NaBloPoMo Month - "Regional Edition - Local Style"

NaBloPoMo Month - "Regional Edition - Local Style"
Entry #14 - 11/14/2013

I receive a daily email from a blog title "The Daily Blog" with a prompt for a blog posting each morning. Sometimes I use the prompt suggestion, some days I modify it to fit my own idea of what I want to write about and some days I take "photographers" section and make it a blog post. Okay, technically I haven't done the latter ever...but I'm changing that today.

 

The photographer prompt for today was - local. So I decided to drive around town since I had the day off from work and take my camera with me. If you follow me on Instagram you've often seen some of my handy work with my iPhone. But today I took out the big camera that I purchased when I lived in Reno and drove around the Oklahoma countryside and through Stillwater.

 

Stillwater is a city in north-central Oklahoma and it the county seat of Payne County. In 2012, the city population was estimated at 46,560 and in 2010 CNN Money Magazine named it amongst the 100 top places to live. The nickname for the city is "Cowboy Country" due in part to the university that's located here - Oklahoma State University.

 

Today's trip doesn't begin to encompass everything that makes up Stillwater, but rather a small portion of my background and how Stillwater compares.

 

 

Stillwater at the moment is home. The picture below left is my current home and below right is my first apartment when I returned to Stillwater in 2006. Little did I know how much Stillwater was going to impact who was, where I had come from and what I would do with my life. When I left Stillwater in 2008 I was a completely different person than when I returned five years later in 2013.

 

For me Oklahoma State University and Eskimo Joe's will ever be tied together, because it is impossible for me to think of one and not think of the other. From the first time I set foot on the campus of OSU in November 2001 I knew that I wanted to partake in the allure that it had to offer. Have there been moments of regrets, absolutely...but without coming to OSU and Stillwater to live for the first time in August 2002, I honestly don't know what path my life would have taken. Everything happens for a reason, people have told me before, and while I used to hate hearing that, because it was usually said in one of the worst moments of my life...I'm beginning to see the truth in that.

 

 

I grew up in the country. Surrounded by open fields and blue skies...just like the one pictured above. And while I could never see myself country living again, unless it was on a Texas ranch named Southfork, I do appreciate the throwback to a time gone by when I see these things on a daily basis. Yes I loved living in the cities and will most assuredly continue to live in cities - but there is something about looking out across pastures that makes you appreciate Oklahoma for what it is. And there is the lakes...here's the thing about Stillwater, until recently I didn't really know where Lake McCurtry was in Stillwater, because I never wanted to know. My dad loved the lakes...he loved the water...he loved to fish and for the better part of fifteen, nearly sixteen years now I have avoided with great passion such places. But as life often does, new memories can be made that makes once appreciate such places - and as such the lake. It was great moment to drive out there today and photograph the water.

 

Hope you've enjoyed my photo essay/blog. Until next time...ciao bella!