that, or can help, please get in touch.

So, by going to Camp Mighty, I was able to check a few things off the life list, at least partially:

56. Attend BlogHer and/or a Mighty Summit (Camp Mighty counts, I think)
59. Be more expressive, more jubilant (see: spacesuit)
62. Experience weightlessness (OH WAIT THEY LIED ABOUT THAT PART)
68. Participate in a service trip to an African nation (it’s a start; together, we raised more than $25,000 for charity: water, and Robbie and I raised about $1,100 of that ourselves)
74. Photograph the Yucca brevifolia of Joshua Tree National Park

And what’s really exciting is that I connected with people who want to help me achieve even more. And I want to help them. And very quickly it’s all one big, warm, fuzzy puppy pile.**

*To me, being nice means shedding insecurities and fear and being real, honest, and compassionate.
**I’m looking at you, Evany.

This is your flight crew, signing off. Peace out.

It was significant not because of the distance (nothing to serious runners, I know), but because I had to prepare mentally and physically for months ahead of time. I’m learning that many of the goals on my Life List depend on money or opportunity or time, and some require serious groundwork. I have walked in the PantherProwl several times, but this was my first time running in it—in any race, for that matter.

Waiting to start…

It was also Robbie’s first official 5k, so he and I waited together in the 8-minute mile section knowing that he would probably join the 7-minute group and I would end up in the 9-minute group. After much anticipation, we were off. Running with a large group of people, with everyone packed in close at the start of the race, is exhilarating. I felt light on my feet, swept up in this human wave making its way down the street. Quickly, though, I felt people pass me on both sides. Am I still running? I thought. Uh…am I being pulled backward? Nope, I was just hitting a realistic pace, and those behind and around me were finding theirs.

Source: UWM Alumni Association (arrows added by me)

The route was relatively flat and started with a very gradual downhill mile, but that meant we would eventually loop around to return on the same road, and nearly the entire second half would be slightly uphill. At the halfway point, I was struggling. I walked for about 10 feet while I chugged a cup of water at the water station, and then started again…and didn’t stop running until I crossed the finish line.

Pretending to stretch but really just collapsed at the finish line

My goal was to finish it in under 30 minutes, and I was about 50 feet from the finish line when I saw the clock: 29:55. I picked up the pace, but realized immediately that I couldn’t cover that distance in 5 seconds (if only!). My official time was 30 minutes and 6 seconds. My stop at the water stand cost me a few seconds, but the water is what got me through the second half of the race, so I can’t be too disappointed.

I’m so proud of Robbie; he surprised us both by completing the race in 22 minutes and 15 seconds. Not bad for a first time!

Running has been an interesting learning experience for me. I’ve become much more in tune with my body, especially in terms of knowing when I need to eat, exercise, and rest. I know that if the race had been held in the afternoon, I probably would have had a better time—I run better later in the day, when I’m warmed up and have enough food and water in my system to keep me energized. If I do another 5k in the morning, I will get up earlier, go for a walk, and have a larger breakfast. More than anything, though, running has helped me realize how much physical movement affects my mood and energy throughout the day. I think I’ll stick with it for a while.

We did it!

I remember Joy as being painfully shy (while I was an outspoken class clown), and from pictures I remember her long, curly hair. We had a different German teacher for the rest of our time in high school, but Joy and I remember those days fondly, and I can see now that they helped form her future as a linguist and teacher. In fact, I believe that Joy ran into Mr. Aceto years later, in a bar in New York City, and told him as much. I wish I could have been there, too, for that moment.

Something I recognized in high school but have grown to truly appreciate over time is Joy’s quiet brilliance and determination. She was one of our graduating class’ three valedictorians, and she had high standards for her education and future. She attended New York University for her undergraduate degree, in Linguistics (with a minor in German), and The New School for her Master’s degree in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL). For the past 10 years, she has studied, lived, and worked in New York, and most recently she served as a program coordinator for The New School’s international student body—a job that brought her both fulfillment and frustration, at times.

Even with a lot going for her, Joy knew when she was ready for the next step. She applied for and received a Fulbright Scholar award to teach in Germany, and a few weeks ago she moved to Chemnitz, a city in Saxony, where she will teach at a German university. This summer, after packing up her worldly possessions and leaving New York indefinitely, Joy spent some time in her native Wisconsin, and I had the chance to talk to her about her next adventure, including her reasons for wanting to shift away from a career she seemed so well suited for and interested in.

Why did you decide to apply for the Fulbright scholarship? What was the impetus for reinvention?

I guess there were a couple of things. The first was a realization that I did not want to be in the field I was in long-term. My first “real” job out of college was in international education—a field I was very interested in and actively pursued. By the time I had been in the field for a couple of years, I had come to terms with the fact that a major part of my job was, and always would be, enforcing government regulations—often ones I didn’t really agree with. This became highly discouraging, as I had little interaction with students, and the interactions I had were often negative, because I was seen as a person standing in the way of students’ ability to study in the U.S., rather than someone there to help. I began to realize that, while I still loved the cultural exchange aspects of what I did, I wanted to approach that in a different way. The second impetus was, rather stereotypically, a painful breakup, which made me examine myself a bit more closely. I began to think about leaving New York, where I had lived since college, and think about whether I could do “something more” with my life. The combination of those two factors drove me toward starting my Master’s degree in TESOL. That was the first step in my reinvention. Of course, that was back in 2008, so it gives an idea of how gradual the process has been.

Taking that first step was very exciting. I love learning and studying, and it felt good to be working toward something I felt passionate about. However, the change in my case was very slow. I continued to work full-time during the three years it took me to complete my degree, and I’ve never worked so hard, or been so exhausted, in my life. Most of the time the endpoint—that career change—was enough to keep me motivated and working hard, but sometimes it felt like sheer momentum kept me going. Last year I applied for a Fulbright Teaching Assistantship, which was all part of a vague master plan that had formed before I started my degree. It was perfect for me as a non-risk-taker: If I got it, I’d have a fantastic excuse to quit my job and a great opportunity to transition into my new career—plus, it would give me some experience teaching English as a Foreign Language, which would help me decide whether I’d like to try to teach abroad in the future or teach English as a second language in the U.S. By early this year, I knew that even if I didn’t get the Fulbright I was going to quit my job so I could move toward a career in TESOL.

I asked Joy, “Do you see a difference between your personal reinvention and professional reinvention?”

I think they are separate but intertwined. Just as personal and professional reasons affected my desire to change careers, I think my (largely) professional reinvention will have an impact on me personally—for obvious reasons, in that I’ll be in a new country, far away from all of my friends and family, so I’ll be around new people and in a new culture, both of which will require some personal reinvention. I’ve found that the profession of teaching also produces a change in my personality. While I was working on my Master’s degree, my classmates often mentioned their “teacher personalities” and how they were different from their own. Once I started my own practicum, I also noticed how I become more outgoing and more expressive in the classroom. I do sometimes wonder how strong that part of me will become as I continue in this field, and whether it will bleed more into my “real” life.

Does this reinvention bear any resemblance to other changes you’ve made in your lifetime?

I suppose there are similarities between this new period of my life and my decision to go to college at NYU, at least from a personal perspective. That was another time in my life when I decided to move to a place where I had no support system, which allowed me to build a new one during and after college. I think that I do this because I’m naturally a very shy and fairly timid person, so unless I put myself in situations where I have to get out there and make new connections, I won’t.

Describe your approach to change.

Even when I was a kid I was very attached to traditions and habits, so I’m not always very receptive to change—however, I actually think I’ve become more accepting of change as I’ve gotten older. I’ve stopped looking at missing a tradition (Christmas with my family, for example) as losing something, but rather just a variation of my experience. I’m not a very spontaneous person either, so I like to plan my changes in advance, as is pretty clear with the more than three-year process this current reinvention has been.

What lessons have you learned throughout the process of reinvention?

I definitely feel that reinvention is ongoing—or it can be. Certainly there are points in our lives that we settle on, professionally with a specific career, personally with relationships, etc., that provide new eras or new definitions, but this experience has really helped me better understand that I always have the option to make changes in my life.

Could you expand on the point about realizing that you always have the option to change your life? I really like that part, and I’m curious to know whether that has been a “freeing” realization for you.

Yes, it has been a freeing realization in many ways. Growing up, I always saw the future as a matter of finding my path—as if there were only one right path, one right career, one right place for me. At some point I realized it’s actually a matter of making my path, and that life is more of a choose-your-own-adventure, where you figure out what your strengths and interests are and then follow them—then, experience is accumulated rather than an endpoint reached. Suddenly making the “wrong” choice didn’t seem quite so scary, and I didn’t feel nearly as stuck. That said, I think I’m probably quite lucky to have so many options and opportunities to change in my life. I know not everyone does.

I don’t really think of myself as a reinventor. I definitely am at a transitional point in my life that has elements of reinvention, but to me it feels more like evolution, as it has been a very gradual and slowly emerging process for me.

What is your next idea for reinvention or evolution?

It seems that changing scenery has become a huge part of my version of reinvention, so that’s really the next big thing: the decision of where to go next. I’m going to give it a few months before I start to tackle that one.

For my sake, and that of some of our friends here in Wisconsin, I hope that decision will involve Milwaukee…but in many ways I suspect that Joy is destined for more than a homecoming. In the meantime, Joy, we wish you both excitement and Gemütlichkeit while you’re in Germany.

Maybe it’s because I’m a terrible athlete (except for being irrationally competitive) and struggle to exercise consistently, but I am totally impressed by people who become determined to get healthy and go through significant physical changes to achieve their goals. It’s no secret that I’m a huge fan of The Biggest Loser; I credit that show with putting me back on track with exercising and eating real foods.

I also credit two people for inspiring me to become fitter in my everyday life: my husband, Robbie, who has learned (and convinced me) that exercise and eating well make him feel better both emotionally and physically, and our friend Dave, who has lost more than 80 pounds during the time I have known him and who runs with Robbie every week. They’ve encouraged each other and inspired Dave’s wife, Jenn, and me to run, too.

Jenn and I are both up to two miles, and we have a team goal of running in a 5k this fall. (Dave and Robbie already run that distance regularly, but it’ll be a first for Jenn and me.) I always hated running—hated it. I really thought I couldn’t do it, or at least not for any significant distance. Even though I’m small, I have never been physically strong. I love cardio workouts, but I have always either participated in organized classes or used an elliptical or bike. I’m just not disciplined enough to stick with something like running…or so I thought.

I’m proud to say that I have been running three or four times a week. I’m running two miles on a regular basis, and in the next week or two I will add another half mile to that distance. I know many people run much, much farther than that and would probably consider two miles a warm-up, but it feels like a good distance for me. I want to be able to run the 5k, and then we’ll see. It might lead to more, or it might just be a solid, standard workout for me. Either way, it’s part of my reinvention, and I am fortunate to have good friends (and yes, good bad TV) to inspire and encourage me.

Luckily for us, Cameron was in the middle of moving from Louisiana to Madison, and didn’t have a client base in Wisconsin, yet. We met him at a little coffee shop in a strip mall off of I94, and we were immediately impressed with his work. His photojournalism style was exactly what we wanted—no stuffy family portraits for us. We hired him.

During our second meeting with Cameron, he brought Nazan, and that solidified it: We were fast friends. Robbie, Cameron, Nazan, and I could hardly concentrate on the wedding details. Forget reception photos—we wanted to talk politics and travel. Fortunately, Cameron is a professional, and, with Nazan as his second photographer, our wedding photos turned out fantastic.

That was three years ago, and we’ve managed to stay in touch. I have followed Cameron’s work on his blog, and Robbie has a unique knack for running into him and Nazan during the rare occasions they come to Milwaukee. We decided to meet them for a hike at Pewit’s Nest this past weekend, and that gave me the chance to corner Cameron for an interview.

(Side note: It’s intimidating to take a picture of a photographer! I gave it my best shot.)

Cameron was our wedding photographer, but his real passion is nature photography. In the following interview he talks about the challenges of transitioning to different types of photography and making a go of it in the art show world.

As a kid in northern Minnesota, I grew up thinking I wanted to become a National Geographic photographer. As with most everyone’s childhood dreams, that didn’t happen. More people play in the Super Bowl each year than shoot a story for National Geographic. So, I’m not at National Geographic, but I am doing the same kind of work and really enjoy it. I travel this amazing world we live in and bring back photos.

I studied photography at the Colorado Institute of Art, and from there I worked at the Greeley Tribune in Colorado. Then, I worked at the Naples Daily News in Florida—in total, I spent ten years as a newspaper photographer. After newspapers I freelanced in Louisiana for six years. Now, in Madison, I have been attempting to transition into fine art photography. For a little over a year I have been selling the work at art shows around the Midwest and in Florida.

My parents bought me a 35mm camera as a confirmation present, and that led me to becoming a photographer for the high school yearbook and newspaper. Photography was my ticket to fit in and be cool, and what else does a teenager care about? I was a geeky, skinny kid, and now I had a reason to go to the football games and pep rallies. Ever since then, photography has been my passport to get out and explore and experience our world.

I asked Cameron, what types of photography have you done? Which did you enjoy most?

Being a newspaper photographer, you do it all. You photograph everything from mundane, everyday life to riots. I’ve been on the sidelines photographing John Elway playing against Joe Montana on “Monday Night Football,” and I climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro in Africa with a group raising money for a children’s hospital in Florida. It’s a wide-ranging experience. What I really fell in love with was the Everglades, and the environmental issues surrounding that fascinating place, while working at the Naples Daily News in Florida.

How did your photography jobs or experiences help you find a niche?

Covering the Everglades is what really rekindled my love for the environment. I grew up on a farm in northern Minnesota, so my childhood experiences were seeing moose roam through the backyard and exploring the woods behind our house. In the Everglades, I became a kid again, exploring a new and exotic place.

What are you working on, currently?

The past two summers I’ve been doing more fine art nature photography and selling the work in art shows. I’ve had pretty limited success in the Midwest in the summer. Last winter I traveled to Florida to see how it would go over down there, and did a lot better. So, I’m going to continue doing several more Florida shows this winter. But next summer I’m going to have to wake up and smell the coffee and attempt to do more of the profitable things like weddings again. I’ll still do some art shows, but not as many.

Cameron expressed some pessimism about the future of selling his work at art shows. The ubiquitousness of and easy access to high-quality cameras, combined with web-based tools and platforms, have made it difficult for professional photographers to compete, both financially and, in the minds of customers, creatively.

The combination of digital photography and the web has made it harder for professional photographers in the real world to make a living with photography. Even making a living with weddings is becoming difficult. I’ve been a professional photographer for nearly twenty years, and the definition of “professional” means making a profit as well.  If you aren’t making a profit, you have a hobby.

Digital photography is a tool that has certainly made taking a properly exposed and in-focus photograph easier to do in the twenty-first century. But it’s not any easier today to take a good photograph now than it was twenty years ago. It still takes experience and skill. The camera is still just a tool. Nobody would ever say to Bruce Springsteen, “Wow, you must have a great guitar.” But I hear people say, “You must have a great camera,” all the time in my art show booth. I’m sure Springsteen does have a very nice guitar, but that is not what makes his music. I could buy the same guitar, but the noise I’d make with it would not be music.

Still, Cameron is determined to pursue what interests and fulfills him. He considers himself an accidental reinventor because his reinvention is driven more by circumstances than choice.

It’s challenging, no doubt, with the economy and the state of professional photography these days, but I’ve been pouring myself into taking great photographs for almost twenty years. It would be incredibly difficult to give up on that dream now.

I enjoyed my ten years as a newspaper photographer a great deal and wouldn’t take back a minute of it. It was a great experience, but I was starting to get frustrated with the corporate culture of newspapers, and I was tired of giving one hundred percent of my life to the newspaper. I wanted to get a life outside my job, date someone, get married, and be in control of my life. I met Nazan on an assignment in Louisiana, and it was love at first sight. After dating my airline for six months, I decided it was a good time to take the plunge and start freelancing. I finally had what I always wanted—someone to share my life with! I quit the paper and moved to Louisiana.

How did you decide to get into the art show business?

My original plan was to freelance for papers and magazines and start spending more time shooting my own work to someday start doing art shows with nature photography, which was my ultimate goal. When I first started working at the Naples Daily News, I covered some of the many art shows in the Naples area. I had no idea people actually made a living taking fine art photos and selling them at art shows. It seemed like the perfect job for me, and I thought, “Someday I’m going to do that!” I started shooting some nature photographs on my own time with art shows in mind, but of course there was never enough time for it. Freelancing would be my way of making the time to shoot more nature photography.

While he pursued his nature photography interest, Cameron continued to photograph weddings. His photojournalism style was somewhat of a novelty in the South and his business was very successful, but he was met with challenges in the Midwest.

Of course, I was realistic about money, so I was willing to do weddings as well. Weddings are good money, and photojournalism weddings were very in at the time. As things progressed in Louisiana, I did some very low-paying newspaper and magazine work, but the weddings really took off. It didn’t take long to realize I could make $2,500 in a day doing a wedding or $100 a day (or less) for editorial work. I never really intended to become a full-time wedding photographer, but it was paying the bills and actually paying down my mountain of debt. So, I made the decision to not turn down any weddings until my debt was paid. It’s not like it was my lifelong goal to be a weddings photographer; if you would have asked me when I was fifteen what I wanted to do with my life, wedding photographer wouldn’t have been on the list. I did get out of debt, even with the setbacks of Hurricane Katrina.  Then, Nazan got a job at the University of Wisconsin in Madison and we moved. I thought I’d continue with the weddings for a while, at least to get settled in Madison, and then start doing art shows.

Here’s where the reinvention started. As successful as I was with weddings in Louisiana, my wedding business never took off in Madison. I kept trying to get the wedding thing off the ground because I knew that was going to be my bridge to art shows. But the wedding market in Madison is much different than Louisiana, where my biggest selling point was that my posed photo session would last 25 minutes. In Wisconsin, the tradition is to spend several hours taking posed photos in multiple locations. My photojournalism approach just didn’t go over here like it did in Louisiana. 

I was making a pretty lousy profit with weddings here, and I decided that I might as well do something I was really passionate about. I started up the art show business much faster than I ever planned to. It probably was a blessing in disguise. Having the wedding business go down in flames sped up the progression of attempting to do art shows for a living.

Cameron describes his approach to change as follows:

If what you are doing isn’t working, try something else. There is a good saying… “Insanity is trying the same thing over and over again thinking you will get a different result.”

Cameron doesn’t regret his recent decision to focus on nature photography and the art shows. He considers it a reinvention, much like the other times in his life when circumstance and the need to make money precipitated life changes—times that bear a striking resemblance to the uncertainty and trepidation he feels now.

As a photographer, your personal life and professional life are very intertwined. I AM a photographer. There isn’t much separation. Although, as a freelancer, fine art photographer—whatever you call me now—I do enjoy living life at my own pace. I probably work more hours in a week than the average person, but I do find time to go for long walks in the park and take naps whenever I feel like it. It’s great! I’d have a real hard time punching a clock again for some corporation.

These days, I do feel a lot like I did when I was out of art school trying to get a newspaper job. After graduating I applied to something like twenty paid internships at newspapers and got shot down by every one of them. That was a long, depressing summer. Luckily, the Greeley Tribune gave me an unpaid internship that fall (I later found out I was the only one who applied). I gave it my all, and that led to a paid internship, then a part-time job, and then a full-time job. I’m hoping determination pays off again in succeeding in the art show business. But when you are older and wiser, you do worry a lot more about it.

What’s next for Cameron?

I’m going to keep working on the art shows, but also put more energy back into weddings in the summer. My current idea is to hire a portrait photographer for weddings so I can spend more time on the wedding day focusing on what I do best—photojournalism. This way, the brides get the best of both worlds: the posed photos as well as great moment-driven photography, which is what I love to do.

With the Florida art shows, I’m going to just keep doing what I’m doing, add more shows to my calendar, and spend more shooting time in the Everglades. I seem to have a good recipe for success there, and I’m really excited about it. That is the bright spot in my career right now. If it continues to go well, I will be able to spend more time in the place I love: the Everglades. A good way to spend a month or two in winter! Nazan flies down and spends a week with me at some point, so we get some time together as well.

It seems like nature photography isn’t going to ever sell that well at Midwestern art shows. But I don’t mind trying new things.  I am considering completely changing what I shoot and how I shoot it. I have lots of ideas, and it’s going to be fun to go back to the drawing board again. Who knows where that will take me?

I guess what this all boils down to is the struggle that every creative professional deals with: finding that delicate balance between profits and staying true to your creative spirit. It’s getting harder than ever to be a creative professional and still do what makes you happy. The only way to stay afloat is to keep reinventing.

I think there are two ingredients to success—hard work and the ability to critique yourself. I don’t mean patting yourself on the back when you do a good job, but being able to say to yourself, “Something didn’t work out. What will I do different next time?” Hard work by itself doesn’t get you there. You have to be able to look in the mirror. I heard someone say once that you achieve success through a string of failures. So, that must mean I’m at least part of the way there by now.

Learn more about Cameron and check out his photographs on his web site. You can also follow his adventures on his blog, Quiet Places.

Cameron and Nazan.